Sarajevo Haggadah

An illustrated page from the Sarajevo Haggadah, written in fourteenth-century Spain. Top: Moses and the Burning Bush. Bottom: Aaron's staff swallows the magicians'.

The Sarajevo Haggadah is an illuminated manuscript that contains the traditional text of the Passover Haggadah which accompanies the Passover Seder. It is the oldest Sephardic Haggadah in the world, originating in Barcelona around 1350. The Haggadah is presently owned by the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo, where it is on permanent display.

The Sarajevo Haggadah is handwritten on bleached calfskin and illuminated in copper and gold. It opens with 34 pages of illustrations of key scenes in the Bible from Creation through the death of Moses. Its pages are stained with wine, evidence that it was used at many Passover Seders. It is considered to be the most beautiful illuminated Jewish manuscript in existence and one of the most valuable books in the world. In 1991 it was appraised at $700 million[1].

Storied history

The Sarajevo Haggadah has survived many close calls with destruction. Historians believe that it was taken out of Spain by Spanish Jews who were expelled by the Inquisition in 1492. Notes in the margins of the Haggadah indicate that it surfaced in Italy in the 1500s. It was sold to the national museum in Sarajevo in 1894 by a man named Joseph Kohen[2].

During World War II, the manuscript was hidden from the Nazis by the museum's chief librarian, Dervis Korkut, who at risk to his own life, smuggled the Haggadah out to a Muslim cleric in a mountain village—there it was hidden under the floorboards of either a mosque or a Muslim home. During the Bosnian War of 1992-1995, when Sarajevo was under constant siege by Bosnian Serb forces, the manuscript survived in an underground bank vault. To quell rumors that the government had sold the Haggadah in order to buy weapons, the president of Bosnia showed off the manuscript at a community Seder in 1995.

Afterwards, the manuscript was restored through a special campaign financed by the United Nations and the Bosnian Jewish community in 2001, and went on permanent display at the museum in December 2002.

Over the years, the museum has allowed the publication of a few thousand copies of the Haggadah, each of which have become collector's items. In May 2006, a Sarajevo publishing house announced the forthcoming publication of 613 copies of the Haggadah on handmade parchment that attempts to recreate the original appearance of the 14^th century original. This limited edition is being sold for 1,700 Euros (US$2,500) per copy. To purchase the book please visit the publisher house official web site at http://haggadah.ba/ where you can order the book online.

There is a brief mention of the manuscript in the motion picture, "Welcome to Sarajevo". The book "People of the Book" by Geraldine Brooks creates a fictionalised version of the history of the Haggadah from its origins in Spain to the museum in Sarajevo.

External links

• Pictures from the Sarajevo Haggadah