Cast of a Purim play in a Sephardic Jewish community, NYC, 1936

📷 credit: Center for Jewish History

Jewish culture is finding out Ashkenazim pronounce ת as s in a lot of words and, just… mind blown, that’s why people are calling a tallit a tallis on the internet

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Jewish Resources (Assorted)

Since my last post seemed to be helpful to a lot of people, I thought I’d make another to share some additional resources. This list includes a bunch of stuff, meant for Jewish people in general. I would definitely encourage you to explore them! There’s a lot of useful stuff here. Goyim are welcome to reblog, just please be respectful if you’re adding tags or comments. Jewish Multiracial Network, an organization for multiracial Jewish families and Jews of Color Sefaria, a free virtual library of Jewish texts Sephardic Studies Digital Library Museum “The SSDC includes key books, archival documents, and audio recordings that illuminate the history, culture, literature, politics, customs, music, and cuisine of Sephardic Jews all expressed in their own language, Ladino.” (from their website) The SMQN, an organization for LGBTQ+ Sephardic and Mizrahi Jews Keshet, a group for LGBTQ+ Jews JQY, a group for LGBTQ+ Jews with a focus on those in Orthodox communities  Queer Jews of Color Resource List (note: this list is way more than just resources, there’s a LOT there) JQ International: “JQ celebrates the lives of LGBTQ+ Jews and their allies by transforming Jewish communities and ensuring inclusion through community building, educational programs, and support and wellness services, promoting the healthy integration of LGBTQ+ and Jewish identities.” (from their website) Jews of Color Initiative, an organization dedicated to teaching about intersectionality in the Jewish community, focuses on research, philanthropy, field building, and community education Nonbinary Hebrew Project: It’s hard to describe, but they’re working to find/create/add suffixes that represent nonbinary genders in Hebrew. If you speak Hebrew/another gendered language, you might know what I mean about gendered suffixes. Jewish Mysticism Reading List  (These are related to our closed practices, goyim should NOT be practicing these things) Ritualwell (you can find prayers and blessings related to specific things here, I personally like that they have blessings related to gender identity)  Guimel, an LGBTQ+ support group for the Jewish Community in Mexico. The site is in Spanish. I’m not a native speaker, but I was still able to read a little bit of it.  SVARA: “SVARA’s mission is to empower queer and trans people to expand Torah and tradition through the spiritual practice of Talmud study.” (From their website) TransTorah is definitely an older website, but there are still some miscellaneous pdfs and resources up on the “Resources” page. Jewish Disabilities Advocates: “The JFS Jewish Disabilities Advocates program was created to raise awareness and further inclusion of people with disabilities within Jewish organizations and the larger Jewish community.” (from their website) Jewish Food Society (recipes, have not spent a lot of time browsing here but maybe I should in the future) Jewish Blind & Disabled, an organization that operates mainly in providing accessible housing and living. Jewish Braille Institute International: “The JBI Library provides individuals who are blind, visually impaired, physically handicapped or reading disabled with books, magazines and special publications of Jewish and general interest in Audio, Large Print and Braille formats.” (from their website) Their services are free!)

hey, Jewish friends: mute and block whatever tags you have to. you’re not excusing violence or absolving anyone of responsibility for wanting a break. especially if you are awaiting news on the wellbeing of your loved ones. take a break. let yourself be distracted for a bit.

Arabelle Raphael

Gender: Female

Sexuality: Pansexual

DOB: 27 February 1989

Ethnicity: French, Tunisian, Iranian-Jewish

Nationality: French / American

Occupation: Adult actress, sex worker, dancer, activist, artist

Note: Don't Google if under 18.

North African Jewish Woman, likely to be Berber, of Debdou, Morocco.

! DONT FORGET !

(Postcard of Mizrahi reading the Torah. Cant find much else)

Not all Jews are Ashkenazi so DONT TREAT US LIKE WE ARE!

! DONT FORGET !

! WE ARE JEWISH TOO !

(Moroccan Jews at a henna party wearing Kaftans and Berberisca. The Berberisca dress; or ‘Keswa El Kbria’ is a Moroccan Jewish wedding dress.)

Researching Sephardic Cooking in the Janice Bluestein Longone Culinary Archive

The Jewish Manual...(1846) by Lady Judith Cohen Montefiore (Special Collections Janice Bluestein Longone Culinary Archive, Cookery 1846 Mo)

Enjoy this guest post by Nathalie Ross, Heid Fellow, on her research in the Janice Bluestein Longone Culinary Archive. Nathalie is a doctoral candidate in the History Department at the University of North Texas, specializing in Jewish Food Studies.

Sephardi Jewish woman, from Morocco, Natalie Ohayon Toby. Dress by Suzanne Benchimol, photography by Eric Benchimol.

Imagine if....

...people on Tumblr decided that South Koreans were "white" and North Korean were "POC."

Imagine that people you follow, and who follow you, are regularly referring to South Korea as a "U.S. army base," and "a white colonizer state."

Whatever you think you know about history and whatever you've seen with your eyes is irrelevant. These labels are now the norm, and you can't convince people otherwise.

Imagine that people you follow, and who follow you, are urging that you must spread the word about South Korea's "genocide" against North Korea, or you're not a true Ally.

Do you openly question anyone on this?

Do you dare just ignore it all?

Or do you start looking for ways to maintain your "ally" badge for both North and South Korea, without losing too many of your followers on this website?

Maybe you simply reblog the anti-South Korea posts, while looking for ways to show off that you're totally still an ally to the South Koreans (perhaps by acting outraged over a maybe-stereotype in a random work of fiction). That seems logical, right?

Shalom! I have always wanted to convert to Judaism and a few weeks ago, I learned that I'm Jewish through a direct female line (my maternal great-grandma was a Sephardic jew) but grandma, mom, and I were not raised jew in any way, we were raised as Muslims, because great grandfather was one, and great grandma fied in the early 40s of a cardiac attack when news reached them of France falling to nazi germany and how they were planning on taking North African Jews to camps in Europe, Fortunately, Moroccan Jews were not taken as the king refused to hand us over. Years later, my grandmother married a Muslim man, and so did my mother, I'm twenty now and my question is, do I have to convert to be able to practice and learn, or do I just go to a synagogue and tell them of my heritage (I only have grandmother's words to prove it as Sephardic jews can't be traced on DNA tests like Ashkenazi), thank you for answering.

Hi there! As a preface, I am on mobile (so expect a ton of spelling errors and I also don't know how to create a break rather than a new paragraph on mobile) and am not Sephardi nor have I extensively interacted with or taken part in Sephardic communities, so there is a chance that I could be wrong. I invite any Sephardim / Jews who know better to correct me in the replies / reblogs. The first thing I will always say in this kind of situation is "Ask your Rabbi!!!!!1!!1!1"*.

When it comes to your heritage, you are 100% Jewish. If your mother is Jewish, you are Jewish**. This means that because your great grandma was a Jew, her daughter (your grandma) was/is a Jew, her daughter (your mother) is a Jew, and you are a Jew. However, issues do arise when it comes to being able to prove your great grandmother's Jewishness, as you pointed out. Those who have spotty Jewish heritage are usually asked to go through a conversion, so that may be what will happen to you, however I'm not sure of what the standards are for "not enough evidence". Have you spoken to your grandmother more recently and extensively on this issue? If not, I would say that you should speak with her to try and find any kind of evidence of your great grandmother's Jewishness (such as photographs, letters, documents, etc.). It may also help if she had a Jewish maiden name that you can find on a birth certificate. But I am no expert on exactly what proof would be needed when it comes to presenting her Jewishness.

In the end, I would say that you should look for Sephardic communities in your area and choose one to check out, then contact them and go from there. As a little warning, I would say that synagogue staff and rabbis are usually notoriously terrible at responding to emails in my own and my friends' experiences, so you may want to do your best to meet in person.

I hope this helped and I wish you luck on your journey! Much love, ignore the obscene amount of tags for visibility, and baruch Ha'Shem.

*You don't have one, so I would say that once you find a community that works for you, you should speak to the rabbi there.

**I personally do not see those who are patrilineal as any less Jewish, but that's a whole different debacle and not the mainly accepted idea.

Leaf from the Cevera Bible, one of the oldest and most significant Sephardi bibles, dated 1299-1300

via ecstases

hi hello i am a lesbian moroccan jew from new york looking for other queer sephardi/mizrachim to be friends with. i feel like a fish out of water looking for community so let’s see how this goes:

Express in Hebrew when things are really bad!

Hebrew speakers and Israelis use this slang expression to say how bad it is.

maybe don’t go into a sephardi jew’s replies to call them a colonizer unprompted if you have “Spanish” in your bio

Abdulrahman Akkad

Gender: Male

Sexuality: Gay

DOB: 17 May 1998

Ethnicity: Syrian Jewish

Occupation: Youtuber, public speaker, activist

Note: In 2017 Akkad streamed a live video on Facebook, coming out as gay after fearing that his family would have had forced him to marry a woman against his will. The video was shared on various Arab social channels, as it was the first ever occurrence of a gay Syrian man publicly expressing his sexual orientation in a video with his real name and face.