Auction 96 Early Printed Books, Chassidut and Kabbalah, Books Printed in Jerusalem, Letters and Manuscripts
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Em HaBanim Semechah, on redemption from the final exile, by R. Yissachar Shlomo Teichtal. Budapest: Salamon Katzburg, 1943. First edition.
Fine copy in original binding, with gilt decorations to spine and front binding.
First edition of R. Yissachar Shlomo Teichtal's famous work regarding the importance of immigrating to Eretz Israel, love for Eretz Israel and defense of non-observant people in the Zionist movement. The book includes sharp criticism of the rabbis who hindered immigration to Israel before the Holocaust, and R. Teichtal writes further that the Holocaust came as a punishment for disdain for Eretz Israel.
The book was composed under difficult circumstances, while the author was hiding from the Nazis. He nevertheless quotes hundreds of sources, from memory. The printing of the book was concluded in 1943, mere months before the German invasion and the destruction of Hungarian Jewry.
The author, R. Yissachar Shlomo Teichtal (1885-1945; perished in the Holocaust). Prominent Hungarian rabbi, served as rabbi and dean of Pishtian (Piešťany). In 1942 he fled Slovakia for Hungary for fear of the Nazis. Until the Holocaust, he staunchly opposed Jewish settlement in Eretz Israel, like the rest of Hungarian Chassidic rabbis and his teacher the Minchat Elazar of Munkacs. During the Holocaust, he began to change his views, after studying the topics of exile and redemption and clarifying whether Eretz Israel should be settled by natural means. His conclusions were published in the present book, which he wrote and printed despite great difficulty in Budapest in 1943. When the Jews began to be expelled from Hungary, R. Teichtal fled back to Slovakia. After the suppression of the Slovak Uprising in 1944, he was expelled to Auschwitz, where he perished shortly before the end of the war. He is also known for his Responsa Mishneh Sachir, parts of which he published in his lifetime. His grandson is R. Meir Brandsdorfer, dayan and posek of the Edah HaCharedit in Jerusalem.
[11], 3-360 pages. Approx. 23 cm. Paper somewhat dry. Good condition. Some stains. Stamp to title page. Original binding, with minor damage.
Collection of 26 books printed in Hungary and Transylvania, during the Holocaust. The collection includes: Chassidic and ethical books, books on the Torah, halachah, Talmudic novellae and more.
During World War II, all the Hebrew presses in eastern and western Europe were shut down except for those in Hungary and Romania, which also faced heavy pressure. Hungarian Jews continued their religious life, studying Torah (to the extent possible) and even printing books, until the Nazis invaded Hungary in 1944, murdering hundreds of thousands of Hungarian Jews. Some of the books in the present collection are particularly rare.
See Hebrew description for list of books.
26 books in 27 volumes. Varying size and condition. Signatures and stamps. New bindings (except for one volume). The books have not been thoroughly examined, and they are being sold as is.
Talmud Bavli – complete set. Munich-Heidelberg, 1948. "Published by the Union of Rabbis in the American Occupation Zone in Germany".
After World War II, the demand for Talmud and holy books by surviving Jews congregated in the DP camps exceeded the few available copies. From 1946, the Union of Rabbis in Germany, with the assistance of the American army and the JDC, began to print volumes of Talmud for survivors. At first, only a few tractates were printed in various formats. In 1948, the present edition – a complete edition of the Talmud – was printed for the first time. Each volume contains two title pages. The first title page was especially designed to commemorate the printing of the Talmud on the debased German land; on its upper part is an illustration of a Jewish town with the caption "From slavery to redemption and from darkness to great light"; on its lower part is an illustration of barbed wire fences and a concentration camp, with the captions: "Labor camp in Germany during Nazi era", "They almost destroyed me on Earth, but I did not forsake Your precepts" (Psalms 119).
19 volumes. Approx. 39 cm. Several volumes printed on dry paper. Overall good condition. Stains. Tears, including tear to title page of Tractate Pesachim. Title page of Tractate Rosh Hashanah missing. New leather bindings (uniform).
Thirteen books printed in Shanghai between 1942-1945 by Mir yeshiva students who fled to the Far East during the Holocaust:
See Hebrew description for list of books.
13 books. Varying size and condition. Original bindings (worn, dusty and loose, some with open tears). The books have not been thoroughly examined, and are being sold as is.
Sefer HaTapuach by Aristotle and Meshal HaKadmoni by R. Yitzchak ibn Sahula. Frankfurt an der Oder: Yochanan Christoff Beckman, [1693].
Divisional title page for Meshal HaKadmoni. Many woodcut illustrations depicting the parables and tales in the work.
[6], 30, 32-58, 56-116, 118-121 leaves. Leaf 24 appears twice. Misfoliation. Approx. 15 cm. Fair condition. Stains, including dampstains and dark stains. Wear. Tears, including open tears affecting text, partially repaired with paper. Worming, affecting text. New binding.
Melechet Machshevet, a philosophical study on the Five Books of the Torah, by R. Moshe Chefetz. Venice: Bragadin, [1710]. First edition.
Complete copy with fine margins, including illustrated half-title with detailed copper engraving, leaf with portrait of the author and leaf with geometric diagrams. Additional diagram on leaf 57. Below the portrait of the author is a rhyme alluding to his age at the time of the printing: "a hundred (Meah) years old", referring to the numerical value of the word "Meah", 46 (some mistakenly took the word literally, believing he was in fact 100 years old; see below).
R. Moshe Chefetz (1664-1711), Italian rabbi, scholar and philosopher. Born in Trieste, he was raised in Venice, where he later disseminated Torah. He possessed wide-ranging knowledge of physics and metaphysics, as attested by his works Melechet Machashevet and Chanukat HaBayit. He composed this book to find solace for the untimely passing of his son R. Gershom, author of Yad Charuzim. R. Moshe died at the young age of 48 on 30 Cheshvan, 1711 (R. Mordechai Ghirondi, Toldot Gedolei Yisrael, Trieste 1853, p. 239). R. Shmuel David Luzzatto (Shadal) quotes a tradition transmitted by Italian Torah scholars, which maintains that the sages of his generation, upon hearing of the text of the caption R. Moshe intended to place beneath his portrait in his book, tried to dissuade him from doing so, warning him that it is not something one can make jest of. He did not heed their warning, and passed away within the year (Igrot Shadal, VII, p. 1013).
On the title page of the book is a signature of R. "Yaakov de Medina" – a Livorno Torah scholar in the time of the Chida (served as Dayan in Livorno alongside R. Yaakov Nunez-Vaez and R. Shem Tov ben Samun).
On the leaves of the book are several glosses (some trimmed) in his handwriting. On p. 96b is a gloss relating to the French conquest granting equal rights: "…we see with our own eyes today the French kingdom, where the government […] everyone, the lowly as the great".
[11], 98 leaves. 30.5 cm. Fair-good condition. Stains, including dampstains and dark stains. Wear and tears. Several leaves partially detached. Worming in a few places. Original binding, with parchment spine, damaged.
Assorted collection of photographs of Vizhnitz rebbes and their family members. Europe and Eretz Israel, [ca. 1930s-1960s].
• Photographs and copies of photographs of the Ahavat Yisrael of Vizhnitz taking a walk in the Marienbad and Karlsbad spa towns, next to family members, rebbes and associates. • Photographs of the Damesek Eliezer and his brother-in-law the Rebbe of Kopitchnitz. • Passport photograph of the Imrei Chaim together with his wife. • And more photographs of the Imrei Chaim.
13 photographs and pictures. Varying size and condition.