Biur al HaTorah [commentary to the Chumash].

Auction 94 | Thursday, June 17th, 2021 at 11:00am

Rare & Excellent Hebrew Printed Books: From the Library of Arthur A. Marx

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Lot 410

SFORNO, OVADIAH.

Biur al HaTorah [commentary to the Chumash].

<<FIRST EDITION.>> Large printer’s device on title. Initial word of each of the Five Books historiated. A clean, wide-margined copy. ff. 92. Touch stained. Modern blind-tooled morocco. Sm. 4to. Vinograd, Venice 538.

Venice: Giovanni Griffio 1567

Est: $1,500 - $2,000

PRICE REALIZED $3,200

Though written in a deceivingly simple style, Sforno’s commentary here contains great depth and offers original rationales for the various commandments (ta’amei hamitzvoth). True to the humanistic Italian-Jewish tradition, Obadiah Sforno excelled in several diverse fields: Philosophy, mathematics, and particularly medicine. It was he who taught the Hebrew language to the German philo-Semite Johannes Reuchlin (for which Sforno had been criticized by some).