Lectures in Jewish History and Thought. No hard questions, please.
Nahmanides (Rabbi Moshe ben Nahman, or Ramban) was one of the most important thinkers of Jewish history. Brilliantly creative and intellectually courageous, his commentary on the Torah is widely studied eight centuries after his passing. Part of the Jewish Biography as History series by Dr. Henry Abramson.
American-born Henrietta Szold was an extremely influential Zionist leader and organizer, founder of Hadassah, the Women’s Zionist Organization of America.
To view the Prezi associated with this video, click here.
Nicholas Donin was an erstwhile Talmudic scholar who converted to Christianity and made a career of denouncing the Talmud. His charges, brought before the Pope, resulted in a massive destruction of priceless Jewish manuscripts in Paris, 1242. Part of the Jewish Biography as History lecture series by Dr. Henry Abramson.
![Jews in Synagogue, 15th c. Mantua, Italy. (Codex Rossianus 555, fol. 12v) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons](https://henryabramson.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/synagogue_cod-_rossian-_555.jpg?w=736)
Yocheved was the daughter of one of Judaism’s greatest scholars: Rabbi Shlomo Yitzhaki, better known as Rashi. A fascinating woman in her own right, this lecture will survey some of the references to Yocheved (and her illustrious sisters) and what light this sheds on the history of medieval Jewish women.
![Sephardic Migrations. By Universal Life (http://michel.azaria.free.fr/History.htm) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)], via Wikimedia Commons](https://henryabramson.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/sepharadic_migrations.jpg?w=736)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1OnArXdHQdc
L.L. Zamenhof (1859-1917) was a Polish Jew who invented the world’s most successful artificial language, Esperanto. Conceived as a vehicle for world peace, Esperanto is even regarded by the Oomoto religion of Japan as the “language of heaven.”
This week marks the death anniversary of King Boleslaw V (The Chaste) in 1279. Boleslaw followed the tradition of his predecessors in Poland by creating incentives for Jewish settlement in Poland, including the establishment of Magdeburg Recht. Ultimately, these policies proved extremely attractive to Ashkenazi Jews from the Rhineland, making Poland a great center of Jewish civilization by the early modern period.
![By Sol Podolefsky, Di geshikhte fun di Kazarn un zeyer ideshe meluche in tsentrel Eyrope. New York: Rokhman, 1971. Page 148 (http://www.khazaria.com/sarkel.html) [CC0], via Wikimedia Commons](https://henryabramson.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/sarkbric.jpg?w=736)
Henry Abramson 