Auction 100 – Important Hebrew Manuscripts and Books from the Victor (Avigdor) Klagsbald Collection

Pi Shnayim – Altona, 1735 – Sharp Glosses Handwritten by Rabbi Yaakov Emden Against His Colleague Rabbi Moshe Chagiz

Opening: $2,000
Estimate: $4,000 - $6,000
Sold for: $21,250
Including buyer's premium

Pi Shnayim, commentary on the Order of Zeraim by Rabbenu Asher (the Rosh), with additions by the publisher R. Elisha son of R. Avraham, and novellae by R. Yaakov Emden and R. Moshe Chagiz. Altona: Aharon son of Eliyahu Katz, [1735]. First edition of the commentary of the Rosh to the Order of Zeraim. Contains illustrative diagrams.
This work was published by R. Elisha son of R. Avraham of Grodno from a manuscript belonging to R. David Oppenheim. The book includes approbations by R. Moshe Chagiz, who was in Altona in the year the book was printed, and R. Yaakov Emden (Yaavetz), in Altona that year. R. Yaakov Emden added to his approbation an extract from his novellae to Tractate Rosh Hashanah, which was printed after the publisher's introduction. Several pages of novellae by R. Moshe Chagiz were printed at the end of the book (of which the publisher writes "what I found in the handwriting of the Torah scholar R. Moshe Chagiz of Jerusalem…").
The present copy belonged to R. Yaakov Emden, and contains his autograph glosses in two places in the book:
On the leaf containing the extract from his novellae, R. Yaakov Emden added notations and corrections, as well as a gloss.
In addition, to the novellae of R. Moshe Chagiz, R. Yaakov Emden added several lengthy glosses, most of them sharply-worded dissents criticizing R. Moshe Chagiz: "He speaks at length as if he saw what no one ever saw… he has the way of women…", "I resolved this well, but he didn't understand", "This is also nonsense…", "This is also futile breath and dribble to prolong the study…", "This is nonsense, and he forgot…"; "And he didn't understand the words of the Rashba…"; "He erred… and so why was he so upset, what was my transgression and my sin… he should have been grateful to us for leaving it for him to earn glory from".
In one of the glosses R. Yaakov Emden mentions his work: "…see what I wrote with the help of heaven in Shaar HaShir" (referring to the section on the Pesach Haggadah in his Siddur).

The background to the sharp glosses in the present book is revealed in R. Yaakov Emden's memoirs – Megilat Sefer (first printed in Warsaw, 1896), where R. Yaakov Emden recounts his tension with R. Moshe Chagiz, who was his partner in opposing Sabbateanism (including attacks on R. Yehonatan Eibeshitz and R. Moshe Chaim Luzzatto), and who was his neighbor in Altona for a few years. R. Yaakov Emden recounts that the present book was brought to him for an approbation. At that time, the main text of the book was already printed, and R. Yaakov Emden discovered that R. Moshe Chagiz's novellae printed at the end related to his own ideas in Lechem Shamayim on Tractate Bikurim (1:4). Although R. Moshe Chagiz did not explicitly mention R. Yaakov Emden or his work, R. Yaakov Emden was convinced that he was being referred to, and he felt that R. Moshe Chagiz was making ad hominem attacks on him deriving from personal rivalry and spite. R. Yaakov Emden mentions there that his approbation to the present book contains a veiled reference to R. Chagiz's novellae ("I will also speak, if G-d wills it, against the one who tried to find false pretexts against me…"). Handwritten in his personal copy, the present item, we find R. Yaakov Emden's impassioned responses to R. Moshe Chagiz's claims. R. Yaakov Emden later included the contents of these glosses in a lengthy passage written in response to R. Moshe Chagiz, in his work Asarah HaLechem printed at the end of Responsa She'elat Yaavetz (on Bikurim 1:4), where he adds further details to his account of the incident and to his response to R. Moshe Chagiz.

[6], 8, [8]; 1-21, [7], 29-76, 101-108 leaves (misfoliation). 21 cm. Fair condition. Dark paper. Stains. Tears and significant worming, affecting text, repaired with tape. New binding.

CB, no. 5015,1.

Books by R. Yaakov Emden and Polemics against Sabbateans
Books by R. Yaakov Emden and Polemics against Sabbateans