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Bidding Information
Lot #    25752
Auction End Date    1/12/2010 12:27:00 PM (mm/dd/yyyy)
          
Title Information
Title (English)    Ha-Atikat ha-Igeret - Ten Lost Tribes of Israel
Title (Hebrew)    העתקת האגרת- עשרת השבטים
Author    [Isaac Ha-Levi]
City    [Bombay]
Publication Date    [1886]
          
Collection Information
Independent Item    This listing is an independent item not part of any collection
          
Description Information
Physical
Description		    Lithography, 16,16 pp.,154:110 mm., light age staining, small tears in margins, 16 p. of square script and 16 p. of Rashi script. A good copy bound in modern cloth boards.
          
Detailed
Description		    Hebrew and Arabic. In the mid-17th century, about the time of the Chmielnicki massacres in the Ukraine, interest in the Lost Ten Tribes of Israel, or the Bnei Moshe ("sons of Moses"), prompted an emissary from Israel, Baruch Gad, to travel eastward in search of them. He returned to Jerusalem, claiming to have found them in Persia and to have brought back a letter from them. The letter was published many times, its credibility accepted by some and not by others. The search for the Lost Tribes continued.

In 1883, another emissary from Israel, Isaac bar Hayyim Baruch Ha-Levi, made the attempt, hoping that the Ten Lost Tribes would be able to help their co-religionists, then suffering from the pogroms in Russia. He took with him a letter from the Chief Rabbi of Tiberias to give to the leaders of the Lost Tribes. Arriving in Calcutta, he announced his mission in the Jewish newspaper, HaPerah, and asked for monetary help, which he received. In a subsequent advertisement, he announced that he knew where the Lost Tribes were, and needed 10 men to accompany him to Tibet via Darjeeling. In 1885, in Bombay, he published several Messianic pamphlets. But in the followjng year, Ha-Levi was stopped at the border by the English, who considered him a spy, and he left India. Before his departure, he wrote a farewell letter in HaPerah, claiming that the English had stopped him because they did not want him to bring the Messiah, and urging the Indian Jews to continue the struggle to find the Ten Lost Tribes. He also published n1)~i1 npmm [Ha-Atikat ha-Igeret), which contains the story of Baruch Gad, the letter he supposedly brought back from the Bne; Moshe, and 3 poems, all translated into Arabic. The book includes a crude map (p. 8) which purports to be a map of the dwelling-place of the Ten Lost Tribes beyond the river Sam bat yon. The text claims that the country resembles Jerusalem!

          
Paragraph 2    ... ששלחו בני משה רבינו ע"ה ע"י ר"ג [הועתקה על-ידי ר' יצחק הלוי]...

עברית וערבית. מקום ושנת הדפוס על-פי א' יערי, הדפוס העברי בארצות המזרח, חלק ב, עמ' 60-61, מס' 40. ועיין גם: א' יערי, שליחים מארץ ישראל לעשרת השבטים - סיני, כרך ו, ת"ש, עמ' תעח. בלא-שער. נוסח האיגרת שונה משל ההוצאות האחרות של "אגרת בני משה". כולל גם שלושה שירים: [א] ברוך בא בשם ה', שבת קודש מאור עיני. שיר לשבת ... שחיבר ... ח"ר ששון [ב"ר מרדכי שנדוך] זיע"א. אוצר השירה והפיוט, ב, עמ' 74, מס' 1650. [ב] אל קומם סוכתך נופלת. שיר שכתב ... ר' ששון מרדכי [שנדוך]. שם, א, עמ' 185, מס' 4004. [ג] אשיר שירים לאל בביאת הגואל. סימן אברהם, שם, שם, עמ' 361, מס' 7989.

          
Reference
Description		    Yaari Bombay #40 - gives collation of 16 pp. only, CD-EPI 01141 29
        
Associated Images
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Listing Classification
Period
19th Century:    Checked
  
Location
Other:    India
  
Subject
History:    Checked
  
Characteristic
Language:    Hebrew, Judeo-Arabic
  
Manuscript Type
  
Kind of Judaica