The Aleppo Codex is one of the books that is a struggle to classify. It is a great thriller, a fascinating piece of history, a captivating human drama and a beautiful study of religion and politics which will appeal to atheists and the apolitical alike. It is the true story the most perfect copy of the Hebrew Bible, written in …

In the city of Tiberias on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee around the year 930 A.D., the swift scribe Shlomo Ben-Buya’a under the direction of the scholar Aaron Ben-Asher created a perfect copy of 24 books of the Old Testament in Hebrew. The codex, or book, represented generations of study and was meant to be a reference …

TORONTO – Toronto-born Jerusalem journalist Matti Friedman has published a cracking good yarn. If you like historical detective stories or mysteries, The Aleppo Codex is an excellent example of the genre – and it’s not even fiction. Anyone who looks into the history of the text of the Hebrew Bible very quickly comes across the work of the Masoretes, rabbinical …

Many medieval manuscripts have obscure pasts, but the Aleppo codex has a history that only became murky in the 20th century. A bound copy of the Tanakh (the Hebrew bible) more than a thousand years old, the codex was always considered the most authoritative representative of the tradition by which the Jewish Scriptures have been preserved. We know when and …

The Aleppo Codex is part historical exposé, part international thriller, and part meditation on the passions awakened by religion and religious artifacts. In this book, Matti Friedman carefully outlines the epic journey of The Crown of Aleppo, the most perfect copy of the Jewish Torah. The Crown was inscribed in 930 AD by the scholar Aaron Ben-Asher and is thought …

Rival Owners, Sacred Text The story of how the most authoritative manuscript of the Hebrew Bible, spirited to Aleppo in the 14th century, found its way to Israel. By Benjamin Balint In Jerusalem, a gleaming white dome and a black basalt wall shield Israel’s greatest treasures—not bejeweled crowns or scepters but unadorned texts. Visitors to the Shrine of the Book, …

Click here for an interview on The Aleppo Codex with Krys Boyd of KERA, a great public radio station broadcasting to north Texas.        

‘A window onto 1,000 turbulent years crucial to understanding today’s Mideast’ Journalist and author Matti Friedman discusses his new book, the Aleppo Codex, and the significance today for this often overlooked chapter in Jewish history. Shmuel Rosner We should first provide some explanation for those who haven’t yet read the ‎book: What is the Codex and why is it important?‎ ‎  …

For full May 31 interview with host Rich Fisher click here.

For an excerpt from The Aleppo Codex, click here.