וְעַתָּ֗ה אֲלֵיכֶ֛ם הַמִּצְוָ֥ה הַזֹּ֖את הַכֹּהֲנִֽים

And now, O priests, this charge is for you: 

אִם־לֹ֣א תִשְׁמְע֡וּ וְאִם־לֹא֩ תָשִׂ֨ימוּ עַל־לֵ֜ב לָתֵ֧ת כָּב֣וֹד לִשְׁמִ֗י אָמַר֙ יְהוָ֣ה צְבָא֔וֹת וְשִׁלַּחְתִּ֤י בָכֶם֙ אֶת־הַמְּאֵרָ֔ה וְאָרוֹתִ֖י אֶת־בִּרְכֽוֹתֵיכֶ֑ם וְגַם֙ אָרוֹתִ֔יהָ כִּ֥י אֵינְכֶ֖ם שָׂמִ֥ים עַל־לֵֽב

Unless you obey and unless you lay it to heart, and do honor to My name—said the LORD of Hosts—I will send a curse and turn your blessings into curses. (Indeed, I have turned them into curses, because you do not lay it to heart.)

הִנְנִ֨י גֹעֵ֤ר לָכֶם֙ אֶת־הַזֶּ֔רַע וְזֵרִ֤יתִי פֶ֙רֶשׁ֙ עַל־פְּנֵיכֶ֔ם פֶּ֖רֶשׁ חַגֵּיכֶ֑ם וְנָשָׂ֥א אֶתְכֶ֖ם אֵלָֽיו

I will put your seed under a ban, and I will strew dung upon your faces, the dung of your festal sacrifices, and you shall be carried out to its [heap]. 

Malachi 2:1-3

(Sefaria)

Yehoshua Pfeffer

"What must a Jew believe", Dayan Yehoshua Pfeffer (1)

Moabe

Inscribed late 9th or early 8th century BCE altar that was discovered in a Moabite sanctuary at the Khirbat Ataruz site in central Jordan in 2010

David Berman

"Darkness and Cold", Purple Mountains

The light of my life is going out tonight
As the sun sinks in the west
The light of my life is going out tonight
With someone she just met
She kept it burning longer than I had right to expect
The light of my life is going out tonight
Without a flicker of regret

Darkness and cold, darkness and cold
(Darkness and cold, darkness and cold)
Rolled in through the holes in the stories I told
Conditions I'm wishing weren't taking control
Darkness and cold, darkness and cold

The light of my life is going out tonight
And she don't look too depressed
The light of my life is going out tonight
In a pink champagne Corvette
I sleep three feet above the street
In a Band-Aid pink Chevette
The light of my life is going out tonight
Without a flicker of regret

Darkness and cold, darkness and cold
(Darkness and cold, darkness and cold)
Rolled in through the holes in the stories I told
Conditions I'm wishing weren't taking control
Darkness and cold, darkness and cold

Darkness and cold, darkness and cold
(Darkness and cold, darkness and cold)
Patiently encroaching on the animal
The weather of forever retaking control
Darkness and cold, darkness and cold

Darkness and cold, darkness and cold
(Darkness and cold, darkness and cold)
Rolled in through the holes in the stories I told
Conditions I'm wishing weren’t taking control
Darkness and cold, darkness and cold

Darkness and cold, darkness and cold

Vida

A bald eagle is pictured perched in a tree in Baddeck, Nova Scotia, Canada

Steven Weinberg

"What's the matter with Quantum Mechanics?" (2016)

Rembrandt

"David with the head of Goliath before Saul" (1627)

Israel Knohl

"Isaiah V. Deuteronomy - Hebrew Bible: Between Universalism & Nationalism"

Adriano

Bust of the Emperor Hadrian Publius Aelius Hadrianus

Jacob van Ruisdael

"The Jewish Cemetery" (1650s)

Vida

 

Najin, one of the last two northern white rhinos on the planet, in her enclosure at Ol Pejeta Conservancy, Kenya

Rembrandt

"Haman before Esther"

Jared Diamond

"Upheaval" (2019)

Alan Mittleman

"Twentieth Century Perspectives" (2)

Kafka

"Three Runners" (1913)

Yiddish

"The Homecoming of Yiddish to Israel", Ruth Wisse

"Fiddler: A Miracle of Miracles" de Max Lewkowicz

Trailer

Vida

 

A cicada rests on a pine tree during the heat of summer in Valbonne in the south of France

Charles Krauthammer

"Decline is a Choice" (2009)

Auto de fé

 

 "Saint Dominic presiding over an Auto-da-fe", Pedro Berruguete (1499)

וַיֹּ֨אמֶר מֹשֶׁ֜ה אֶל־הָֽאֱלֹהִ֗ים הִנֵּ֨ה אָנֹכִ֣י בָא֮ אֶל־בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵל֒ וְאָמַרְתִּ֣י לָהֶ֔ם אֱלֹהֵ֥י אֲבוֹתֵיכֶ֖ם שְׁלָחַ֣נִי אֲלֵיכֶ֑ם וְאָֽמְרוּ־לִ֣י מַה־שְּׁמ֔וֹ מָ֥ה אֹמַ֖ר אֲלֵהֶֽם

Moses said to God, “When I come to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is His name?’ what shall I say to them?” 

וַיֹּ֤אמֶר אֱלֹהִים֙ אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֔ה אֶֽהְיֶ֖ה אֲשֶׁ֣ר אֶֽהְיֶ֑ה וַיֹּ֗אמֶר כֹּ֤ה תֹאמַר֙ לִבְנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל אֶֽהְיֶ֖ה שְׁלָחַ֥נִי אֲלֵיכֶֽם

And God said to Moses, “Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh.” He continued, “Thus shall you say to the Israelites, ‘Ehyeh sent me to you.’” 

Exodus 3, 13-14

(Sefaria)

Samuel Heilman

"Chasidic Judaism In America Today!", Samuel Heilman

Toledo

The "El Transito" Synagogue in Toledo, Spain (1357)

Steven Pinker

"The Better Angels of Our Nature: A History of Violence and Humanity" (2013)

Vida

A Philippine eagle in a sanctuary in Davao city, Philippines. 

The bird, one of the largest and most powerful in the world, is endangered by deforestation and hunting

Carl Burgos

"The Human Torch" (1939)

Vespasiano

"Vespasian Victory" (75 CE)

To celebrate their triumph over Jerusalem, the Romans produced a huge issue of commemorative coins, known as Judaea Capta (Judea captured). 
These coins depict the Emperor Vespasian; Titus, the general who conquered Jerusalem and later became emperor in 79 C.E.; and personifications of a defeated Judea as a mourning Jewess.
 

Alan Mittleman

"Twentieth Century Perspectives" (1)

"Our Boys"

Promo | HBO

Thomas Mann

Thomas Mann's condemnation of antisemitism (1942)

כִּ֤י יְבִֽיאֲךָ֙ יְהוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֔יךָ אֶל־הָאָ֕רֶץ אֲשֶׁר־אַתָּ֥ה בָא־שָׁ֖מָּה לְרִשְׁתָּ֑הּ וְנָשַׁ֣ל גּֽוֹיִם־רַבִּ֣ים ׀ מִפָּנֶ֡יךָ הַֽחִתִּי֩ וְהַגִּרְגָּשִׁ֨י וְהָאֱמֹרִ֜י וְהַכְּנַעֲנִ֣י וְהַפְּרִזִּ֗י וְהַֽחִוִּי֙ וְהַיְבוּסִ֔י שִׁבְעָ֣ה גוֹיִ֔ם רַבִּ֥ים וַעֲצוּמִ֖ים מִמֶּֽךָּ

When the LORD your God brings you to the land that you are about to enter and possess, and He dislodges many nations before you—the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites, seven nations much larger than you— 

וּנְתָנָ֞ם יְהוָ֧ה אֱלֹהֶ֛יךָ לְפָנֶ֖יךָ וְהִכִּיתָ֑ם הַחֲרֵ֤ם תַּחֲרִים֙ אֹתָ֔ם לֹא־תִכְרֹ֥ת לָהֶ֛ם בְּרִ֖ית וְלֹ֥א תְחָנֵּֽם

and the LORD your God delivers them to you and you defeat them, you must doom them to destruction: grant them no terms and give them no quarter. 

Deuteronomy 7:1-2

(Sefaria)

Babilónia

 

An earring found during an excavation at Mount Zion is cited as evidence of Babylonian conquest of city in 586 BCE

Reuven Hammer ע״ה

Vida

 

Newly hatched loggerhead turtles (Caretta caretta) make their way to the sea at Cirali Beach in Kemer district Antalya, Turkey

Purple Mountains

"All My Happiness is Gone"

"Friends are warmer than gold when you're old
And keeping them is harder than you might suppose
Lately, I tend to make strangers wherever I go
Some of them were once people I was happy to know

Mounting mileage on the dash
Double darkness falling fast
I keep stressing, pressing on
Way deep down at some substratum
Feels like something really wrong has happened
And I confess I'm barely hanging on

All my happiness is gone
All my happiness is gone
It's all gone somewhere beyond
All my happiness is gone

Ten thousand afternoons ago
All my happiness just overflowed
That was life at first and goal to go
Me and you and us and them
And all those people way back when
All our hardships were just yardsticks then, you know
You know

It's not the purple hills
It's not the silver lakes
It's not the snowcloud shadowed interstates
It's not the icy bike chain rain of Portland, Oregon
Where nothing's wrong and no one's asking
But the fear's so strong it leaves you gasping
No way to last out here like this for long

'Cause everywhere I go, I know
Everywhere I go, I know

All my happiness is gone
All my happiness is gone
It's all gone somewhere beyond
All my happiness is gone"

Samuel Bak

"Passing"

David Berman ע״ה

Tisha B'Av

"Destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem", Francesco Hayez (1867)

Kafka

National Library archival expert and Humanities Collection Curator Stefan Litt shows drawings by novelist Franz Kafka, during a press conference in the National Library of Israel in Jerusalem, on August 7, 2019. Hundreds of letters, manuscripts, journals, notebooks, sketches and more - handwritten by Brod and Kafka - have been transferred to the National Library of Israel, following orders by Israeli and Swiss courts to open vaults in Zurich, which had stored the materials for decades. These materials, part of Max Brod's literary estate, have now been returned to Israel and have arrived at the National Library in Jerusalem, in accordance with Brod's wishes. 

 

Maimónides

"Rambam's Guide for the Perplexed on the Seder Night", Rabbi Jonathan Sacks

Vida

A tiger cooling in water in Ranthambore national park, India

Tisha b'Av

"Tisha b'Av - The Miracle of Jewish Memory", Rabbi Meir Soloveichik

Amsterdão

Illustration of a Portuguese Jewish funeral in Amsterdam, Bernard Picart (18th-century)

וְאָמַרְתָּ֖ אֶל־פַּרְעֹ֑ה כֹּ֚ה אָמַ֣ר יְהוָ֔ה בְּנִ֥י בְכֹרִ֖י יִשְׂרָאֵֽל

Then you shall say to Pharaoh, ‘Thus says the LORD: Israel is My first-born son. 

וָאֹמַ֣ר אֵלֶ֗יךָ שַׁלַּ֤ח אֶת־בְּנִי֙ וְיַֽעַבְדֵ֔נִי וַתְּמָאֵ֖ן לְשַׁלְּח֑וֹ הִנֵּה֙ אָנֹכִ֣י הֹרֵ֔ג אֶת־בִּנְךָ֖ בְּכֹרֶֽךָ  

I have said to you, “Let My son go, that he may worship Me,” yet you refuse to let him go. Now I will slay your first-born son.’” 

Exodus 4:22-23

Masada

"Karaim"

Antissemitismo

Rabbi Sacks on worldwide antisemitism (House of Lords, 20th June 2019)

Vida

Sage grouse

Aarão

The Tomb of Aaron the High Priest in Jordan

Marrocos

Temple Beth-El in Casablanca, Morocco

Salomão

"The Judgment of Solomon", Valentin de Boulogne (1625)

רָאִ֥יתִי עֲבָדִ֖ים עַל־סוּסִ֑ים וְשָׂרִ֛ים הֹלְכִ֥ים כַּעֲבָדִ֖ים עַל־הָאָֽרֶץ

I have seen slaves on horseback, and nobles walking on the ground like slaves. 

Ecclesiastes 19:7