Elegant Search Platform to Enhance and Energize Discourse on Jewish Social Responsibility

American Jewish World Service (AJWS) has officially launched a searchable online database of Jewish social justice texts designed to support rabbis and Jewish educators who want to teach about Judaism and social justice.

The database, called On1Foot, is an educational resource that allows users to search and browse hundreds of biblical, rabbinic and contemporary Jewish texts about social justice, upload new texts and create custom source sheets using the texts and suggested discussion questions.

“On1Foot offers an extraordinary opportunity for rabbis, Jewish educators, Hebrew and day school teachers and Jewish social justice activists to bring serious Torah study to bear on the great social injustices of our time – poverty, hunger, conflict and discrimination,” said Aaron Dorfman, AJWS’s Director of Education. “On1Foot will make the canon of Jewish justice literature more accessible, provide user-friendly tools to bring that literature to life in the classroom and energize and deepen Jewish engagement with social justice.”

Useful for the development of sermons and divrei Torah, classroom training and volunteer enrichment, family education and Bar and Bat Mitzvah preparation, On1Foot was created with the following goals:

• To make the full catalogue of Jewish texts on social justice available and accessible to users.
• To extend the breadth and depth of Jewish social justice education.
• To serve a central forum for discussion within the Jewish social justice movement.

By increasing access to these texts, the site will increase the frequency with which Jewish educators and clergy teach about social justice and facilitate text study in this context. Clergy and educators can now more easily create substantive, expansive and interesting teachings that go beyond the simplicity of pursuing justice and allow for nuance.

On1Foot has brought the expertise of a wide array of Jewish social justice organizations across the United States and around the globe together in one place; the site will facilitate collaborative conversation about issues of justice, equality and social activism. On1Foot is a project of American Jewish World Service and is co-sponsored by AVODAH: The Jewish Service Corps, Hazon, Tzedek, Mechon Hadar and Uri L’Tzedek.