Auction 111 Rare Books, Manuscripts, Letters of Rabbis and Rebbes
Dec 11, 2018 (Your local time)
Israel
 3 Shatner Center 1st Floor Givat Shaul Jerusalem
The auction has ended

LOT 72:

Yalkut Nachmani [1937]. Little Recognized Literary Theft, with Enthusiastic Approbations from Prominent Polish ...

Start price:
$ 200
Estimated price:
$300 - $350
Auction house commission: 22%
VAT: On commission only
tags:

Yalkut Nachmani [1937]. Little Recognized Literary Theft, with Enthusiastic Approbations from Prominent Polish Admors who did not Know that this Book was a Fraud

"... the idea sparkled in his mind to purchase books with other titles and to publish them as his own ..." Rabbi Menachem Kasher.

Little recognized literary theft, with enthusiastic approbations from prominent Polish Admors who were unaware that this book was entirely copied.

The copier hired two Torah scholars from Lodz and instructed them to copy Rabbi Kasher's Torah Shlemah. However, instead of arranging the medrashim according to the verses, per Rabbi Kasher, they organized them in twelve sections. Rabbi Kasher revealed this fraud when he was approached in New York with the claim that somebody had already created a work similar to what he had written. When Rabbi Kasher opened the book he was surprised to discover a lengthy approbation from Rabbi Menachem Ziemba of Warsaw - this was particularly surprising, because Rabbi Ziemba had received a copy of Torah Shlemah. Rabbi Kasher sent a query to Rabbi Ziemba who answered that he had been mistaken, and was very pained. Rabbi Ziemba additionally added that he knew that the author (who had passed away in the interim) had repented and would probably want the information published as an atonement. This prompted Rabbi Kasher to write the entire story in the introduction to Torah Shlemah on Vayakehl-Pekudi. To the credit of the copier, he put in a nice addition to the book - the Divrei Chachamim, featuring large passages from the later authorities.

[4] 347 leaves. 27 cm.

Very fine condition. Original binding.