Auction 48
Lot 119:
Chumash Devarim from the set Mikraei Kodesh with the commentary “HaTorah v’HaMitzvah” by the Malbim. Two title pages, the first in purple and red ink. Spine detached and defective, overall good condition.
The blank first leaf has a signature in Sefardi script: “the young Shlomo Yehuda Algazi s”t…(-?) and Av Beit Din.” And a signature in a local language with the name Friedlander.
This is none other than the forger Shlomo Leib Friedlander, who became famous for his great forgery of the “Yerushalmi on Seder Kodshim”. He was an extremely skilled talmid chacham, and his commentary “Cheshek Shlomo” on Masechet Yevamot of the Yerushalmi won approbations from gedolim from the Satmar area.
His real name was neither Friedlander nor Algazi. His true name is not known with 100% certainty, and the Jubilee Book “HaPardes” of 1951 notes that Rabbi Yekutiel Yehuda Greenwald remembered having connections with him—he said that in one of his conversations Friedlander admitted that he never found Seder Kodshim of the Yerushalmi and that his name was not Algazi and that he was not s”t [sefardi tahor], and that his birthname was Zusya and he was from Beshankovichy (then in Russia, now in Belarus).
Additional signature on the back of the title page: “The holy Shlomo Chaim Savoy, author of the Goral HaEmet v’Ashiriot.”
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