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.
Midos
A Jewish WeddingDeep in fields the klezmers can be heardDriving horses foaming at the mouth,Relatives, both poor and rich, arriveTo Reb Sane’s daughter’s wedding feast. [ . . . ]But from a room where…
The Discreet Charm of Zionism
There are now 157 or 162 independent states in the world, both new and old. The vast majority of them are under the sway of oppressive regimes, slavery, mass-brainwashing, ruler-worship: in one way or…
The Explosion on Ahalan Street
The explosion was on the first day of the Passover vacation.The minimarket across from our house was already closed when suddenly a deafening bolt of thunder could be heard, rolling down the…
Under This Blazing Light
So what do storytellers do? The ones I like operate more or less like tribal witchdoctors.
Here is a little story for you. Nine thousand six hundred and six years ago, in a…
Facing Reality: Lessons from Jeremiah, the Destruction of the Second Temple, and Bar Kochba’s Rebellion
Is the Jewish existence so hollow and frail that it took hundreds of thousands of human victims in order to consolidate it, as the claim that the Bar Kochba rebellion ensured our continuity would seem…
May Women Wear Tefillin?
A recent discussion of our question concludes as follows:
In conclusion, women are not permitted under any circumstances to wear tefillin. In view of the fact that the Rema, the…
The Essence of Baseball Explained for Non-Sportsmen
Illustration of a baseball diamond in a short primer on the game of baseball published in the summer of 1909 in the Yiddish-daily Forverts (Forward). Some of the words in the picture are…
Almanac for the Year 5675
This calendar, Almanac for the Year 5675: Souvenir der Hochschule Bar Iochai und Altenhaus in Miron, was probably a fundraising giveaway for an old-age home and for the high school that Eliezer Ya…
Phat’hi’s Treasure
I stood outside the grocery, holding a shopping bag in one hand, and Phat’hi’s strange “letter” in the other. I looked at the drawings of the car, the clock, and the sign over…
Against the Apocalypse: Responses to Catastrophe in Modern Jewish Culture
Gathering the sources was a modern way of closing ranks, of reaffirming the essential unity of Jewish experience as one vale of tears through space and time. The harder the times, the more desperately…
Tin Soldiers on Jerusalem Beach
On a very hot summer’s day, at noon, I am in the kibbutz in which both my father, who died in 1972, and my brother-in-law, who was killed in the…
Genealogies of Two Wandering Hebrew Melodies
It is well known that tunes of songs, no less than their texts, often provide an historical mirror of an exceedingly sharp focus. A special category of such songs are the so- called “migrating” or…