The Vilna Gaon Jewish State Museum in Vilnius

Vilnius

Vilnius is the capital of Lithuania, and its largest city, with a population of 560,190 as of 2010. It is the seat of the Vilnius city municipality and of the Vilnius district municipality. It is also the capital of Vilnius County...

, Lithuania

Lithuania

Lithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...

 is dedicated to the historical and cultural heritage of Lithuanian Jewry

Lithuanian Jews

Lithuanian Jews or Litvaks are Jews with roots in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania:...

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The museum was established in 1989 by the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture. Over the course of the following years, its exhibition items, many from earlier Jewish museums in Lithuania, were brought together. It received its current name in 1997, commemorating the 200th anniversary of the death of the Talmud

Talmud

The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....

ic scholar Vilna Gaon

Vilna Gaon

Elijah ben Shlomo Zalman Kramer, known as the Vilna Gaon or Elijah of Vilna and simply by his Hebrew acronym Gra or Elijah Ben Solomon, , was a Talmudist, halachist, kabbalist, and the foremost leader of non-hasidic Jewry of the past few centuries...

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Its five branches focus on various aspects of history and culture. The Tolerance Center's collections include works of sacred, modern, and traditional art along with historical materials; The Green House is a Holocaust exhibit; the Paneriai Memorial is dedicated to the Paneriai Massacre

Ponary massacre

The Ponary massacre was the mass-murder of 100,000 people, mostly Polish Jews, by German SD and SS and Lithuanian Nazi collaborators Sonderkommando collaborators...

; the Jacques Lipchitz

Jacques Lipchitz

Jacques Lipchitz was a Cubist sculptor.Jacques Lipchitz was born Chaim Jacob Lipchitz, son of a building contractor in Druskininkai, Lithuania, then within the Russian Empire...

 Memorial Museum in Druskininkai

Druskininkai

Druskininkai is a spa town on the Neman River in southern Lithuania, close to the borders of Belarus and Poland. The city of Druskininkai has a population of 18,233 and dates back as a spa resort to the 19th century.-Names:...

exhibits his lithographs; and the former Tarbut Gymnasium displays the history of Lithuanian Jews in the interwar and Nazi period.

The museum acquires and systematizes materials, issues publications, conducts research, organizes permanent and temporary exhibitions, and sponsors educational activities.