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10 treasures from the New York Public Library’s 125-year-old Jewish collection
(New York Jewish Week) – In the heart of Manhattan, you can page through the Passover story in an Italian haggadah from half a century ago, check out the posters for the most popular Yiddish plays of the 1920s and examine dried flower arrangements from the Holy Land made at the end of the 19th century.
Opened just two years after the New York Public Library itself, the Dorot Jewish Division of the New York Public Library is celebrating its 125th anniversary this year.
Today the collection, housed in the library’s main building on Fifth Ave., boasts over 250,000 materials from all over the world, with the earliest ones dating back to the 13th century.
“People don’t realize the amount of depth we have in this collection chronologically and geographically and it is still growing,” said Lyudmila Sholokhova, the curator of the collection. “I think we have been too modest about what we have here — this library is for everybody and the community needs to know that.”
To celebrate its 125th birthday and spread the word, the Dorot Jewish Division is putting some of its favorite materials on display for an event with librarians, scholars and writers from around the country to discuss the history of Dorot, and its future, on Wednesday, Dec. 14. The event is in person and online.
That history dates to November 1897, when banker and philanthropist Jacob Schiff donated $10,000 to the New York Public Library for the purchase of “Semitic literature” and the hiring of a curator of a Jewish division in the library. Schiff ended up donating $115,000 (nearly $4 million today) over the course of his lifetime.
The head librarian position went to bibliographer and historian Abraham Solomon Freidus, who immigrated to New York from Latvia in 1889. Under his watch, the newly established Jewish Division became a prominent research and reference center for Jewish scholars all over the world. A reading room dedicated to the Jewish Division, where scholars have researched everything from a study of Jews and chocolate to a history of Jewish women in theater, has remained in active use at the library since 1911.
Sholokhova came to the NYPL in 2020 after nearly 20 years working as a librarian at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research. Part of her mission is to showcase the collection to the public and help bring awareness to the library’s extensive resources.
Through most of its history, the Dorot Jewish Division was used as a reference site while scholars worked on encyclopedias and research. Today, the reading room is still open to the public — and there’s alos an extensive digital catalog available on the library’s website. All New Yorkers need to do is request the items they want to see a few days in advance.
Though the division inherited a few small collections and private libraries, many of its items have been purchased or donated over time.
The New York Jewish Week recently stopped by to see what would be on view during the anniversary celebrations. Here are 10 highlights:
1. Historic haggadahs from Venice and Amsterdam
Traditional illustrated haggadahs from Venice (left) and Amsterdam (right). Printed in the 17th century. (Julia Gergely, design by Grace Yagel)
The Dorot Jewish Division boasts an impressive collection of haggadahs, the guides used at Passover seders. The collection includes the Venice Haggadah with Judeo-Italian translation, printed in 1609, and the Amsterdam Haggadah printed in 1695. Both of these volumes are first editions of what became a standard structure for a haggadah — the Venice Haggadah influenced Mediterranean tradition and the Amsterdam Haggadah influenced Central European tradition.
2. The very first Sunday edition of the Forverts
Vol. 1, No. 1. Sunday edition of the Forverts from May 2, 1897. (Julia Gergely, design by Grace Yagel)
Forverts (or “Forward” in English), the Yiddish daily that circulated in New York throughout the 20th century, is not just one of the most significant publications in American Jewish history — at its height it was the highest-circulation daily in New York. The paper began publishing in April 1897 and paper copies from its first few months in circulation are incredibly scarce. Sholokhova believes Dorot’s original copy of its first Sunday Supplement, published May 2, 1897, may be the earliest known copy of the Forverts in existence.
3. The earliest image of the North American continent in a Hebrew book
An image of the globe in Ma’aseh Toviyah, an encyclopedia of science and medicine. (Julia Gergely)
Published in Venice in 1707, “Ma’aseh Toviyah” (Work of Tobias) is an encyclopedia of science and medicine written in Hebrew, with sections on theology, astronomy, medicine and geography. Written by Toviyah Katz (also known as Tobias Cohn), the book contains the earliest known image of the American continent in a Hebrew book.
4. First Hebrew alphabet printed in the United States
The first Hebrew grammar book, printed for a Hebrew course at Harvard College. (Julia Gergely)
Printed around 1735, “A Grammar of the Hebrew Tongue” or “Dikduk leshon l’ivrit” is the first known book in the American colonies to contain the entire Hebrew alphabet and a lesson on Hebrew grammar. Compiled by Judah Monis, a Hebrew teacher at Harvard College, the book was intended for Harvard students who desired to study the Old Testament in its original language. Monis was born Jewish but converted to Christianity.
5. A palmistry guide according to Kabbalah
A kabbalah palmistry book, dated around 1800. (Julia Gergely)
This book details the art of palmistry, or hand-reading, according to the Jewish mystical tradition of kabbalah. “Sefer Hochmat HaYad,” or “Book of the Wisdom of the Hand,” was compiled by Eliyahu Mosheh Galino, who lived in Constantinople (present-day Istanbul) in the early 16th century. The library dates the printing of this copy, notable for illustrations that feature white lines etched into black hands, to sometime around 1800.
6. Farewell banquet invitation for Eliezer Ben-Yehudah, lexicographer of the first Hebrew dictionary
Invitation for a farewell banquet for Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, who compiled the first Hebrew dictionary at the New York Public Library. (Julia Gergely, design by Grace Yagel)
One of the Dorot Jewish Division’s most famous researchers, Eliezer Ben-Yehudah, was an early Zionist who became known as the father of Modern Hebrew. During World War I, Ben-Yehudah came to the New York York Public Library to work on the first modern Hebrew dictionary, which he eventually brought back to Palestine. The archive has kept an invitation for Ben-Yehudah’s farewell dinner on Feb. 26, 1919, which includes all the names of the members of the dinner committee as well as the menu in Hebrew and English.
7. A community ledger from Mariupol, Ukraine
The title page ledger with minutes from a mishnah study class in Mariupol, Ukraine. (Julia Gergely)
A pinkas is a census-like ledger kept by Jewish communities in Eastern Europe, recording births, deaths, financial transactions, events and even criminal cases. This illustrated pinkas comes from a mid-19th century Hasidic community in what is now Mariupol, Ukraine, and details the minutes of a Mishnah study class held over the course of a decade. The first entry is dated 1837 and the last is 1848. The pinkas is dedicated to the Trisk Rabbi, Avrohom ben Mordechai Twersky.
8. An 18th-century Megillat Esther
An illuminated manuscript of Megillat Esther, read on Purim. The illustrations, in folk style, were drawn in the late 18th century. (Julia Gergely)
An illustrated scroll of Megillat Esther, the scroll read on Purim, is believed to be from Eastern Europe from the late 18th century. The scroll is significant because it is an illuminated manuscript, with hand-drawn images from scenes in the Book of Esther surrounding the text.
9. Pressed flowers and photographs from 1890s Palestine
Left: An 1899 photo of Jerusalem by Bruno Kentschel. Right: Flowers from Israel, dried and pressed in the 1890s. (Julia Gergely, design by Grace Yagel)
In the 1890s, as the political Zionist movement was beginning to take shape, small books of pressed flowers that were gathered in the Holy Land appeared in the United States. Dorot’s holding features native flowers pressed into the shape of Jewish symbols, and will be shown next to photographs of the landscape of Jerusalem from the same period, taken by Bruno Kentschel, a German photographer who worked from a small studio in Jerusalem.
10. Advertisements from Jewish businesses in the United States
Advertisements , postcards and trading cards for American Jewish businesses. (Julia Gergely, design by Grace Yagel)
The Dorot Jewish Division also has a vast collection of matchboxes, postcard advertisements and trading cards from Jewish businesses across America. The colorful, illustrated advertisements from the 19th and 20th centuries are very often the only traces of Jewish businesses that still exist, Sholokhova explained.
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The post 10 treasures from the New York Public Library’s 125-year-old Jewish collection appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Ukraine reburies Nazi collaborator with state honors, drawing Israeli condemnation
(JTA) — Israel criticized Ukraine Monday after President Volodymyr Zelensky gave full state honors to a Ukrainian nationalist leader who was part of a movement that collaborated with the Nazis during World War II.
During a reburial ceremony on Sunday, Zelensky described Andriy Melnyk and his wife, Sofia Fedak-Melnyk, as “iconic Ukrainians of the 20th century who are deeply respected,” according to The New York Times.
Melnyk led one of the factions of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists during its collaboration with Nazi Germany during World War II. Though the Ukrainian organization shared a mutual opposition to Soviet rule with the Nazis, it also promoted antisemitic rhetoric and some of its members participated in the persecution of Jews during the Holocaust. Melnyk initially sought cooperation with Nazi Germany but was later detained by the Nazis as relations with Ukrainian nationalist groups deteriorated.
The ceremony marked the latest flashpoint in a longstanding dispute over Ukraine’s commemoration of World War II-era nationalist figures linked to Nazi collaboration. In 2018, the country designated the birthday of Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera as a holiday, and in 2017, a statue was unveiled honoring a nationalist leader whose regime killed tens of thousands of Jews in pogroms during the Russian Revolution.
The remains of Melnyk and his wife were exhumed from Luxembourg last week and then transported to Ukraine for reburial at Kyiv’s National Military Memorial, which opened last year for soldiers killed in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“Glory to every Ukrainian hero! Glory to all our Ukrainian warriors! Glory to our people!,” Zelensky, who is Jewish, wrote in a post on X marking the ceremony, adding that he was “grateful to everyone who has worked to make such returns of great Ukrainian figures possible and to give the Ukrainian People their own pantheon of heroes.”
The reburial was quickly decried by Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust memorial, which wrote in a post on X that it was “deeply troubled by such national commemorations, which come at the expense of historical truth and the memory of Holocaust victims.”
“Honoring the leader of a movement that supported and collaborated with Nazi Germany during the persecution and murder of millions of Jews undermines the moral integrity essential to Holocaust remembrance,” the post read.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry wrote on X that there is “no place for ignoring historical truth and the memory of the victims murdered by the Nazis and their collaborators.”
The post Ukraine reburies Nazi collaborator with state honors, drawing Israeli condemnation appeared first on The Forward.
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Trump administration again sues UCLA over antisemitism, alleging ‘hostile educational environment’
(JTA) — The U.S. Department of Justice sued the University of California for the second time this year over allegations of an antisemitic campus environment at UCLA, claiming the school “was deliberately indifferent to the suffering of its Jewish and Israeli students” after Oct. 7.
The federal lawsuit, filed Tuesday, claims UCLA violated the students’ civil rights by failing to intervene during pro-Palestinian encampment activity in early 2024. It follows an earlier suit that focused on the university’s treatment of its Jewish and Israeli employees, and comes 10 days after the university unveiled its own “Initiative to Combat Antisemitism.”
“Earlier this year, we sued UCLA for subjecting its Jewish and Israeli employees to an antisemitic hostile work environment,” assistant U.S. attorney general Harmeet Dhillon said in a press release. “Now, the Department of Justice calls UCLA to account for its toleration of the equally appalling hostile educational environment against its Jewish and Israeli students.”
Requests for comment to the Justice Department and UCLA were not immediately returned.
The new suit draws on widely reported accounts of UCLA’s campus environment in spring 2024, when protesters in pro-Palestinian encampments clashed with pro-Israel counter-protesters, sparking violence and turmoil. The failure to protect Jewish students violated their Title VI civil rights, attorneys said.
Citing the report of UCLA’s own task force on antisemitism, published in response to the 2024 campus upheaval, the suit states, “UCLA’s leadership apparently preferred a do-nothing ‘de-escalation strategy’ to protecting their Jewish and Israeli students from an angry mob organized by peers armed with tasers, lumber, and a sword.”
The Justice Department is seeking several redress measures, including the return of all federal grants made to UCLA “during the time of UCLA’s noncompliance with Title VI.” The school had previously resolved several Title VI antisemitism cases under the Biden administration, and also reached a $6.13 million settlement with Jewish groups in a private suit related to the spring 2024 incidents on campus — a case cited in DOJ’s new lawsuit.
The Trump administration has sought to make a particular example of UCLA in its aggressive approach to campus antisemitism. Officials had sought to levy fines in excess of $1 billion against the public university for its alleged failure to protect Jewish and Israeli students, until a federal judge intervened. Several DOJ lawyers have left the department over its UCLA investigation, telling reporters the case was “fraudulent,” a “sham” and driven by pressure to “find” evidence to support further legal action against UCLA.
In addition, some of the most violent clashes on the campuses included perpetrators on both sides of the conflict, leading some members of the UCLA Jewish community to complain that pro-Israel counter-protesters ultimately undercut the Jewish students’ legitimate grievances regarding the harassment they had been facing inside the campus gates.
And the campus environment for Jews remains tense. Last month, the UCLA student senate condemned a campus visit by a freed Israeli hostage, drawing blowback from a university regent.
The post Trump administration again sues UCLA over antisemitism, alleging ‘hostile educational environment’ appeared first on The Forward.
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Jewish leaders say Belgium’s prosecution of circumcision is antisemitic
(JTA) — Dozens of European Jewish leaders, joined by Israeli and American diplomats, decried Antwerp prosecutors who plan to charge two Jewish men with performing illegal circumcisions.
In an open letter on Tuesday to European and Belgian officials, 45 communal and religious Jewish leaders accused the Antwerp Public Prosecutor’s Office of “effectively criminalizing the act of circumcision” and infringing on religious freedom.
Earlier this month, Belgian prosecutors announced their recommendation to refer two mohels, or ritual circumcisers, to the criminal court following investigations into alleged illegal circumcisions.
In Belgium, the law requires all circumcisions to be performed by licensed medical professionals. The two men would be charged with intentional assault or battery against minors and the unlawful practice of medicine.
The European Jewish leaders responded that prosecuting mohels was “antisemitic in nature, reminiscent of efforts taken in Europe against Jewish practice prior to the Second World War.”
They said the potential prosecutions sent a message that “Jews are no longer welcome in Belgium” and “Belgian Jews are now second class citizens with limited rights.” Their appeal was led by the chairman of the European Jewish Association, Rabbi Menachem Margolin.
Israeli and U.S. officials have also accused Belgium of targeting Jews for practicing their faith.
Gideon Saar, Israel’s minister of foreign affairs, called the prosecutors’ decision a “scarlet letter on Belgian society.” He was joined by the U.S. ambassador to Belgium, Bill White, who said on X that Belgium “will be thought of now as anti Semitic by world.”
Belgium’s foreign minister fired back that it was “inappropriate to publicly criticize a country and tarnish its image simply because you disagree with judicial proceedings.”
“I recall that the proceedings in question were initiated by representatives of the Jewish community themselves,” said Maxime Prévot. “To portray those as a country’s desire to undermine the religious freedom of Jews is defamatory.”
The mohels were first investigated after complaints lodged by Moshe Aryeh Friedman, an Antwerp rabbi. He alleged in 2023 that six local mohels practiced metzitzah b’peh, in which the circumciser cleans the circumcision wound with oral suction. Over the past two decades, several infants in New York City were infected with herpes as a result of the practice.
The letter from European Jewish leaders did not address Friedman’s claims.
The post Jewish leaders say Belgium’s prosecution of circumcision is antisemitic appeared first on The Forward.