A rare, elaborate and mystical Jewish Bible written by a prominent rabbi in 14th-century Spain, whose gilded and colorful pages combine Jewish, Christian and Islamic artistic traditions, is set to go on public display after being bought at auction for $6.9 million ( 6.3 million euros), according to The Guardian.

The Shem Tov Bible, which was completed by Rabbi Shem Tov Ibn Gaon in the northern Spanish city of Soria in 1312, has had an adventurous and almost miraculous journey, surviving countless wars and upheavals on its travels to Jerusalem, Baghdad, Tripoli, the London and Geneva during seven centuries.

On Tuesday night, the richly decorated Bible – described as “a tour de force of biblical and kabbalistic scholarship and a precious testimony to the medieval tradition of Sephardic book art” – sold near the top of its estimate of $5-7 million at Sotheby’s in New York.

Sharon Liberman Mintz, Sotheby’s International Senior Judaic Specialist for Books and Manuscripts, said the 800-page Bible combines deep knowledge, secret letters and cross-cultural artistic influences that make it unique.

Not only does the Shem Tov Bible frequently refer to the Hilleli Codex, a legendary, lost ancient Hebrew Bible, but it also contains some 2,000 elaborately marked “abnormal” letters, which are smaller or larger letters imbued with a special, secret meaning, according to traditions of Kabbalah or Jewish mysticism.

Its most impressive feature is the combination of three different artistic and architectural traditions.

“It was written in Christian Spain in 1312, but Christians and Jews live with all this Islamic mudejar [μαυριτανική] architecture and they still see all the cultural aesthetics of Islamic Spain around them,” Lieberman Mintz said.

“The book merges and uses three artistic expressions: you see the Hebrew script in the artwork, the delicate flourish of purple and red ink marks the different parts of the Bible.”

There are also Gothic arches inspired by northern European architecture – “but if you turn a few pages, you’ll see a multi-lobed Islamic arch. So the architectural features reflect the Mudejar art of the time, while at the same time using artistic words from the French Gothic vocabulary.”

Other people have claimed that the Shem Tov Bible serves both practical and aesthetic purposes. A Bible reference from the late 1860s states that its owners were reluctant to part with it “because, apart from being a truly valuable article, it is a tried and true amulet, for a woman in difficult labor will be saved from the labor pains when the book enters her house.’

The book was central to the affections of David Solomon Sassoon, the world’s foremost collector of Jewish manuscripts, who acquired it in the first decade of the 20th century. Shortly before he died in the summer of 1942, he asked his son to go and speak to the Torah scrolls and the Shem Tov Bible and tell them: “We will return to you and you will return to us. We will not forget you neither in this world nor in the next.”

After so long in private hands, the Bible is released to the public.

“It was purchased by private individuals who, understanding its supreme importance, are eager to make it available to the public,” said Liberman Mintz.

He added: “I think anyone who buys a book of this size understands that it needs to be available to the widest possible audience and they’re not going to bury it in some little library.”

The well-traveled Bible

Despite the Bible’s rarity, its mystical significance, and its enormous historical, artistic, and economic value, Liberman Mintz is most impressed by his travels and by the very fact of his survival.

After completing his astonishing feat of scholarship in 1312, Ibn Gaon, the author felt that what the Sotheby’s expert calls the “Bible for the ages” should be taken to the Holy Land, even though, as Liberman Mintz said: “This it wasn’t just an excursion at the time.”

The rabbi died around 1330 in the city of Safed in Galilee, but the travels of the Bible were just beginning.

“I think the journey is so fascinating because he left Spain in 1315, thus avoiding the riots and massacres of 1391, while after the expulsion [των Εβραίων] from Spain in 1492, many books were lost,” Liberman Mintz said. These lost volumes include the Hilleli Codex.

“He then reaches Israel, which is overrun by the crusaders. He manages to get away with that too. He goes to Baghdad and we know that the Jewish community in Baghdad experienced all kinds of turmoil. Somehow he makes his way to Tripoli. He is in London during World War II – or possibly in Letchworth – and he survives the war. He had a miraculous survival journey.”