SEPTEMBER 30 ZOOM TALK at 3:00 PM EDT

THE SARAJEVO HAGGADAH: MIRACLE ON PARCHMENT

From Medieval Spain to Modern Bosnia – A Jewish Story of Beauty, Loss, and Miraculous Survival

This talk is Free and Open to everyone – come travel with me through time!

Before you read more, let me personally invite you.
Here’s a short video where I share why the Sarajevo Haggadah means so much and why I want to tell its story right now.

The Sarajevo Haggadah is one of the most fascinating Jewish manuscripts to survive the centuries.
Created in medieval Barcelona during a short, but brilliant moment of Jewish history, it reflects both the refinement of Jewish culture and the vibrant world of the city around it. In its pages we see not only Biblical stories, but also vivid glimpses of how Jews of the time lived, celebrated, and imagined their place in history.

The colors, the details, the quiet beauty of Sarajevo Haggadah's illuminated pages still speak to us today. I remember the first time I saw them - I felt as if the voices of our ancestors were whispering through the paint and parchment.

Once commissioned by the wealthy Jewish family, then a wedding gift, the journey of this book, however, was never simple. Expelled from Spain, carried across Europe, changed hands, nearly lost, the Haggadah was twice miraculously saved in the twentieth century: hidden from the Nazis during the Holocaust, and rescued again during the Bosnian war.
In fact, every time I retell this part of the story, I can hardly believe it myself, it feels like the book wanted to live.

Traditionally, we open the Haggadah at Passover, we are all aware of that. But this fall, in the season of Rosh Hashanah and Sukkot, I invite you to open it with me for another reason. This talk is my personal response to the way the National Museum of Bosnia where the Haggadah is being kept, has chosen to use this Jewish treasure in an anti-Israeli context.
Telling its true story now is both an act of love and of remembrance.

In this free talk, we will admire the Haggadah’s illustrations, uncover what they reveal about the lives of our ancestors, and follow the extraordinary journey of this manuscript from medieval Spain to modern Bosnia.

It is a fragile book, yet it carries a strength that belongs to all of us - a story of art, survival, and the enduring resilience of Jewish memory.