Women Cantors

How Jewish women worked their way into the field of synagogue music.

By Irene Heskes for MyJewishLearning.com

Reprinted from Jewish Women: A Comprehensive Historical Encyclopedia with permission of the author and the Jewish Women's Archive.

By the end of the nineteenth century, Jewish women in America had taken on significant roles in the rapidly developing cultural phenomenon of Yiddish American theater.

Not only were they performing as stars in a wide range of dramatic productions, but they were singing all sorts of Jewish songs, including the religious hymns and liturgical chants, and newer music of spiritual significance.
For example, Sophie Karp (1861–1906) introduced a Yiddish ballad written especially for her, "Eli, Eli" (My God, My God), with text material derived from Psalm 22 and other Jewish prayers. The song became a favorite solo of many other female performers of that day, including the renowned actor Bertha Kalich (pictured) and opera singers Sophie Braslau and Rosa-Raisa.

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The Crazy New App For Using Your iPhone on Shabbos

By Ester Bloom for Jewniverse

Shabbos and technology: two great tastes that taste great together? The makers of the new Shabbos App, available in February from the iTunes Store and Google Play, want to convince you that, though it may seem counterintuitive, their spirituality-practicality hack will allow you to keep the Sabbath better from the comfort of your own phone.

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Western Wall plaza dig reveals structures dating back to Herod

‘Significant, beautiful’ remains, including lavish public buildings, found by archaeologists 20 meters from — but not under — Temple Mount

By Times of Israel staff

Israeli archaeologists recently dug up an ancient subterranean structure, parts of which date back to Roman times, just meters from the Temple Mount, Channel 10 reported Sunday.

“It’s one of the [most] impressive, beautiful and grand places found recently in Jerusalem,” Israel Antiquities Authority Jerusalem Region Archaeologist Yuval Baruch told the station.

“It is one of the most significant remains” found in Jerusalem in the last generation,” he said.

The ongoing excavations, which are taking place beneath the Western Wall plaza in the former Mughrabi Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City, feature a Mamluk-era caravansary dating to the Middle Ages and remains of lavish public buildings from the Herodian period, over 2,000 years ago, some 20 meters (65 feet) from the Temple Mount.

Baruch explained that when digging began, the earthen fill reached the ceiling of the now-restored caravansary, and that archaeologists had no idea how large the structure was.

“We understood that there was something else here, in terms of size, in terms of grandeur,” he said.

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The Other Persian Jews

By Jenny Levison for Jewniverse

If you’re not from the region and you’re not a Near East cultural scholar, chances are that when you think about Persian Jews, you either go all the way back to the Book of Esther, or you think about the Jews of Tehran and Isfahan. But there’s another vast community of Persian speaking Jews in Central Asia and beyond: Bukharan Jews.

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