In 2016, Herschel Hepler was shopping Google Images to observe his paleography – the examine of historic writing methods – when he stumbled upon an eerily acquainted picture that will result in a groundbreaking discovery.
“I recognized it immediately and said, ‘That’s a manuscript in our collection,'” Hepler, a curator on the Museum of the Bible in Washington, recollects.
The museum had lately acquired the manuscript – a uncommon Jewish prayer guide – believing it to be a part of the well-known Cairo Geniza, a trove of historical Jewish paperwork uncovered in a Cairo synagogue within the late nineteenth century.
But the black and white image in Tablet journal described the manuscript as a “16th to 17th century Hebrew book of Psalms, said to be from the Bamiyan area” of central Afghanistan.
Stunned by the revelation, Hepler got down to confirm it. Tracking down the writer of the Tablet article, British historian and archaeologist Jonathan Lee, Hepler confirmed that Lee had the truth is discovered the guide in an Afghan warlord’s possession in 1998 and photographed the duvet and two inside pages.
“Without Jonathan’s documentation from his trip to Bamiyan in 1998, we would still be assuming this is probably from the Cairo Geniza,” Hepler mentioned.
But if Hepler was stunned to study in regards to the guide’s origin within the distant mountains of Afghanistan, Lee was equally surprised when Hepler revealed that the manuscript had been carbon-dated to a minimum of the ninth century.
“At that point, I realized that the discovery was of major importance,” Lee mentioned by way of e-mail.
Recognizing their mixed experience – Hepler in Hebrew manuscripts and Lee in Afghan historical past – the duo joined forces and invited in different consultants.
Their yearslong analysis not solely established the manuscript because the oldest-known Hebrew guide but in addition unearthed proof that Jews had lived in Afghanistan – and alongside the traditional Silk Roads – for longer than historians beforehand believed.
But the joys of discovery was dampened by the conclusion that the manuscript had in all probability been smuggled out of war-torn Afghanistan and purchased on the antiquities market.
At the time, the museum, based by the Green household, homeowners of the Hobby Lobby arts and craft firm, was nonetheless reeling from its acquisition of artifacts smuggled from Iraq and Egypt.
This undated picture exhibits the Afghan Liturgical Quire on show on the Museum of the Bible in Washington. Experts say the pocket-size guide is remarkably well-preserved for its age.
The museum confronted a major problem: Before it might showcase it to the world, it wanted to legitimize its possession of the manuscript. This required years of delicate negotiations with New York’s small Afghan Jewish group and an Afghan authorities teetering getting ready to collapse. The stakes have been excessive, and the trail to safe the manuscript’s rightful place within the museum would show be too advanced and demanding.
Lee’s discovery
Lee, who has spent the higher a part of the final 5 many years researching and writing about Afghan historical past and archaeology, found the guide by likelihood.
In April 1998, he was guiding a Japanese TV crew in Bamiyan and was looking out for a Bactrian language inscription and gold cash looted from an historical Buddhist shrine.
At the time, the Bamiyan Valley, with its famed Buddha statues nonetheless standing, was managed by an area Shiite rebel group, whereas the Taliban dominated a lot of the remainder of the nation.
The anti-Taliban group’s chief, Karim Khalili, stored a set of antiquities, amongst them the cache of gold cash Lee had been on the lookout for. Lee photographed them.
‘Then, his [Khalili’s] advisers introduced in a miscellaneous assortment of different antiquities that included the ALQ,” Lee said, using the acronym for the “Afghan Liturgical Quire,” the Hebrew book in the Bible Museum’s collection.
A local man affiliated with the Shiite insurgent group had found the book under a collapsed roof in a cave the prior year and given it to Khalili.
Unversed in Hebrew, Khalili apparently showed the book to other foreigners visiting Bamiyan, trying to figure out what it was.
“I used to be instructed it had been present in Bamiyan, however then all the pieces is present in Bamiyan,” Lee said.
As Lee recalls, the pocket-size book looked remarkably well-preserved for its age.
“The cowl was considerably bent, broken and watermarked, however the folios have been comparatively well-preserved, and a lot of the texts readable,” he said.
To Lee, that suggested the manuscript was ‘not that old.” He left Afghanistan and for years did not give it a lot thought.
How and when the manuscript left Afghanistan stays unknown.
The Nineteen Nineties have been a darkish interval for Afghanistan’s wealthy cultural heritage. As armed teams fought over territory, their males – typically directed by their commanders and guided by traffickers – plundered the nation’s huge archaeological websites and ransacked its museums. Seventy % of the nationwide museum’s treasures vanished, in accordance with one estimate, many ending up in non-public collections and a few respected establishments.
“There is a long history of illicit export of antiquities from the country that goes back for decades but ultimately back to colonial times,” mentioned Cecilia Palombo, a University of Chicago professor who has researched the plunder of Afghan antiquities.
A number one researcher with intensive expertise in Afghanistan mentioned the manuscript was seemingly taken overseas after the Taliban overran Bamiyan in late 1998. The researcher spoke on situation of anonymity.
Research by the Bible museum discovered that an unnamed Khalili deputy made a number of gross sales makes an attempt within the United States and Europe between 1998 and 2001 earlier than “apparently” offloading it to a personal collector in London in fall 2001. The collector stored it for a decade or extra earlier than Hobby Lobby purchased it in 2013 and donated it to the museum.
The workplace of Khalili, who later served as a vice chairman, declined a VOA interview request.
The Tablet article
Although Lee had discovered the guide in Afghanistan, he did not understand how important it was. On returning to England, he confirmed his pictures to a Hebrew specialist, who thought it was from the sixteenth or seventeenth century.
Then, after a cache of historical paperwork dubbed the “Afghan Geniza” surfaced on the worldwide artwork market, Lee determined to publish his {photograph}, together with an article about Afghan Jewish historical past. Citing the guide for instance of “Jewish material [turning up] occasionally” in Afghanistan, he wrote that the “whereabouts of this manuscript is now unknown.”
He would discover out 4 years later. That’s when, “out of the blue,” Hepler contacted him by way of LinkedIn and instructed him the manuscript was not the Book of Psalms however a prayer guide, comprising Sabbath prayers, poetry and a partial Haggadah, the Jewish textual content recited on the Passover seder.
The Green household purchased the guide from an Israeli antiquities supplier in 2013 throughout a shopping for spree of historical artifacts. Some of this stuff have been later returned after it was found they’d been illegally taken out of Iraq and Egypt.
Smuggled Iraqi Artifacts Are Returned Home
The Afghan Liturgical Quire got here with a solid provenance of its personal, tracing the manuscript to collectors in London within the Nineteen Fifties, masking any ties to Afghanistan. With Lee’s documentation, the museum was capable of right its provenance.
The museum had initially thought the guide was from the ninth century, however a second carbon-dating check carried out in 2019 confirmed it dates to the eighth century, making it two centuries older than the earlier oldest-known Hebrew guide on the earth.
The discovery electrified consultants.
For Hebrew students, the invention supplied the earliest proof of a certain Hebrew guide.
For Afghanistan specialists, it highlighted ‘how important this area was in respect of the historical past of the Middle East, Inner Asia and Northern India, and Afghanistan’s historical connectivity with cultures and spiritual traditions,’ Lee mentioned.
Yet the conclusion that it had been smuggled out of Afghanistan forged a cloud over its legitimacy.
Afghan legal guidelines and the 1970 UNESCO Convention make it unlawful to export cultural artifacts and heritage objects with out authorities approval.
To legitimize its custody of the manuscript, the museum adopted what it calls a “human rights-based approach” to cultural heritage.
Invoking the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the museum argued that the Afghan individuals and Afghan Jews residing in New York have a proper to entry the manuscript.
“One of the things this project is focused on is on access – so, access to the Afghan Jewish community, access to the people of Afghanistan,” Hepler mentioned.
This undated picture exhibits the Afghan Liturgical Quire on show on the Museum of the Bible in Washington. A second exhibit is deliberate for New York beginning this month.
To get the backing of each stakeholders, the museum initiated discussions with officers of the previous Afghan authorities and members of the Jewish group in New York.
These efforts culminated within the signing of a memorandum of understanding in 2021 with the Afghan embassy in Washington earlier than the Taliban takeover, guaranteeing the doc could be held in custodianship.
The Afghan ambassador on the time, Roya Rahmani, didn’t reply to a request for an interview. Another former Afghan ambassador wrote a letter of assist for the venture.
Jack Abraham, head of the Afghan Jewish Federation who was born in Afghanistan, mentioned his group supplied its full assist for preserving the manuscript within the United States.
“I told [Hepler], ‘What you have in your hands is our heritage. It belongs to us. It could be any of our forefathers,'” Abraham mentioned.
But some Afghans see it as equally a part of their heritage.
“This is the property of Afghanistan and must be returned to Afghanistan,” a senior former authorities official mentioned, talking on situation of anonymity.
Barnett Rubin, a number one Afghanistan scholar and an advisor on the ALQ venture, mentioned each communities can legitimately lay declare to the guide.
“The museum wanted to have the approval of any one of the two main entities that might have a claim on it to their custody of it,” Rubin mentioned.
With a custodianship settlement secured, the museum launched an exhibit in September, celebrating the venture as an interfaith collaboration amongst Jews, Christians and Muslims.
A second exhibit is deliberate for New York beginning this month.
While the Bible Museum technically owns the manuscript, Hepler mentioned Afghanistan and the Afghan Jewish group ‘have quite a lot of company on this custodianship.’ To that finish, the museum plans to offer one high-quality reproduction to the Jewish group and three to main cultural establishments in Afghanistan.