Sample Sources
The sources below are those contained in our three curated collections—covering themes of Passover, Gender Roles, and Holocaust Resistance. They represent a fraction of the thousands of sources that will be available when the full site launches in 2024.
The Lonely Man of Faith
It is not the plan of this essay to discuss the millennium-old problem of faith and reason. I want instead to focus attention on a human-life situation in which the man of faith as an individual…
Courtesy, or Rules of Comportment
As I write these words it occurs to me that, since it is the woman who runs the household, she must have wide knowledge and be a good manager. For many centuries our nation ignored women’s education…
Judaism and Its History
There are facts of such an overwhelming power that even the most stubborn opinion must yield to them. Such a fact is the origin of Judaism in the midst of rude surroundings, like a vigorous…
A Few Words Concerning Literary Criticism
Admittedly, it is true that all our hearts will be filled with feelings of astonishment when we recall the giant steps that the new generation has taken upon the peaks of the sciences and forms of…
Prayer book
This siddur from Greece contains the prayers of the Romaniote (Greek-speaking Jewish) community of the eastern Mediterranean. It is open at a piyyut (liturgical poem) called “God’s Beloved Daughter,”…
Jewish Clothing from Fürth
In 1705, the Nuremberg artist, Johannes Alexander Böner, published a slim volume about Fürth, Germany, containing several copper-engravings dealing with the life of Jews in the city. This print…
Silver circumcision plate
This silver plate from Padua, Italy, was made for use in the brit milah, the circumcision ritual celebrated when a baby boy is eight days old. In this detailed depiction of the ritual, the baby seems…
The Order of Grace after Meals
This page from a birkon (Grace after Meals) is an example of the work of Aaron Wolf Herlingen (Aaron Schreiber), a prominent eighteenth-century scribe and artist known for his illustrated Grace after…
Jewish Men’s and Women’s Clothing in Worms (Tracht der Juden zu Worms)
The illustrations Tracht der Juden zu Worms (Jewish Men’s and Women’s Clothing in Worms) show a man and woman in typical Jewish fashion of the sixteenth century. The woman wears a white veil and…
Self-Portrait of Abraham ben Shabbetai Kohen
Kehunat Avraham (The Priesthood of Abraham), published in Venice in 1719, is an interpretation and retelling of sections from the book of Psalms in verse. This portrait of its author, Abraham ben…
Medical Diploma of Emanuel Colli from the University of Padua
This diploma of Doctor of Medicine was awarded to Emanuel Colli by the University of Padua, Italy. Designed as a small, illuminated book, its four leaves are decorated with floral borders, and include…
