Bar Ilan University's Responsa Project wins Israel Prize

Minister of Education Yuli Tamir announced yesterday that Bar Ilan University's Responsa Project has won the 2007 Israel Prize for Torah literature.

The Responsa Project is the largest electronic database of Torah literature in the world. The database contains 160 million words, and includes 100,000 halakhic rulings.

All texts are available in full, and are proofread and hyper-linked. The database also includes the Bible and its principal commentaries, the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmud, Midrashim, the Zohar, Maimonides, the Shulchan Aruch and many other resources.

The Israel Prize is the most prestigious award handed out by the State of Israel, and is presented annually on the eve of Israeli Independence Day.

Inaugurated in 1991 as a CD, the Responsa project has just made the transition to the internet, as the Online Responsa project, which was produced by Bar Ilan University in collaboration with C.D.I. Systems , using C.D.I.'s online publishing platform NetIS .

Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes.co.il - on February 14, 2007