Rare Hebrew Books,
Including Six Incunabula
From the Collection of the late
Dr. Michael D. Paul of
St. John’s, Newfoundland.
* With a Fine Isidor Kaufmann Portrait Painting.
Montreal born Dr. Michael David Paul (1954-2024) was a respected professor of medicine specializing in nephrology who devoted himself to the citizens of Newfoundland and Labrador for more than forty years.
Alongside his teaching and medical practice, Dr. Paul served as the long-time President of the small Jewish community of St. John’s. His many interests included travel, philanthropy, but especially book-collecting - alongside related study and research.
Of all the many clients I have been privileged to know in my forty year book career, Dr. Paul was among the most learned and certainly the most interesting.
May his soul receive its eternal reward and may his memory forever be blessed.
DEK
Spring, 2025.
* Most of the books offered here from Dr. Paul’s library, contain his small embossed stamp, generally affixed to the title-page.
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LOT 23:
ASCHKENAZI, ELIEZER HAROPHÉ.
more...
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Sold for: $2,600
Price including buyer’s premium:
$
3,250
Start price:
$
900
Estimate :
$1,200 - $1,800
Buyer's Premium: 25%
sales tax: 8.875%
On the lot's price and buyer's premium
Users from foreign countries may be exempted from tax payments, according to the relevant tax regulations
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ASCHKENAZI, ELIEZER HAROPHÉ.
Ma’asei Hashem [commentary to the Six Days of Creation, Ethics of the Fathers, the Passover Hagadah (with text) and various Biblical portions].
FIRST EDITION. Title within woodcut architectural arch.
ff. (6), 197. Ex-library, touch stained, small blank portion of title removed, signed by censor on last page. Modern half-morocco. Folio.
Vinograd, Venice 661; Stefansky, Sifrei Yesod 453.
Venice, Giovanni di Gara, 1583.
R. Eliezer Aschkenazi (1513-86) held influential positions in widely scattered Jewish communities from Egypt, Cyprus and Italy to the major 16th century centers of Poland, where he died. As a biblical exegete, Aschkenazi follows the rationalist trend in rabbinical scholarship. He suggests that irrational elements in Jewish tradition had occurred due to copyists’ errors, misunderstandings and misreadings, or had been inserted during times of political and social troubles, or even interposed by adversaries.
The commentary on the Hagadah here annotates in an Aggadic vein alongside a mystical explication and served as a basis for many later commentators. It was very popular and has been republished numerous times to this day.
