Really looking forward seeing my friends at YILC!

Lectures in Jewish History and Thought. No hard questions, please.





A presentation of the life of Golda Meir (1898-1978), spanning her immigration to Israel in 1921 through the end of her term as the fourth Prime Minister of Israel in 1974. The lecture will discuss the foundations of the Yishuv, the pre-state Jewish community, and touch on the major social and military conflicts that Israel…

Evgenia Ginzburg (1904-1977) was a Jewish woman who endured the horrors of the Stalinist Gulag. Charged and convicted of anti-Soviet activity in 1937, she was sent to the infamous work camps of Siberia for nearly two decades until her case was reviewed two years after Stalin’s death. She was ultimately rehabilitated, and published her memoirs…

An examination of the life and work of Emanuel Ringelblum (1900-1944), the heroic Polish scholar who organized the underground Oneg Shabbat society in the Warsaw Ghetto. Ringelblum recognized the extreme and unprecedented nature of the Nazi onslaught early in the war, and brought together a group of highly dedicated volunteers who recorded every aspect of…
Part I: Part II: Part III: Solomon Mikhoels (1890-1948) was one of the most prominent actors and directors in early Soviet Russia. His career coincides with the brief flourishing of Yiddish culture under the policy of korenizatsiia, or “indiginization,” when the Communist authorities sought to develop folk culture as a means of developing loyalty to the…

Shimon Dubnow (1860-1941), a noted historian and activist whose theories of Jewish survival in the diaspora were extremely influential in the shaping Jewish identity in the modern world, from the future of Russian Jewry to the establishment of the modern Federation movement in the United States. Dubnow’s scholarship was inextricably intertwined with the effort to…
Moses Mendelssohn was a hugely influential thinker in 18th-century Germany. An unusually gifted intellect, he became the primary spokesperson for the emancipation of Jews in the 18th century, and his cause was championed by many non-Jewish liberals of the era. Heralded as the founder of the Reform movement even though Mendelssohn himself maintained an observant…

Nathan of Hanover is best known for his moving chronicle of the Khmel’nyts’kyi (Chmielnicki) Rebellion. Entitled Yeven Metsulah (“The Abyss of Despair”), it records with remarkable fairness the social, political, economic and religious background of the mid-17th century Ukrainian movement against the Poles, along with the horrible pogroms perpetrated in the context of that violent…

Here’s the Torahcafe.com edited version, in one piece, with the PPTs integrated. A little easier to watch.

This lecture was sponsored by Eva Zack de Waiser and Aliza Abramson.

This lecture is sponsored by Mr. Daniel Sommer. The TorahCafe.com people later edited this video very nicely, although for some reason they keep removing my opening joke! Still, it’s great to have the PowerPoints integrated into the video, so here’s a slightly different version for your enjoyment. Click on the icon below for the…
Correction: the reference in the lecture was to the Pittsburgh Platform (not the Philadelphia Platform). Even that, however, was a mistake: I was thinking of the 1883 Cincinatti “Trefa Banquet.” Thank you for the clarification, Menachem!
Lecture sponsored by Young Israel of Bal Harbour
Lecture Sponsored by Judy Seed
Lecture sponsored by Joe and Zohara Weiss
Rabbi Yosef Karo: The Kabbalah of Halakhah Delivered at the Young Israel of Bal Harbour, January 25, 2012. Lecture sponsored by Menachem Sternbaum, Susan Leaventon, and an anonymous donor. Correction: it wasn’t Rothschild after all, it was the Duke of Naxos. Update: The nice people over at TorahCafe took this video and improved it considerably.…
Welcome to the new website for Hillel Abramson‘s Lecture Series in Jewish History at Young Israel of Bal Harbour! This site will feature information on the series, and host video recordings of the lectures. We encourage you to sign up for our Email Newsletter below, which is our principal way of letting participants know what’s…