Arba’ah Turim [Rabbinic Code of Law]

JACOB BEN ASHER.

Chaim bar David, Yoseph bar Yakar, Yitzchak bar Chaim

Augsburg

1540

Four parts bound in one. Title page without ornamentation. On f.7 ornate woodcut border by Hans Holbein the Younger (partially censored) depicting the Creation, architectural pillars flanked by Kings David and Solomon clutching scrolls inscribed “The Path of Life (Orach Chaim) Journeys Upwards for the Wise” (Proverbs 15:24). Poem at end by Elijah Levita. Scattered marginalia in an early hand especially Orach Chaim ff. 88-89.

Vinograd, Augsburg 11; Adams J-14; St. Cat. Bodl. 5500:7 (ed. rara); Mehlman 728.

Jacob ben Asher’s Tur. A Rare and Important German Edition. A fundamental Rabbinic treatise embracing all the laws and customs incumbent both on an individual and the community as a whole. Its over riding authority has been recognized and accepted by Jewish scholars for generations. The publisher praises this edition on the title-page as follows: “All previous editions of the Turim have faults and are crippled… especially the last two parts… I called upon my son-in-law Yoseph bar Yakar and told him… you are a scholar, dig into the depths of the halacha… you must repair the problems. …We obtained a Tur that was checked and corrected by our teacher, HaGaon R. Abraham of Prague the “Light of our Generation” and compared every page two or three times.” <