Lectures in Jewish History and Thought. No hard questions, please.
What, exactly is Chanukah (or is it Hanukah, or Hannukkah)? This short video describes the historical origins of the holiday, notes the ironic nature of its observance in the American context, and has a couple of jokes besides. Suggested Holiday Gifts (Maybe for people you don’t especially like). Many titles available […]
Read More What is Chanukah, and How Do You Spell it? This Week in Jewish HistoryBrief video highlighting the life and work of Rabbi Israel Meir Kagan (1838-1936), one of the most influential Rabbis of the 20th century. Better known as the Chofetz Chaim (*one who desires life,” taken from Psalm 34).
Read More The Chofetz Chaim (This Week in Jewish History)Please visit https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/464044 and enter coupon code YT52E (Expires October 19, 2014). Please click here for excepts and supporting videos.
Read More Free Download of The Kabbalah of Forgiveness (Expires October 19, 2014)Rabbi Moshe Isserles was an exceptionally important Polish Jew of the 16th century. His commentary on the Code of Jewish Law brought Sephardic and Ashkenazic Jewry together to an unprecedented degree, and established the ascendancy of Polish Jewry over the older German community.
Read More Rabbi Moshe Isserles (The Rema) This Week in Jewish HistorySarah Schenirer (1883-1935) founded the Bais Yaakov (Bet Ya’akov) school system for women. One of the most visionary educators of the twentieth century, her movement had global impact. To view the Prezi associated with this lecture, please click here.
Read More Sarah Schenirer and the Revolution in Jewish Education for Women (This Week in Jewish History)This lecture briefly covers the rise of mass Jewish politics at the turn of the 20th century, looking at the rise of Jewish Socialism, Zionism, and other movements. Part of the Essential Lectures in Jewish History series available at http://www.jewishhistorylectures.org. To view the Prezi associated with this lecture, please click here.
Read More Mass Jewish Politics in the Modern Era (Essential Lectures in Jewish History)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.”
Read More L.L. Zamenhof and Esperanto (This Week in Jewish History)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 […]
Read More Origins of Polish Jewry (This Week in Jewish History)Vladimir Ze’ev Jabotinsky (1880-1940) was one of the most influential political thinkers in the first half of the twentieth century, founder of the Revisionist movement.
Read More Vladimir Ze’ev Jabotinsky (This Week in Jewish History)Officially banned in 1479, no Jews lived in the Russian Empire until Tsarina Catherine II conquered a major portion of Polish territory, instantly inheriting the largest single concentration of Jews in the world. Under her rule the Pale of Settlement was established, determining the region where Jews were allowed to reside, however tenuously, until the […]
Read More The Pale of Settlement (This Week in Jewish History)