- [Professor Malachi Beit-Arié passed away on October 17, 2023. This Academia page, curated by Mr. Menachem Butler of C... more[Professor Malachi Beit-Arié passed away on October 17, 2023. This Academia page, curated by Mr. Menachem Butler of Cambridge, MA, was established in 2019 with the support and guidance of the late Professor Malachi Beit-Arié. It now serves as a memorial in his honor.]
Malachi Beit-Arié was the Ludwig Jesselson Professor Emeritus of Codicology and Paleography at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the head of the Hebrew Paleography Project under the auspices of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities and the National Library of Israel. He served as the director of the Jewish National and University Library of Jerusalem from 1979 until 1990.edit
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The manuscripts and Torah scrolls that Abraham Firkowicz (1787-1874) appropriated served the same purpose as the epitaphs he forged. He not only tampered with colophons of codices, but also fabricated long Karaite ownership inscriptions... more
The manuscripts and Torah scrolls that Abraham Firkowicz (1787-1874) appropriated served the same purpose as the epitaphs he forged. He not only tampered with colophons of codices, but also fabricated long Karaite ownership inscriptions and records of dedication to Karaite foundations that allegedly attested to the early settlement of the Karaites on the Crimean Peninsula. Above all, like his date-changing in epitaphs, he inscribed very old dates within the first millennium in the many fake notes he added to liturgical Torah scrolls. He did not tamper extensively with authentic colophons or paratexts, but mainly fabricated paratexts of his own and occasionally created historical records as well.
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Research Interests: Jewish Studies, Medieval History, Medieval Studies, Jewish History, Medieval Jewish Philosophy, and 5 moreHebrew Manuscripts, Medieval Jewish History, Manuscripts (Medieval Studies), Medieval Jewish-Muslim Encounters, Judeo-arabic manuscripts regarding Islam, Polemics of Jewish Authors against Islam, and Early Printed Jewish Books
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Malachi Beit-Arié, “Publication and Reproduction of Literary Texts in Jewish Medieval Civilization: Jewish Scribality and its Impact on the Texts Transmitted,” in Yaakov Elman, et al., eds., Transmitting Jewish Traditions: Orality, Textuality, and Cultural Diffusion (New Haven: Yale, 2000), 225-247more
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מפעל הפאליאוגראפיה העברית MANUSCRITS MEDIHVAUX EN CARACTERES HfiBRAIQUES p o r t a n t d e s i n d i c a t i o n s d c d a t e j u s q u 'a 1 5 4 0 אוצרות ה ר תו ה
Initiated by Malachi Beit-Arié, the Hebrew Palaeography Project has documented all the medieval codices written in Hebrew script. These codices either contain explicit production dates or scribe names. All their visual and measurable... more
Initiated by Malachi Beit-Arié, the Hebrew Palaeography Project has documented all the medieval codices written in Hebrew script. These codices either contain explicit production dates or scribe names. All their visual and measurable material features and scribal practices have been recorded in situ. The SfarData database, accessible at http://sfardata.nli.org.il, offers users a tool to identify the production region and assess the period of manuscripts with identical features. This contributes to the typology of Hebrew medieval handwritten books and provides historical information.
The website, launched on 17 April 2019, is now user-friendly. It has been integrated into the National Library of Israel's website and links to the full digitized manuscripts in Ktiv.
To ensure the database's continuity and its sophisticated search of nearly one thousand codicological features, the National Library of Israel integrated SfarData. This integration demanded a significant technical transition to the NLI platforms, with support from the Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures of Hamburg University, bringing additional improvements.
The website, launched on 17 April 2019, is now user-friendly. It has been integrated into the National Library of Israel's website and links to the full digitized manuscripts in Ktiv.
To ensure the database's continuity and its sophisticated search of nearly one thousand codicological features, the National Library of Israel integrated SfarData. This integration demanded a significant technical transition to the NLI platforms, with support from the Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures of Hamburg University, bringing additional improvements.