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.
Home! Home?
After surviving the war, Miklós Adler returned to his hometown of Debrecen and created sixteen woodcuts, signing them Ben Binyamin (“son of Benjamin”) in honor of his father. In this woodcut…
East End, London
In 1950, when this photograph was taken, much of London’s East End was in ruins, the result of heavy bombing during World War II. Its glory days as a vibrant Jewish immigrant community were over, and…
The Present Crisis of American Jewry
America has, in less than one generation, become the second largest center of the Jewish Diaspora, and bids fair to become the first, instead of the second, within another generation. No other country…
Hand-Washing Basin
Before the priestly blessing is recited in the synagogue, those making the blessing ritually wash their hands. It is also customary for Jews to wash their hands before entering a synagogue for worship…
Postage Stamp
When the company owned by Jacob Abraham Jesurun (1806–1875) obtained a contract for mail delivery within the Caribbean in 1867, it had its own stamps printed featuring the firm’s initials, J. A. J. &…
The Book of Leviticus, Translated and Explained
The present commentary on Leviticus is based on my lectures on Leviticus given at the Rabbinical Seminary in Berlin in 1873/4 and 1876/7. This fact explains the approach and the economy of my…
On the Question of All Questions Concerning the Settling of the Land
The Arab Question—with which the youngsters born in this Land have been familiar for many years, and because of which they were subject to disgrace and ridicule by the prominent men within the Yishuv…
Memories of the Meldar: An Ottoman Jew’s Early Education
Did you go to a meldar as a child? Have any of you been so lucky and blessed? I am sure that, seeing these two questions, you will all object that you had no idea what a meldar was and that you went…
Social Hygiene of the Jews
For Jews, social hygiene embraces the entire domain of religious laws and customs of Judaism on maintaining the purity and health of the body. These traditions partially, and certainly at their core…
Interpolation of the Sokolover Rebbe
The [Babylonian] Talmud in tractate Sanhedrin [109b] brings a statement that when a stranger came to the city of Sodom, he would be placed on a bed. Someone who was taller than the bed would have his…
The Dance of the Demons
Meanwhile Reb Zalman, all undeterred, was arranging a match for Deborah, and one evening he arrived with a brand new proposal, one that was—in these hard modern times—almost too good to…