The Jerusalem Publishing House

Who We Are

 THE JERUSALEM PUBLISHING HOUSE was founded in 1966 by Shlomo S. (Yosh) Gafni. The company has as its aim the publication of books in various languages on Jewish and general subjects. Over the years, the publishing house has specialized in producing encyclopedias.

The Jerusalem Publishing House has had one  overriding credo: to publish the highest-quality reference works, based on the most authoritative sources, and in the most aesthetic fashion.

We are simply not willing to settle for "second-best," for we know that  first-rate quality can be - and is - always to be achieved.

Our Latest Project

We, at the Jerusalem Publishing House, are proud to have been selected by Thomson Gale in the US and by the Keter Publishing House in Israel to spearhead and coordinate the Second Edition of the Encyclopedia Judaica.

 Work on the first edition of Encyclopedia Judaica commenced in 1966 and the English-language Judaica was published in 1972 in 16 volumes. This was an enormous undertaking, employing 1,900 writers and hundreds of editors and staff members.

Work on the second edition, coordinated by the Jerusalem Publishing House, began in August 2003. The project was concluded editorially in the first months of 2006. It employed over 50 divisional editors and around 1,200 contributors from all around the world. About half of the roughly 19,000 entries were thus revised and about 2,650 new entries were written. In addition, around 30,000 new bibliographical items were added. In all, 4.7 million new words were written for the second edition, the equivalent of 6 full volumes.

The editors sought to do justice to previously neglected areas of scholarship and, first and foremost, to give full expression to the achievements and contributions of Jewish women throughout history. Under the editorial guidance of Judith Baskin, hundreds of new biographical entries were written with women as their subject, while existing entries surveying various topics received new sections reflecting the role of women in Jewish and general society.

Professor Berenbaum, not only being the executive editor, took upon himself the subject that received special emphasis – the Holocaust, and of course the U.S. division. Much of the material has been rewritten in the light of recent scholarship, and the expansion of Holocaust awareness is fully reflected in various entries surveying what may be called the subject of memory and memorialization.

In a series of extensive updates, special treatment is also accorded to the subject of Jewish Law (Mishpat Ivri), again under the direction of Justice Menachem Elon, as it is now possible to examine the principles of Jewish religious law (halahkah) as they are reflected in the courts of a sovereign Jewish state.

One other area that has been considerably augmented is the contribution of Jews to public and community life in the Diaspora, especially in the United States, where they are most visible. In this context full justice is now done to the richness and variety of the American rabbinical experience.

The Encyclopedia also does not neglect the achievements of men and women in all areas of popular culture, from entertainment and sports to fashion and photography. Here too Americans naturally take the lead, given their global prominence and often iconic status wherever popular culture thrives.

Great Britain, and other European countries, Latin America and Canada have been upgraded with hundreds of new entries and complete rewrites of the existing entries. Yiddish Literature has been likewise upgraded, without almost every existing entry revised and dozens of new ones added.

Bible, Talmud, and Second Temple material has been revised entry-by-entry in the light of new data and new thinking.

In fact major revisions, updates and new entries have been produced in almost every field.

Thus the second edition of the Encyclopedia Judaica combines the old with the new. It celebrates the achievements of Jews and illuminates their history. It remains a repository of knowledge and a guide to their inner world. It is itself a cultural monument.