Renowned auction house, Sotheby’s in New York, prepares itself for the sale of possibly the most expensive historical document ever sold at an auction, in the form of Codex Sassoon. This is one of the oldest surviving biblical manuscripts, more specifically, it is a nearly 1,100-year-old version of the Hebrew Bible, which will be going up for auction in May. Experts are speculating that it will fetch anywhere between $30 and $50 million!
The Codex Sassoon and Israel’s Historical Reclamation
The Codex Sassoon is a significant artifact not only for Jewish history but also for the study of ancient manuscripts. The codex contains the entire Hebrew Bible , known as the Tanakh, with the exception of some parts of the Book of Isaiah.
It is written on vellum, a parchment made from animal skin, and contains almost 800 pages. Its 24 books are divided into three parts: the Pentateuch, the Prophets, and the Writings.
The Codex currently can be viewed for free at Tel Aviv’s Anu Museum , reports The Times of Israel , but will soon continue its tour, including Dallas, Los Angeles and will end up in New York where the auction will take place.
“There are three ancient Hebrew Bibles from this period,” said Yosef Ofer, a professor of Bible studies at Israel’s Bar Ilan University: the Codex Sassoon and Aleppo Codex from the 10th century, and the Leningrad Codex, from the early 11th century.
Only the Dead Sea Scrolls and a handful of fragmentary early medieval texts are older, and “an entire Hebrew…
