From 17th-century Haggadah in a plain brown wrapper, a major collection grew

Brandeis University News

It arrived at Dr. Ierachmiel “Yerach” Daskal's home 40 years ago, wrapped in brown paper and secured with twine — a humble package bearing a 17th-century religious book that eventually would multiply into a prodigious collection.



The old tome was a Haggadah, the guide to the liturgy of the Passover Seder. Published in 1695, it had been found in Israel and sent by a bookseller to Daskal, who at first was less interested in the words inside than in the rare map of the Holy Land attached to the back. But as the physician leafed through the yellowed pages of Hebrew text, with their ancient illustrations of the Exodus story, the roots of an obsession took hold.
“When you open one that is 300 years old and you see the wine stains on the pages, and crumbs of matzoh, it comes to life,” said Daskal, of Elkins Park. “You want to know what is the history. Who was this family?”

A retired chairman of pathology and laboratory medicine at Albert Einstein Medical Center, the 77-year-old Daskal and his wife, Dalia, have since amassed nearly 800 prized Haggadot (the plural in Hebrew) from scores of countries, dating from 1583 to 1969, and discovered in such unlikely places as an outdoor market in Jerusalem, in a pile near a gutter. Some of the couple’s most historic Haggadot are on exhibit through May at Gratz College in Melrose Park.
“We fell in love with the text, and it’s been an amazing journey,” Dalia Daskal said after her husband gave a brief lecture on the collection last week at the college’s Tuttleman Library.
Haggadot serve as step-by-step guides to the Seder dinner, which marks the beginning of Passover. The eight-day festival, which starts Monday evening, commemorates the Israelites' flight from slavery — a story that is the centerpiece of the book, which contains prayers, commentaries, songs, and illustrations.







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