Bidspirit auction | Haggadah Shel Pesach 'Chaim LaRosh'

Haggadah Shel Pesach 'Chaim LaRosh' by Rabbi Chaim Palagi — Izmir, 5612 [1852]. The first of the works of the Gaon Rabbi Chaim Palagi that survived the Great Fire. Rabbi Chaim’s own copy… with his annotations… - Haggadah Shel Pesach with commentaries, laws, and customs by the great Rabbi Chaim Palagi, Av Beis Din of Izmir. Izmir, 5612 [1852]. First edition. Otzar HaHaggados, 959. Plucked from the Fire On the night of 11 Av 5601 [1841], a great fire broke out in Izmir, in which most of the Jewish homes were destroyed and the residents were left without shelter. That same night, Rabbi Chaim suffered a personal tragedy as well: fifty-four manuscripts of his own writings were consumed by the flames and lost. Only fourteen compositions survived, after his disciple entered a basement engulfed in flames and rescued a chest of manuscripts. The present sefer was the first to be printed from among the works that were saved, and therefore the author called it Chaim LaRosh. Thus the author describes in his introduction the disaster that befell him and the rescue of his writings, and in this work, which was the first to go to press: “And from Hashem came the matter that I called it by the name Chaim LaRosh… for this one came forth first to the altar of print from the compositions that G-d saved for us from the fire… and through our sins, on that night most of my Torah which I had nurtured and increased was burned…” On the title page, ownership inscription of Mordechai Zechariah Bachar. Several lengthy marginal annotations in Eastern manuscript hand throughout the volume. Izmir, 5612 [1852]. First edition. Details: 52, 112 leaves. 17 cm. Wine stains on several leaves of the Haggadah. Worming to margins with text loss. Several leaves detached from the binding. Condition varies; fair to poor.