The real commercial value of most 18/19th cent. torah scrolls is $500-$1000 if bought individually, half that if bought in bulk. There are 1000s available for sale at any time. Why does the IRS routinely grant tax deductions of well over $10k per scroll?
reiss-sohn.de/en/lots/9454-A… Image
The scroll shown above was deservedly unsold on the last Reiss auction at a reserve of EUR 1500. It's incomplete (missing the first part of Genesis), but it's an Ashkenazi tradition scroll, which is vastly less common than the more usually found Sephardic ones from North Africa.
The wildly inflated valuations for these scrolls that the IRS have accepted - coupled with the vast numbers bought by a handful of wealthy Christian collectors & institutions - effectively means the US taxpayer has subsidized a small group of evangelical Christian billionaires.
At the same time, the activities of provenance researchers, motivated sometimes by anti-Christian animus, and taking offense on behalf of Jews about something most actual Jews are indifferent to, have made things worse - by implying that there is academic importance to these mss.
Overwhelmingly, 18th/19th cent. torah scrolls are uninteresting from an academic perspective. The vast majority will never be studied, and never be worthy of study. The exist in enormous numbers, with only tiny variations, which, even where they exist, are seldom of importance.
The are in many ways exactly analogous with 18th/19th century printed bibles - while there are a limited number of exceptions here and there, the vast majority are without interest, and worth only their handling cost and whatever premium is put on their decorative character.
[For those unfamiliar with how this works, it's not the receiving institution - church or church-affiliated organization - that receives the tax deduction, it's the wealthy - often billionaire level - evangelical donors who buy and then donate the scrolls that get the deduction.]
Here's another example of a torah scroll for sale: this time a Sephardic tradition scroll from the Middle East or North Africa, coming up for sale on auction in Israel. If it sells, it's likely to fetch very close to the $500 reserve price.
judaica.bidspirit.com/ui/lotPage/sou… Image
To be crystal clear: these scrolls generally cost between $500 and $1000 each to buy (at most). They are routinely appraised for donation & tax deduction purposes - using methods the IRS accepts as legitimate & justifiable - at a value per scroll of between $10 000 and $50 000+.

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More from @incunabula

1 Nov
Take a wild guess which country's flag @FadahJassem, Twitter's new Editorial Curation Lead for MENA [Middle East and North Africa countries] "inadvertently" left out of her tweet..... Image
"It seems I've inadvertently caused a flag flutter because I forgot to add some flags" Image
I'm sure that tweet was just an isolated mistake.... ImageImage
Read 7 tweets
21 Oct
This circa 1665 painting of the Annunciation by the relatively obscure Dutch genre painter Godfried Schalcken (1643 - 1706) gets something exactly right, that almost all other artists - including many far more famous than Schalcken - get wrong. Can you see what it is? 1/
Here is Godfried Schalcken's version vs El Greco's..... 2/
And here is his version vs Titian's. Can you see the key difference yet? 3/
Read 5 tweets
14 Oct
I'm trying to identify the writer of these notes on a Coptic ostracon, most likely an Austrian papyrologist or coptologist. The paper and ink suggests a date between the 1930s and 1950s, but it could be earlier or later than that.
Does anyone here recognize the handwriting?
A comment was made by @V_Feuerstein that the German handwriting looked older, more like 1890-1910. This is perfectly possible and I'd welcome more comments on this from German speakers - are there particular features in the handwriting that indicate an earlier date range to you?
Some very interesting and useful replies so far, thank you to @V_Feuerstein, @madcynic and @sista_ray. In case it helps, here is another sample of the handwriting.
Read 7 tweets
6 Oct
"Perversely, those looters' inscriptions are good legal provenance, from the market's point of view. You need only look at the auction results."

This is a long but absolutely fascinating and important thread, which hasn't had anything like the recognition it deserves.
HT @hchesner for flagging this up.
“This book was taken out of a large Joss House in "Chin Kiang Foo" - the day after it was taken. 21st July 1842. S.F.”
Read 4 tweets
3 Oct
Come for the posture, stay for the trousers: Captain Godfrey Rodrigues' "Correct Posture - It's Meaning and It's Results", printed in Chicago, 1925. Our hero, Capt Rodrigues, was apparently known as "The Tsar of Posture", although not, alas, as "The Tsar of The Possessive Its"... ImageImage
The book recounts the philosophy of physical health (basically, don't overstrain, but take lots of long country walks while holding in your stomach) of Captain Rodrigues, who is, as you'd expect, featured prominently in all his *HAWT* glory... Image
To add spice though, various other muscled athletic men are shown, also shirtless of course - with dire warnings that they all died young due to excessive exercise and their failure to adopt Captain Rodrigues's rules of good posture... Image
Read 4 tweets
3 Oct
In which country's households are you most likely to find a copy of the Talmud? Surprisingly, the answer is probably not Israel.
The country where the Talmud is ubiquitous, where it's quoted by sports stars & celebrities, where it's sold at station kiosks, is... SOUTH KOREA. 1/
Across all editions, the Talmud may be the single bestselling book title in Korea, behind only the Bible.
More than 800 different books, from more than 300 publishers, are returned when you search for “Talmud” in the National Digital Library of Korea. 2/
In 2011, the Korean Ambassador to Israel, was interviewed on Israeli TV. “I want to show you this,” he told the host. It was a paperback book with “Talmud” written in Korean and English on the cover, along with a cartoon sketch of a Biblical character with a robe & staff. 3/
Read 15 tweets

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