Lot 129
Das Buch Bahir - Gershom Scholem's Doctoral Dissertation - Berlin, 1923 - Dedication in Dov Sadan's Handwriting
Das Buch Bahir Sepher Ha-Bahir. Ein Text aus der Fruhzeit der Kabbala auf Grund eines kritischen Textes ins Deutsche ubersetzt und kommentiert. Inaugural-Diskussion zur Erlangung der Doktorwurde der Philosophischen Fakultat (I. Sektion) der Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitat zu Munchen [The Bahir. Work from the Early Kabbalah Period... Translated to German, with Commentary... Ph.D. Dissertation], by Gerhard [Gershom] Scholem. Berlin: Arthur Scholem, 1923. German.
A copy of Gershom Scholem's doctoral dissertation - an annotated copy of the "Bahir". On the title page is a dedication in the handwriting of Dov Sadan: "...A rare book, one of the first fruits of its author's scholarship of the occult" [Hebrew].
The "Bahir" (considered the first work in the history of Kabbalah) was one of the two major subjects of Gershom Scholem's scholarship: the early Kabbalah, and the Sabbatean movement. Scholem, who called the book's appearance "a renewed explosion of myth in the heart of Judaism", studied it his entire life, and in 1948 even published a historical monograph on the subject ("Reshit HaKabbalah", Schocken, 1948). This dissertation is the "first harbinger" of his wide-ranging scholarship, paving the way and laying the foundations of his later works. This is Scholem's first original work to be published.
[2] leaves, 171, [1] pp. Approx. 25 cm. Good-fair overall condition. Creases and stains, dampstains on all the leaves. A few folds to leaf corners. A number of notes, in pencil, on some of the leaves (Hebrew). Damaged binding, with open tears to spine.
