The Lailashi Codex: The Crown of Georgian Jewry, Thea Gomelauri with a contribution by Joseph Ginsberg. Oxford, UK: Taylor Institution Library, 2023. (ISBN 9781838464158; ISBN 9781838464141), 210 pp., hb £49.99, pb £34:99.
The pioneering study of Thea Gomelauri unfolds the history of the Lailashi Codex, and presents the paleographical and codicological description of one of the most ancient Bible codices. The Lailashi Codex, named after the remote mountainous village in Western Georgia, is the Masoretic Pentateuch adorned with micrographic ornaments. According to the local tradition, it possesses miraculous superpowers and was brought to the village on angels’ wings.
In the first part of the book, the author traces the history of the manuscript since its earliest reference by the Jewish maskil and ethnographer Joseph Judah Chorny who visited Georgia in 1869, and was permitted to see the manuscript. Gomelauri restores the “biography” of the codex based on the documentary evidence to the present day. The author further presents previously unknown materials about the codex’s vicissitudes during the Soviet period, including its confiscation by the communists in 1939 and the transfer to the Jewish Historic-Ethnographic Museum in Tbilisi which promoted atheism and Soviet culture among the local Jewish population. These events took place against the backdrop of the arrests and executions of the Jewish community leaders. The Lailashi Codex played a determinant role in the recovery and preservation of one of the greatest Georgian national treasures – a portrait of Georgian Medieval Poet Shota Rustaveli. According to the author, certain criminal elements tried to get the Lailashi Codex into their hands after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
The second part of the book provides a detailed description of the Lailashi Pentateuch. The author discusses the circumstances surrounding the disappearance of several leaves, as well as the eventual recovery of some of them by Joseph Ginzberg in the National Library of Israel. Gomelauri’s study together with Ginsberg’s contribution includes an analysis of previously missing leaves. Unlike its counterparts such as the Leningrad or the Aleppo codices, the Lailashi Codex was unknown to the scholarly world until recently. It is not mentioned in Israel Yeivin’s list of important Masoretic Bibles published in his classic Introduction to the Tiberian Masorah. Professor Giorgi Tsereteli, a founder of the Faculty of Oriental Studies at Tbilisi State University, claimed in 1969 that the manuscript dates from the tenth century. However, it has never been studied by paleographers. Tsereteli’s study contains numerous mistakes in timeline, history, page count, and other important characteristics of the codex. The foreword of a single facsimile copy of the Lailashi Codex also contains multiple inaccuracies as it is based on Tsereteli’s work. Gomelauri’s research highlights these issues and sets the record straight once and for all.
Written with dark ink in three columns (except for the Song of the Sea and Song of Moses which are written in different styles designated for poetic passages), the codex includes a Tiberian vocalization, and the notes of Masorah Magna and Masorah Parva. It is one of the striking examples of the Hebrew Bible manuscripts known as Vavei Haʿamudim, which requires that words beginning with the letter vav should be the first words on each leaf of the codex except for six specific cases defined by the scribal tradition. The Lailashi manuscript belongs to the Oriental scribal school and reveals an extraordinary planning method by which the scribe arrived at predetermined words in the first lines of opening columns with minimal use of line fillers. 79,847 words and 304,805 letters of the Pentateuch are arranged in such a way that 166 leaves start with the letter vav without splitting a biblical verse on the recto side of folios. According to the Masoretic tradition, the midpoint of the whole Pentateuch (and all biblical books except for Numbers) is marked by a special graphic design combining words with ornaments. The scribe of the Lailashi Codex used a midpoint marking system similar to the Leningrad Codex. However, a scribe of the Leningrad Codex did not succeed in arriving at the middle verse of the Torah in the first line of the middle leaf of the book, as it was successfully achieved in the Lailashi Codex. Weekly periscopes are indicated in the margin by the word פרש which appear as embellished symbols and in most cases are similar to the Leningrad Codex. According to the author, the codex was proofread by two scribes. The Lailashi Codex includes numerous calligrams and mnemonic phrases, which are analyzed for the first time. T. Gomelauri pays special attention to the micrography of the Lailashi Codex which exhibits a certain affinity with the Leningrad Codex, and provides rich illustrations. The manuscript does not contain carpet pages, but its leaves are adorned with beautiful and complex micrographic patterns decorated with shapes of semi-circles, circles, tear droplets, zigzags with circles, triangles, and others.
The book includes a contribution by Joseph Ginsberg who uncovered three missing leaves of the Lailashi Codex in the National Library of Israel. His comparative analysis of Haʾazinu between the Lailashi and Aleppo codices demonstrates unique nuances and has significant importance for scholars who study the evolution of scribal practices.
The novel study of T. Gomelauri contributes to several disciplines, including the Transmission of the Hebrew Bible, Jewish Scribal Practices, Textual Criticism, Manuscript Studies, History and Culture of Georgian Jewry, Jewish Art, etc. The analysis of the Lailashi Codex together with its para-textual elements opens a venue for further interdisciplinary research. One of the most important questions which requires more investigation is the provenance of the Lailashi Codex. T. Gomelauri discusses certain similarities between the Lailashi Codex and other ancient Oriental codices, but she rightly abstains from making ultimate judgments until the conclusion of a full-scale study. She suggests that further research into the medieval intellectual life of Georgian Jewry, especially of such figures as the ninth-century Abu Imran Musa al-Tiflis and his followers, and the fourteenth-century scholar Yehosaf al-Tiflisi, might reveal interesting details and enable scholars to come to well-grounded conclusions. While scholars who specialize in the textual history of the Bible will benefit greatly from Thea Gomelauri’s detailed analyses of the manuscript and its unusual features, anyone interested in Biblical Studies or the broader sweep of Jewish history will learn much from the stories and history surrounding the Lailashi Codex and its rediscovery.
Professor Golda Akhiezer is a Senior Lecturer and Professor in the Israel Heritage Department at Ariel University, Israel. She has published extensively on the history and culture of Eastern European Jewry with the main emphasis on Karaism. Her recent publications include “And We Shall Be One People”: Abraham Firkovich, Karaism, and the Samaritans: Abraham Firkovich, Karaism, and the Samaritans. In S. Fine (Ed.), The Samaritans: A Biblical People (Brill, 2022); and Historical Consciousness, Haskalah, and Nationalism among the Karaites of Eastern Europe (Brill, 2017).