Is this Bible worth $50 million?

A few days ago, news was published in various media about the upcoming auction of the Hebrew Bible with an estimated value of 30 to 50 million dollars.

They repeated a press release from auction house Sotheby’s, which is in charge of bidding, according to which this codex is the oldest almost complete copy of the Hebrew Bible, dating from the late 9th – early 10th century. The news quickly spread among scientists and professionals through social networks. What was this manuscript? Why was it so valuable?

Code of Sassoon

The press release referred to the manuscript as “Code Sassoon” without any other qualifications. He describes it as an almost complete Bible – 12 pages missing – consisting of 24 books that make up the Hebrew Bible, divided into three parts: Pentateuch – Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy – Prophets and Scriptures.

But this Bible is not completely unknown and does not appear for the first time, as this note seems to imply. The published photographs correspond to the Sassoon manuscript 1053 (S1). According to the description in the catalog of the Sassoon collection, published in 1932, the manuscript contains 792 leaves, written in three columns of 28-29 lines each, with vocalization and stress marks.

It is accompanied by a masora, the technical name by which is known the set of marginal annotations of textual, exegetical content, etc. found in most medieval biblical Hebrew manuscripts.

The catalog also mentions various records explaining the passage and use of the manuscript from its sale in the early 11th century by Khalaf ben Abraham to a man named Isaac ben Ezequiel al-Attar, who later passed it on to his two sons, Ezekiel and Maimon, until the 13th century, when it was dedicated to the synagogue of Makisin (modern Markada, in northeastern Syria).

Although this codex has been in private hands since 1929, when the collector David Solomon Sassoon bought it for £350, and is still in the possession of Jacqui E. Safra to this day, it is known to scholars.

It is often cited as one of the oldest surviving Hebrew biblical manuscripts, and although until recently the only photographs available were in black and white and of poor quality (a high-resolution digitized copy is now available), the manuscript, especially of his Masorah, has been studied. .

Why is it so valuable?

The value of the Codex Sassoon, according to Sotheby’s, lies in its dating (“the oldest Bible”), its state of preservation (“nearly complete”), in the annotations of its Masorus, and in its quality of fundamental evidence. to understand the transformation in the history of the Hebrew Bible.

Its dating between the late 9th and early 10th centuries, apparently confirmed by radiocarbon testing commissioned by its current owner, contrasts with the consensus among the scientific community that places it in the second half of the 10th century. colophon with the date, researchers took into account other elements to establish it, including the information gathered in the Masorah note, written on the top margin of page 112, which states:

“…how in mahzor (= Bible) of the great scholar Aaron ben Moses ben Asher, and a book called al-Taj“.

header al-Taj it is the nickname of the Aleppo Codex, whose Masorah was written by Aaron ben Moses ben Asher, the most famous of the Masoretes, and is recognized as the most accurate and authoritative Hebrew biblical text.

Other works also conclude that the Masorete from the Sassoon Codex saw the Aleppo Codex and copied and compiled the Masoretic annotations from it. Therefore, the Sassoon Code must be later than the Aleppo Code, dated to about 930 and accurately described as “the oldest nearly complete Hebrew Bible”.

Likewise, its spelling and text arrangement also point to a later date. Compared to other 10th-century Hebrew Bible manuscripts, the Sassoon Codex is copied more casually, without diacritics or some vowels in certain positions. His Masorah was written by more than one person.

Although it holds more tomes than the Aleppo codex, many of them are in poor condition. Not only are the first ten chapters of Genesis missing, but the first leaves are only partially preserved, sometimes with later additions. The part corresponding to the Scriptures (the third division of the Hebrew Bible, consisting of the books of Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Song of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, Esther, Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, as well as 1 and 2 Chronicles) is the worst preserved, parts are practically missing in all his books (usually in one of the columns).

The state of conservation also affects the annotations of La Masora, missing from the first part of the codex due to degraded margins and irregular shape in the middle, missing from the top margins, or erased at the bottom of many pages.

Is it worth what it’s worth?

Undoubtedly, this Bible is a unique copy, a necessary evidence for the study of the transmission of the Hebrew Biblical text, the history of the Book and the practice of copyists. One of the few survivors of a period punctuated by a 600-year absence of direct written evidence. But it is not the oldest Hebrew Bible and not the best preserved.

Elvira Martin-Contreras, Senior Fellow (Hebrew Philology), Center for the Humanities and Social Sciences (CCHS – CSIC)

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original.

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