Research guides: Jewish Studies: Primary sources

Primary Sources

More Jewish studies primary source material available at UofT Libraries.

Bar Ilan Global Jewish Database (Judaic Responsa)
The full text of the Bible and its principal commentaries, the Babylonian Talmud with Rashi's commentary and Tosafot, the Jerusalem Talmud, halakhic and aggadic midrashim, the Mishneh Torah of Maimonides, Shulhan Arukh with commentaries, hundreds of books of responsa (rabbinic answers to questions on topics in Jewish law), and the Talmudic Encyclopedia, representing a period of over three thousand years of Jewish literary creativity.
Online Talmud Text Database
The Databank integrates, in digital text format, all of the surviving manuscripts of the Babylonian Talmud and first printed editions. The collection will encompass all primary textual witnesses of the Babylonian Talmud, including the manuscripts of the tractates of the Babylonian Talmud of Oriental, Ashkenazic, Sephardic, or Yemenite provenance, and first printed editions. It will include hundreds of Cairo Geniza and European binding fragments of the Babylonian Talmud, many as both text and digital image
Sefaria: a Living Library of Jewish Texts Online
Sefaria is a non-profit organization dedicated to building the future of Jewish learning in an open and participatory way. We are assembling a free living library of Jewish texts and their interconnections, in Hebrew and in translation. With these digital texts, we can create new, interactive interfaces for Web, tablet and mobile, allowing more people to engage with the textual treasures of our tradition.
Maagar Sifrut ha-Kodesh (Hebrew)
Hebrew web site with texts of the Hebrew Bible, Mishnah, Talmud, Tosefta, midrashim and the Ramabam's Mishneh Torah
Early Jewish Writings
A collection of English translations of early Jewish writings, includiong the Hebrew Bible, Deutercanonical and Pseudepigraphical texts, Philo and Josephus
HebrewBooks.org
Over 50,000 Classical Hebrew books (sifrei kodesh) for free download.
Maagarim
Database of the Historical Dictionary of the Hebrew Language of the Academy of the Hebrew Language. It contains thousands of texts from the 2d cent. B.C.E. to the 11th cent. C.E.: Dead Sea Scrolls, talmudic and midrashic literature, prayers, piyyutim, geonic and Karaite literature, masoretic and linguistic texts, inscriptions, coins, papyruses, and letters. Every word is fully analyzed grammatically according to the standards of the Academy.
Dead Sea Scrolls Electronic Library Biblical Texts
The Dead Sea Scrolls Electronic Library presents a complete Hebrew transcription and English translation of the Biblical texts, together with high-resolution images. The contents of this online publication is identical to that of the Dead Sea Scrolls Electronic Library Biblical Texts CD-ROM, published by Brill and Brigham Young University but its interface is adapted to Brill's online platform for reference works.
Dead Sea Scrolls Electronic Library Non-Biblical Texts
Complete Hebrew transcription and English translation of the Non-Biblical texts, together with high-resolution images.
Online Critical Pseudepigrapha
The mandate of the Online Critical Pseudepigrapha is to develop and publish electronic editions of the best critical texts of the "Old Testament" Pseudepigrapha and related literature.
The Judaic tradition / Nahum Glatzer
Hermeneia
Critical commentary series offering authoritative interpretation of the earliest texts of the biblical books. An initial 50-volume set is available.
PEACE – Portal of Epigraphy, Archaeology, Conservation and Education on Jewish Funerary Culture
The PEACE portal explores Jewish funerary culture through the ages. In this initial phase, it focuses on epigraphical aspects: the inscriptions recorded on stone, plaster, or gold-glass. The other aspects, namely archaeology, conservation, and education, will be added to the portal in the coming years.
Ancient Inscriptions from Israel/Palestine
The Inscriptions of Israel/Palestine project seeks to collect and make freely accessible all of the previously published inscriptions (and their English translations) of Israel/Palestine from the Persian period through the Islamic conquest (ca. 500 BCE – 640 CE). Epigraphy is the study of such inscriptions, defined as texts written on durable materials (except for coins, which falls under the academic category of numismatics). There are about 10,000 of these inscriptions, written primarily in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek and Latin, by Jews, Christians, Greeks, and Romans. They range from imperial declarations on monumental architecture to notices of donations in synagogues to humble names scratched on ossuaries, and include everything in between.
Project on Ancient Cultural Engagement (PACE): Works of Flavius Josephus
The texts, English translations and a full historical and literary commentary to the works of Flavius Josephus. Also available are the works of Polybius, whose commentary is that produced for the Brill series under the editorship of Prof. Steve Mason. For Polybius the commentary is the only comprehensive one available in English, licensed from Oxford University Press.
Pinkassim Project
The goal of this site, until the development of a fuller and more elaborate one, is to provide free access to the records of Jewish self-government in Europe. In its first phase, the Pinkassim Project deals just with the pinkassim created by the community and regional councils and has also limited itself to those created in the early modern period (c.1500-1800), widely regarded as the Golden Age of Jewish self-government. Scans of the first digitized pinkassim as well as a catalog of surviving pinkassim and a bibliography of relevant research are found below.
Otzar HaHochma
Otzar HaHochma is the world's largest digital library, containing more than 110,564 Judaic books, scanned page after page in their original format. The books encompass all realms of Judaism from ancient times to the modern period and the database includes a sophisticated search engine.

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