Magazine 2023-08 web

he is “99.99 percent certain” that the Aleppo Codex is the text used by the Rambam. Later rabbinic scholars, like the Rambam, also looked to the Aleppo Codex as the most authoritative text of the Jewish Bible. It is told that Rav Yosef Karo (“ Maran ”), 16 th -century author of the Shulhan Aruch , sent an emissary from Safed to Aleppo to make a copy of the precise text of the Codex, and bring it back. Rav Yosef Karo then proceeded to write a Torah scroll on the basis of this text. Legend has it that Rav Yosef Karo sent the copy of the Aleppo Codex which he had commissioned to his distinguished colleague – Rav Moshe Isserles of Cracow, Poland – who likewise wrote a Torah scroll using this copy. In the mid-19 th century, Rabbi Yaakov Saphir, one of Jerusalem’s leading Torah scholars at that time, dispatched a messenger to study the Codex in order to clarify certain issues regarding the Torah text. Rabbi Goldhaber says, “This gives an indication that this is the best ‘blueprint’ of the Torah.”  The Odyssey of an Ancient Manuscript The story of the Codex’s survival and journey across the Middle-East is characterized by a great deal of mystery and intrigue. It is a saga that spans the vast expanse of three continents and several nations and empires that no longer exist. Like the story of the Jewish Nation itself, this story is one of miraculous survival and a passionate, steadfast commitment to the preservation and everlasting endurance of a sacred tradition. It is known with certainty, Rabbi Goldhaber says, that the Codex was written in the early 10 th century, in Tiberias, a city on the shore of the Lake of the Galilee (Kinneret) in northern Israel. The text was then carefully reviewed by Ben- Asher, who also added scholarly notations. While some scholars maintain that Ben-Asher belonged to the heretical Karaite sect, that denied the authority of the rabbinic oral tradition, Rabbi Goldhaber dismisses this claim, while acknowledging that the Karaites played a major role in the text’s preservation after its composition. Indeed, around a century after it was written, the book was purchased by a wealthy individual named Israel Ben Simcha of Basra, who donated it to the Karaite community of Jerusalem. In 1099, the Catholic Church in Europe launched the First Crusade, and the crusading army captured Jerusalem from the Fatimid Caliphate that had controlled the region. During the conquest, the Crusaders looted the manuscript. Knowing how valuable the text was – and how high a ransom they could demand for it – the soldiers were careful not to damage the document. It is believed that Egyptian Jews later ransomed the Codex for an exorbitant price, and had it brought to the city of Fustat (now part of Cairo), which was home to a large Jewish community. The Rambam, who had fled with his family from Cordova, Spain, following the Almohad conquest, settled in Fustat around the year 1168. As mentioned, the Rambam in his writings makes reference to a Torah scroll which was known throughout in Egypt for its authenticity, and it certainly stands to reason that he refers to the Keter Arab Tzova. At some point in the 1400s, the Codex ended up in Aleppo, Syria. Historians believe that it was included among the ancient manuscripts brought to Syria by Rabbi David Ben Yehoshua, a seventh-generation descendant of the Rambam, who traveled from Egypt to Syria, where he settled. The Codex Sassoon On May 17,2023, the Codex Sassoon, a leather-bound, handwritten parchment volume containing a nearly complete Hebrew Bible, was purchased by former U.S. Ambassador to Romania Alfred H. Moses for $38.1 million on behalf of the American Friends of ANU and donated to ANU Museum of the Jewish People in Tel Aviv, Israel. The manuscript is the world’s oldest nearly complete copy of the Hebrew Bible. It was handwritten roughly 1,100 years ago on 792 pages of sheepskin, includes all 24 books of the Bible and is missing only about eight pages. The Aleppo Codex Travelogue 20 COMMUNITY MAGAZINE