The Sarajevo Haggadah

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The Sarajevo Haggadah: A Masterpiece of Jewish Art and Its Incredible Journey From Catalonia to Bosnia.

 

Nowadays considered Bosnia and Herzegovina's most valuable national art treasure, the Sarajevo Haggadah is popularly known as the most beautiful Hebrew book ever produced. The famous illuminated Haggadah was created in the second quarter of the fourteenth century in one of the Jewish communities in the northeastern part of the Kingdom of Aragon (Catalonia). The fascinating illuminations reflect the high cultural and artistic achievements of Sephardic Jewry at the time. The fate of the codex after the expulsion of the Jews from Spain (1492), until it eventually reached Sarajevo, remains a mystery. What we do know is that in 1894, a member of the Sarajevo Sephardic community sold it to the new National Museum that was established in the city a few years earlier. Under the Austro-Hungarians, the manuscript became the theme for the first-ever monograph on a Judaic work of art. During the 20th century, the valuable manuscript was involved in a series of unusual and fateful events. It was sought after by the Nazis, hidden by a Muslim librarian, robbed by art thieves, endangered during the Bosnian War of the 1990s, hidden in the underground vault of the National Bank - and miraculously saved from ruin, time and again. The current Jewish community of Sarajevo claims some rights to the Haggadah and was actually allowed to use the original codex in a communal Seder in 1995. A source of inspiration for modern artists and the subject of a suspense novel (by Geraldine Brooks), this manuscript which was hidden from the public eye for centuries continues to fascinate and capture the imagination of many.

 

Shalom Sabar is Professor Emeritus of Jewish Art and Folklore at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He received his Ph.D. in Art History at the University of California, Los Angeles in 1987. He is the author of about 250 publications that explore Jewish art and the material culture of Jewish communities in the Sephardic and Ashkenazic world in Europe and the Islamic East. His areas of research include Jewish ceremonies and rituals, life cycle events, objects of daily life, ephemera, folk art, amulets, and magic as well as the visual culture of illustrated Hebrew books and manuscripts. Shalom Sabar is also an avid collector of Israeli and Jewish ephemera and has guided numerous traveling seminars to Jewish sites in Europe, North Africa, India, and Central Asia.

 

Sunday, April 2, 8 pm Israel /7 pm CET /6 pm UK /1 pm EST