The oldest and most complete Hebrew Bible on record was purchased Thursday at Sotheby’s in New York for $38.1 million, making it the most valuable manuscript ever sold at auction.
The Sasun Codex, the oldest surviving copy of Manuscript containing 24 books of the Hebrew Biblewould have been written about 1,100 years ago.
Former US Ambassador Alfred Moses purchased the text for the Museum of the Jewish People (ANU) in Tel Aviv, Israel. The Hebrew Bible is the most influential author in history basis of western civilizationMusa said.
“I am glad to know that you belong to the Jewish people. My task, recognizing the historical significance of the Sassoon Codex, was to make it available in a place universally accessible to all.”
Skip this auction $30.8 million was paid by the co-founder of MicrosoftBill Gates, in the 1994 Lester Codex book, Leonardo da Vinci’s Science Notebook.
But it fell short of the auction record for a historical document, set by fund manager Ken Griffin, who purchased a hard copy of the First edition of the United States Constitution 43.2 million US dollars.
The Sassoon manuscript owes the name of its former owner, David Solomon Sassoonwho acquired it in 1929 and amassed in his London home the largest and most important private collection of Hebrew manuscripts in the world.
The text of the Hebrew Bible, whose twenty-four books make up what Christians call the Old Testament, was in a state of flux until the early Middle Ages, when Jewish scholars became known as masoretas began creating a set of notes to consolidate.
The Aleppo Code, created around 930, is considered the most reliable Masoretic text. but, Only 295 of its 487 pages remain Because of the damage caused by a fire in the Syrian city of Aleppo in 1947.
According to Sotheby’s, the Sasson Codex whose carbon dating indicates this Created around the year 900, only 12 pages are missing.
“This is the first time that a Almost Complete Hebrew Bible Sharon Mintz, chief specialist at the auction house for Jewish items, said this past March:
Centuries of symbols and inscriptions reveal this The manuscript was sold by a man named Khalaf bin Ibrahim to Isaac bin Ezekiel al-Attar. who later passed the property on to his two sons, Ezekiel and Maimon.
In the thirteenth century, the manuscript was dedicated to a synagogue at Macesene in northeastern Syria.
After the destruction of the city by the Mongols at the end of the thirteenth century or by the Timurids at the beginning of the fifteenth century, the manuscript was entrusted to Salama ibn Abi al-Fakhr for safekeeping. Then it disappeared for 500 years.
the The last owner of Codex Sassoon was Swiss investor Jacqui Safrawhich he bought for $2.5 million at auction in London in 1989.
By David Gritten
BBC News World
Nation
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