I came across an interesting book review for an interesting (I hope) book about the oldest copy of the Hebrew bible-the Aleppo Codex. It traces back to two scribes living by the Sea of Galilee in the 10th century who wanted to create a copy of the bible that would be a template for future generations. It then traveled to Jerusalem, Egypt, and finally arriving in the Syrian city of Aleppo where it stayed for 600 years. In the 1950's it makes its way back to Jerusalem but a controversy arises over how it got there. Aleppo's rabbi's contend that the codex was taken by Itzhak Ben-Zvi, who smuggled it out of Aleppo when the Jewish quarter was being plundered in riots, and given to the Israeli gov't without their permission. Ben-Zvi happens to be the second Prime Minister of Israel-an interesting aside.
Matti Friedman, the author of The Aleppo Codex, investigates this story and also the mystery of what happened to the missing pages of the text, about 200 pages or 40% of the document.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303918204577448610210896018.html
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