The Steven Spielberg Jewish Film Archive Collection

The Highest Commandment

13 Minutes, 1961
Genre:
Documentary

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Directed by: Edgar Hirshbain
Production:Lasar Dunner
Photographer: Edgar Hirshbain
Language: English
| Subtitles not available

This promotional film produced for the Hebrew University opens in the university’s laboratories, where “Israel’s future begins.” The knowledge accumulated in the university’s scientific centers is translated into practical advancements across various frontiers, which the film proceeds to follow. Mineral mining, drilling for water and oil sources, utilizing solar energy, and improving work and agriculture methods are some of the fields led by the university’s scientists from the Aravah to the Jezreel Valley. The practical knowledge obtained through functional use returns to the university’s classrooms, which the narrator compares to the country’s beating heart. The film concludes with a call to friends of the university worldwide to continue supporting its development, which is the development of the country itself.