SERVICE FOR THE TWO FIRST NIGHTS OF PASSOVER, TRANSLATED BY DAVID LEVI, LONDON: D. LEVI, 1794
Auction Closed
November 20, 08:47 PM GMT
Estimate
12,000 - 16,000 USD
Lot Details
Description
SERVICE FOR THE TWO FIRST NIGHTS OF PASSOVER, TRANSLATED BY DAVID LEVI, LONDON: D. LEVI, 1794
42 folios (8 x 4 3/4 in.; 202 x 120 mm) (foliation: [1]-39r; pagination: [1]-7) on paper. Hebrew and English on facing pages; instructions in Hebrew, English, and often Ladino; Yiddish translations of three hymns at the rear. Scattered staining; light browning and foxing; pencil marks on f. 16r. Modern gilt-tooled calf, slightly scuffed; title, author, and date lettered in gilt on spine; turn-ins and edges gilt; modern marbled paper flyleaves and pastedowns. Housed in a matching marbled cardboard slipcase.
A fine copy of the precursor to the first American Haggadah, with distinguished Canadian Jewish provenance.
Recognizing the need for accurate English versions of primary Jewish texts, David Levi continued his translation efforts with the present work. This “bicultural” volume, suitable for use by both Ashkenazim and Sephardim, improved upon the very first English translation of the Haggadah ever published, which was printed by Alexander Alexander in London in 1770. Like Alexander, Levi included Hebrew and English on facing pages (through f. 35r), instructions in Ladino at various points throughout the Seder, and Yiddish translations of Addir hu and Had gadya at the rear (Levi also added a Yiddish version of Ehad mi yodea); but while Alexander printed two separate Haggadot, one for Ashkenazim and the other for Sephardim, Levi integrated the common elements of each rite and, where they differed (e.g., korekh and birkat ha-mazon), printed alternate versions of the same text preceded by special rubrics. In addition, Levi’s Haggadah also featured seven pages of explanatory notes in English at the rear.
Like some of Levi’s other works (see lot 62), this edition of the traditional Passover Seder liturgy became the standard translation used by English Jews and would serve as the basis for subsequent publications both in England and the United States. In fact, the first American Haggadah, published by S.H. Jackson in New York City in 1837 with the title Seder haggadah shel pesah meturgam mi-leshon ha-kodesh li-leshon englatera (2nd ed.: 1850), was essentially a reprint of Levi’s edition. For this reason, the Service for the Two First Nights of Passover remains an immensely important milestone in the histories of both British Jewry and Jewish liturgical translation writ large.
In addition to a beautiful binding, the present copy of the Haggadah boasts distinguished Canadian Jewish provenance. According to the inscription on the first page of the explanatory notes, it was given by Dorothea Hart (1747-1827) to her grandson Moses Eleazer David (1813-1892) in 1822. Dorothea Catherine (nee Judah) was the wife of Aaron Philip Hart (1724-1800), a London-born Ashkenazic Jew who moved to Canada about 1760, settling in Trois-Rivières, and was reputed at the time of his death to be the wealthiest man in the British colonies. David’s paternal grandfather, Lazarus (1734-1776), helped found the Shearith Israel Congregation, the oldest in Canada, and the latter’s son Moses (1767-1814) was the first Jewish settler of Windsor, Ontario. Moses Eleazer, the first Jew born in the Windsor area, was also an active member of Montreal’s Shearith Israel community.
Provenance
“the gift of Dorothea Hart to Moses Eleazer David May 12th 1822 / Mrs. Hart 3 Rivers Canada” (p. [1])
Literature
Joseph Jacobs and Lucien Wolf, Bibliotheca Anglo-Judaica: A Bibliographical Guide to Anglo-Jewish History (London: Office of the “Jewish Chronicle,” 1888), 175 (no. 1535).
Jonathan V. Plaut, The Jews of Windsor, 1790-1990: A Historical Chronicle (Toronto: Dundurn Press, 2007), ch. 1 (“Moses David: Windsor’s First Jewish Settler”).
Richard H. Popkin, “David Levi, Anglo-Jewish Theologian,” Jewish Quarterly Review 87,1-2 (1996): 79-101.
Cecil Roth, “Ha-defus ha-ivri be-london: nissayon bibli’ogerafi,” Kiryat sefer 14,1-3 (1937): 97-104, 379-387, at p. 379 (no. 70).
David B. Ruderman, Jewish Enlightenment in an English Key: Anglo-Jewry’s Construction of Modern Jewish Thought (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000).
Simeon Singer, “Early Translations and Translators of the Jewish Liturgy in England,” Transactions of the Jewish Historical Society of England 3 (1896-1898): 36-71, at pp. 56-71.
Denis Vaugeois, Les premiers juifs d’Amérique, 1760-1860: l’extraordinaire histoire de la famille Hart
A (Quebec: Septentrion; Paris: PUPS, 2012), 302.
Vinograd, London 137
Avraham Yaari, Bibli’ogerafyah shel haggadot pesah me-reshit ha-defus ve-ad ha-yom (Jerusalem: Bamberger & Wahrman, 1960), 25 (no. 254).
Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi, Haggadah and History (Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society, 2005), plates 74, 93.
Isaac Yudlov, Otsar ha-haggadot: bibli’ogerafyah shel haggadot pesah me-reshit ha-defus ha-ivri ad shenat [5]720 (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1997), 33 (no. 371).