Hagadah shel Pesach im Peirush Kethav Yad MeHaRav...Michel Ber [Oppenheim] Av Beth Din Kehilah Kedoshah Friedberg...VeKehilah Kedoshah Oibibach [Offenbach]

(HAGADAH).

Mainz

(1772-1800)

Hebrew manuscript on paper. Penned around a printed Hagadah laid onto larger sheets. Written in an elegant, cursive Ashkenazic hand, with square headings, two columns ruled in red. The penultimate leaf written in a highly-styled geometric form with artistic flourishes at the base. From the Dorothy Parker Estate

AN ORIGINAL, EXTENSIVE AND UNPUBLISHED HAGADAH COMMENTARY This extensive manuscript commentary is densely written around a rare printed Hagadah (published in Frankfurt, 1749 - see Yudlov, 205) each page of which has been pasted onto larger folio leaves. It contains lengthy halachic, pilpulistic, aggadic and kabbalistic discourses pertaining to the Hagadah and the Passover holiday in general. The author, R. Michel Ber Oppenheim (d. 1750) was the son-in-law of the bibiophile, Chief Rabbi David Oppenheim of Prague. R. Michel Ber's father Aaron, was a wealthy community leader in Frankfurt (see M. Horowitz. Frankfurter Rabbinen p. 294) who published a commemorative pamphlet "Seder VeHanhagath Nisuin," (Frankfurt, 1701), in honor of his son's wedding (see St. Cat. Bodl. 3968). R. Michel Ber was appointed Rabbi of Offenbach and later served as Chief Rabbi of Friedberg for 42 years. He wrote many approbations to scholarly works in accordance with his highly regarded status. Some of his manuscripts under the title "Michal Mayim" are housed in the Bodleian Library, Oxford (see Neubauer no. 261). The scribe of this manuscript R. Yaakov b. Baruch Noimberg of Mainz records on the title-page that he copied the work from the original manuscript in 1772, when he was a student at the Yeshiva of R. Tevele Scheuer in Mainz. Years later in 1800, Noimberg presented the manuscript as a wedding gift to his disciple Yozel Wolf Speyer. See L. Lowenstein, David Oppenheim, in Gedenkbuch fuer David Kaufmann (Breslau, 1900) pp. 550-51