Auction 96 Early Printed Books, Chassidut and Kabbalah, Books Printed in Jerusalem, Letters and Manuscripts

Kol MeHeichal – Halukka Controversy – Jerusalem, 1885

Opening: $300
Sold for: $500
Including buyer's premium

Printed booklet, Kol MeHeichal, polemic against the people of the New Yishuv who opposed the Halukka system of charity distribution in Eretz Israel. [Jerusalem: Yoel Moshe Salomon, 1885]. Printed without title page.
The booklet contains the printed signatures of about eighty leaders of the Ashkenazi Perushim and Chassidic communities.
The author of the booklet is apparently the famous traveler R. Yaakov Sapir. The author describes the economic contributions of the Old Yishuv in contrast to the passivity of the new settlers, and goes on to describe the strain on the Halukka donations in Jerusalem as a result of refugees from the pogroms in Russia and Romania in 1881.
This booklet raised much interest in its time, and was the Old Yishuv's official response to the polemic against the Halukka institutions.


8 pages. 20.5 cm. Dry, brittle paper. Fair condition. Many stains. Wear. Many tears, including open tears, partially repaired with tape. Old binding.


Sh. Halevy, no. 529 (who calls this "an especially rare booklet").
Recorded in the Bibliography of the Hebrew Book project based on a photocopy.

Early Hebrew Books and Broadsides Printed in Jerusalem
Early Hebrew Books and Broadsides Printed in Jerusalem