Hebrew Bible, which is 1,100 years old, sells for $57 million at auction in New York

A 1,100-year-old Hebrew Bible that is one of the world’s oldest surviving biblical manuscripts has sold for $US38 million ($57 million) in New York. 

The Codex Sassoon, a leather-bound, handwritten parchment volume containing a nearly complete Hebrew Bible, was purchased by former US ambassador to Romania Alfred Moses

He bought it on behalf of the American Friends of ANU and donated it to the ANU Museum of the Jewish People in Tel Aviv, where it will join the collection, Sotheby’s, who ran the auction, said in statement.

The manuscript was exhibited at the ANU Museum in March as part of a worldwide tour before the auction.

Sotheby’s Judaica specialist Sharon Liberman Mintz said the $US38 million price tag, which includes the auction house’s fee, “reflects the profound power, influence, and significance of the Hebrew Bible, which is an indispensable pillar of humanity”.

It is one of highest prices for a manuscript sold at auction.

In 2021, a rare copy of the US constitution sold for $US43 million.

Leonardo da Vinci’s Codex Leicester sold for $US31 million in 1994.

Ms Mintz said she was “absolutely delighted” that Codex Sassoon would be making its “grand and permanent return to Israel, on display for the world to see”. 

The Codex Sassoon is believed to have been fabricated sometime between 880 and 960.

It got its name in 1929 when it was purchased by David Solomon Sassoon, a son of an Iraqi Jewish business magnate who filled his London home with his collection of Jewish manuscripts.

Mr Sassoon’s estate was broken up after he died and the biblical codex was sold by Sotheby’s in Zurich in 1978 to the British Rail Pension Fund for around $US320,000.

The pension fund sold the Codex Sassoon 11 years later to banker and art collector Jacqui Safra who bought it for $US3.19 million.

AP