28 January
A Complete Unknown - A Bob Dylan Biopic 
January 28, 2025 A Complete Unknown - A Bob Dylan Biopic
January 22, 2025 "On The Road" from Nuri Bilge Ceylan
January 21, 2025 "We Are All Here to Help Each Other" - Interview with Wendy White
January 20, 2025 Happy Rebirthday Mr. Director! - My Tribute to David Lynch
January 17, 2025 “Journey” is Looking At Yourself In a Puddle, Not In the Mirror
The Rebirth of The Izmir Historical Rabbinate Library - Interview with Donna Dina Eliezer
On December 17th, 2024, the Rabbinic Library of Izmir, located in a room of the Karatash Jewish Hospital was opened. With more than 1700 books printed between the 17th and 20th centuries, the library is a testimony of the community´s reputation of being one of the Sephardic world´s intellectual and religious centers. Rare books containing handwritten marginal notes of famous rabbis from Izmir are just one of the reasons that make this library unique. A Jewish educator from Philadelphia, Donna Dina Eliezer, tells the story of how she discovered the books in the old Hahamhane (Rabbinate) building and how she dedicated herself to helping salvage the books and form the Rabbinic Library of Izmir. February 6, 2025
Dina Eliezer (standing up) & Yudit Sevinir, November 2024
By Sarit BONFIL
Can you introduce yourself for Shalom readers?
I've been working in Jewish education for over 30 years. I have a master's degree in Jewish education and administration. Then I continued my studies towards a doctorate degree in Jewish studies. I have worked with children of different ages and with adults as well. I have worked as the education director in various Jewish schools. I am retired for five years but am still involved in part-time teaching Hebrew and preparing students for their Bar/Bat Mitzvah in various institutions. I am married, have 3 children and 3 grandchildren.
You have shown a remarkable commitment to bring out a treasure that belongs to the Jewish community of Izmir. What exactly are your ties with Izmir?
I was born in Izmir. My father, pediatrician Dr. Elie Ventura, and my mother Regina Margunato, and their parents were all born in Izmir, too. So, I've been several generations from Izmir. In 1959, when I was two and a half months old, my parents immigrated to Israel. I grew up in Israel. I married Edi Eliezer, who was also born in Izmir. We lived in France for four years and then arrived in the United States in 1981. In America, I started my studies in computer studies, but I left it right away and went into Jewish education, a career I was always drawn to. Besides English, I speak Hebrew, Ladino, and French fluently. And I like to believe that I speak also Turkish, but very limited. My parents spoke Turkish among themselves, and the Turkish culture was part of our lives at home. The Turkish food, music, and history (my father was a historian fanatic with great knowledge of the history of Turkey) were part of almost my daily life growing up.
How did you get involved in the Rabbinic Library project?
In January 1999, I was invited by the Jewish community of Izmir to help start a Jewish education program for the 130 children in the community. The Talmud Tora had been closed the previous year. When I first received a long fax message from Sara Pardo, who used to be a member of the administrative committee then, I was very excited. I said to myself, this is a sign from God telling me that that's why I chose Jewish education and not computer science. In February of 1999, I traveled to Izmir after so many years. And I spent a whole week training the teachers, who were actually volunteer mothers.
On the last day of my visit, Sara and the teachers took me to Kemeralti to visit the ancient synagogues. The last visiting sight was the old Hahamhane (Rabbinate) building, which had been out of use for several years. She took out a big key and opened the door. The room smelled terrible. The roof was collapsing and water was sipping in. There were books in old wooden cabinets from floor to ceiling all around the room. I started pulling out some books. They looked old, rotten, some were even moldy, and in many books, the pages were stuck together. The historical value of the books was undeniable. In disbelief and rage, I said to Sara “This is the treasure of your community. These are your rabbis’ works. And look, you are killing them.” Sara explained to me that as the community was shrinking and there was no one who could read Ladino, Hebrew, and the Rashi script, they didn’t know what to do with the books, so they only kept the door locked and didn’t let anybody in.
My proposition to Sara was that if she could find a proper room and put there some shelves, I would come in the summer in order to move the books to a new and safer location. Two months later she sent me a fax informing me that indeed she had a room with shelves in the Jewish Karatash Hospital. So, I bought a ticket and came to Izmir in the summer of 1999.
The opening of the Library, December 17th, 2024 - (from left to right) Jak Kaya, Nadya kaya, Elvira Levi, Erol Amado, İren Özel, Dina Eliezer, Sara Pardo
What hardships did you face once you started working with the books?
Working in the conditions of the Hahamhane (Rabbinate) was no easy task. Together with Sara, we spent a week cleaning up each book, putting them in boxes, and taking them to Karatash Hospital. Many books were in very bad shape. Those books we sent directly to burial. We later found in a smaller room more books, newspapers, and old Parochot that were brought from synagogues or left by people who made aliyah to Israel. Those too we brought to the hospital. Sara Pardo, during the year, contacted people to sanitize the room and got information on how to preserve the books. Once the books were protected in their new location I said to Sara, “We really need to make a list of the books so we can share with the world community the content of this repository.” I proposed to come during the following summers, during my vacation, to do the list.
So, for four consecutive years, every summer I came to Izmir to make the list of the books, which took a long time because some of the books were in very bad shape and also because to get the publication year of most of the books I needed to convert biblical phrases to numeric values using Gematria. In 2004, we finally completed the list of the books. We had one thousand seven hundred books. Since I'm not a librarian, I created a system where I cataloged the books according to shelf number. I had a meeting with, then, the community leaders, to set up some maintenance, security, and follow-up activities for the library.
From 2004 to 2020, I came several times to Izmir to visit the library. The problem was that because leadership in the community changed and those in charge did not know much about the treasure they had and what to do with it, the security was breached - many people had the keys and there was no direct supervision of the activities in the room. As a result, some books were taken out and in 2014, after the hospital was rented to another health institution, the room was used as a storage place. Another shelving unit was installed in the middle for the books they later brought from Talmud Torah and some more synagogues. The room looked neglected and in terrible condition.
In 2022 I requested the community to clean the room and remove all the storage items out of the room.
Can you give us some information about the content of the books?
There are approximately five dozen authors represented in the library. Among them are numerous illustrious rabbis from Izmir such as Rabbi Yossef Escapa, Rabbis Hayim, Avraham and Itshak Palagi, Rabbi Moshe Benveniste, Rabbi Eliyahu Hazan…The works include, responsa literature in which Rabbis communicate with each other and determine laws, collections of derasha – sermons which contain Rabbi’s comments on the weekly Tora portion accompanied with some accounts about the community. Many books on religion and manuscripts are printed in Ladino in Rashi script. In addition, there are also story books and novels printed in Ladino.
As you examined the books thoroughly you saw a lot of marginalia which you realized was an additional treasure. What were your efforts to bring them to academic focus?
About 450 books in the library contain within their pages handwritten notes (marginalia) of some of the scholars in the community. Most of them are written in Ladino in Solitreo letters (A cursive form of the Hebrew alphabet used by the Sephardic rabbis). When I came back in the summer of 2022, we decided to check how much marginalia there was and take pictures of them. With some volunteers from the community, we checked each book, and took pictures of the marginalia with our phone. I later created a portfolio with all the pictures taken.
Later that year I reconnected with the Kiriaty Foundation who had initiated the project on the restoration of the ancient synagogues. Judith Kiriaty Matalon offered to help support and promote the importance of the library. In order to do that the Kiriaty Foundation sent me to two conferences. Accompanied and guided by Uri Bar Ner from The Kiriaty Foundation, I was introduced to experts in the field: At the AEJP (European Association for the Preservation and Promotion of Jewish Culture and Heritage) conference In Paris, I met manuscript experts from the National Library of Israel and in Berlin at the conference of the Directors of Jewish Museums in Europe I had a chance to meet people from the Rothschild Foundation Hanadiv Europe. Both institutions were very interested in the Rabbinic library. When I came back, together with the vice president of the community of Izmir, Erol Amado, we wrote a grant asking to produce a new list of the books and to take professional pictures and digitize all the marginalia so we would be able to give it to the National Library of Israel to be included in their manuscript website called KTIV. Thanks to the Rothschild Foundation Hanadiv Europe and the Kiriaty Foundation, we were able to realize this project.
In November-December 2024, 630 pictures of the marginalia were taken by a professional photographer, Emin Emrah Yerce. It was a very delicate work. We also created a new cataloging system in the library by placing books in specific sections according to their specialty. In December the digitized images were delivered to The National Library of Israel; and a dedication ceremony was held at the library on December 17 announcing the official date of the Library’s opening for visitors and scholars.
Taking photos for digitalization, November, 2024
What was done to enhance the security and preservation of the books?
I was very fortunate to work with community member Levana Levi who, each time I arrived in Izmir to work in the library, she joined me and was a tremendous help. This year Yudit Sevinir who speaks many languages joined me in reorganizing the library and creating the new list of books. She now knows the library well and will now be in charge of the library. People who want to visit will have to contact her. She will be the only person to have a key. We also put cameras and an alarm to which Yudit, the leadership, and I are connected. The cameras, the AC unit, and all the refurbishing in the room were funded by the community. Finally, we have a beautiful library where those interested can come and do research. The way that the library is looking right now, it is thanks to the current leadership of the community, Erol Amado and Avram Sevinti, who understood the value of the place and the need to really protect its treasure.
What will visitors find in the library?
A catalog will be available. The library is arranged now by categories, as well. Specific sections are: marginalia, literature, prayer books, rabbinic work, rare books, newspapers, calendars, handwritten notebooks, booklets prepared by families for meldados (prayer for the deceased), etc. If you want to do some study of genealogy, you can find family names in those little booklets. And also, we made a little section of books that have names of people from the community engraved / printed on their cover, which is very special. The covers made of leather are beautiful. We also found a lot of unbelievable things in between the books, such as a ketubah, or an invitation to the Jewish Congress. Everything is kept in there. There are many treasures in that room.
What makes this library so significant?
Izmir had some of the most important printing houses in the Ottoman Empire. So, some of the books are first editions. There are signatures on the books made by Chaim Palachi and Avraham Palachi. There are dedications on the books from very important rabbis outside of Izmir, written to the local rabbis. The names of some very wealthy people in the community who donated money and built yeshivot in Izmir were written inside the books. So, all of this information tells the story of the community and its legacy.
You will not find any of this in other editions that are in other libraries. There, the books do not have the marginalia, or the name of the person that the books belonged to. So that's what makes it very unique. And not only this, it’s important that this library which is the heritage of the famous rabbis from Izmir, will continue to live after them as well.
In December, I gave a presentation at Bar-Ilan University at a conference on the 101st year of the Republic of Turkey. The presentation about my work in the library generated a lot of interest. One of the professors at Bar-Ilan University who gave a lecture said that there were so many topics related to Turkey that were missing from academia. So, I really want to spread the word around the world, that the library is there. My hope is to see students from different universities in the world coming and using the information and the platform for the research, so the entire world can see what's in there.
What are your plans about the library for the future?
Now that the goal of having a real library is achieved, I think I will become an observer and an advisor because the library belongs to the community, they will have to take care of it.
I'm very happy to be able to preserve the legacy of these important rabbis, who made some very important laws for Jews in the world. Many of the laws that Rabbi Eskapa and the Palachi rabbis made are being used by the Sephardic community today. So, I'm honored and happy that I was able to have this task and mission in my life along with the opportunity to help the Izmir Jewish community to come to this point with this project.
Related News
23 July
“Normal” Lives That Suddenly Explode
“One grandmother was hidden in the cellar of two Catholic women in Belarus for 630 days and nights. When she was liberated she had to relearn to walk, and to speak out loud. My other grandmother boarded a ship full of Polish orphans during the beginning of the war and went to Palestine, where she had to start her life over without her family, at age 9”
