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.
God’s Gifts
My most pious songs have I written
On rising from my sinful bed.
God has given me a wealth of sins,
And God alone has saved me from my sins.
Translated by David Soeterndorp.
Free Love
I do not believe in free love.
There is legal marriage, an institution based on ideas and pretenses.
A legally married wife you can divorce, but where will you run away from free love?
As for…
Holy Grandmothers in Jerusalem
Holy grandmothers in Jerusalem,
May your virtue protect me.
The smell of blossoms and blooming orchards
I suckled with my mother’s milk.
Feet soft as hands, fumbling
In the torrid sand,
And tousled…
The Lithuanian Yeshivas
These students, who poured into the Yeshivah from near and far, what were they seeking? And what was the Yeshivah seeking to give them? Did the students undertake to complete their course work at…
We Polish Jews
“All right,” someone will say, “granted you are a Pole. But in that case, why ‘we jews’?” To which I answer: because of blood “Then racialism again?” No, not racialism at all. Quite the contrary.
Th…
First Address to the Knesset
It is with a feeling of deep reverence and consecration that I rise to open the Constituent Assembly of the State of Israel, the first Knesset Israel of our time in this eternal…
Notes to an Old–New Debate
Many people believe that the question of “the mingling of the diasporas” will be resolved in the workplace, in the mixed neighborhood, in school, etc. oriental [Mizrahi] Jews, they say, who acquire…
Eulogy for Roi Rotberg
Yesterday morning Roi was murdered. He was lulled by the quiet of the spring morning and did not notice those lying in wait in the furrow.
Today, let us not cast aspersions at the murderers. How can…
Sands of Gold
It was noon and a small boy lay on the couch in the room. The woolly coverlet prickled his back, making him toss about uncomfortably. His eyes roved across the ceiling and down the blank walls to the…
The Escape
All that had happened to him lay behind him like a yawning abyss. There was a strange excitement for him in his adjustment, an intoxication beyond fear. His movements were untrammeled, and as a result…
We Left Slowly
We left slowly. The night was pale.
In the distance the lights flickered.
And you were all loveliness like your two eyes
With tears cupped in them.
The jackal howled as you went to the vineyard
You…
The Sun and I
We wore each other out today
the sun and I
working in the vineyard.
The sun dropped behind the mountain
exhausted, red,
and burning hot
I was left alone.
We were both
a little overheated
today,
the…