Ira Rezak’s prize-winning book Jewry Reflected, Refracted and Recorded on Medals is based on an exhibition of his material at New York’s Center for Jewish History. Rezak is the winner of the American Israel Numismatic Association’s 2025 Shekel Prize.

The phrase “Jewry reflected, refracted, and recorded in medals” is a compelling description of the way Jewish history, culture, and experience are represented and preserved through the art and craft of medals.

Jewry is reflected in the medals, tokens and badges that have been used for centuries by Jewish artists to reflect the actuality of Jewish individual and communal existence. “A Jewish Mother” by Boris Schatz offers a reflection upon Jewish values, presenting a mother in the act of tenderly raising her young child, both literally and figuratively, to be concerned for the welfare of others in the Jewish Community, to perform the biblically commanded mitzvah of charity.

It is refracted in the medals often used to honor or reward individuals who have excelled in some activity that brings credit to the Jewish people. Over their long history Jews have had to adapt themselves individually and communally as they engage with society in changing circumstances which has inevitably necessitated change, refraction of direction and method. After nearly two millennia the Jewish re-settlement of the Holy Land required new adaptations to older ways of life. The 1932 prize medal designed by Moses Murro for the Levant Fair in Tel Aviv presented such change by inventing a new iconographic logo, the flying camel, a modern version of an ancient Jewish mode of passage.

It is recorded by commemoration, establishing a material record of past events and present achievements, which is perhaps the most common function of medallic art. Jewry, the Jewish people, have had much in their past to reflect upon, and fortunately also attainments worthy of celebration. The 1905 medal by Isidore Konti celebrating the 250th anniversary of the arrival of Jews in America records this event in a classical Beaux-Arts style. Liberty and Justice triumph over Intolerance on one side, while on the other a figure of History has inscribed on a tablet the dates 1655 and 1905 under the protection of an American eagle.

The Shekel Prize is awarded annually since 2017 to the author of the best book published on the subject of Ancient Judaean, Holy Land, Israel, or Jewish Numismatics.

Ira Rezak is a retired physician and educator who has studied and collected Judaica for many years. An Emeritus Professor at Stony Brook University, he serves as president of the Harry G. Friedman Society and is a board member of the AINA.

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