The
Voynich Manuscript
presents one of the world’s greatest unsolved mysteries.
We
know the following:
‘It is an illustrated codex,
hand-written in an undeciphered script referred to as
'Voynichese'. The vellum on
which it is written has been carbon-dated to
the early 15th century (1404–1438). Stylistic
analysis has indicated the manuscript may
have been composed in Italy during the Italian Renaissance.’ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript
There is
a debate as to who wrote it, where it originated (beyond speculation) and what
its purpose was. To this day, it has not
been properly translated as no-one has been able to decipher the script it is
written in.
Hypotheses
range from believing it to be either a natural or constructed language, an
unreadable code, a cipher or some other type of cryptography. It could even be a work of fiction or a hoax,
a reference tome consisting of an index or compendium of folklore.
Some say
it is a work of fiction. Its first confirmed
owner was Georg Baresch, a 17th century alchemist from Prague and its name
derives from the Polish book dealer who bought it in 1912, Wilfrid Voynich. https://www.voynich.nu/letters.html
It is
beyond the scope of this Drasha to go into the minutiae of the makeup of the manuscript
but its focus and purpose seems to have been to serve as a pharmacopoeia, (from the ancient Hellenistic Greek word
‘pharmakopoiía’ which means ‘preparation of drugs’ which is similar to
‘pharmakon’ meaning drug and ‘logia’, the study and knowledge of this science) which
is the preparation of drugs or drug making.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharmacopoeia), a digest which addressed topics in medieval or early modern
medicine. Its numerous illustrations and
their puzzling details have confounded the experts who have tried to decipher
it over the centuries. As a result, they
have come up with many theories as to the book’s origin, the context of its
text and its main purpose.
The
topics it covers are sectioned thus:
Herbal (126 pages) - illustrations of European
plants whose species are not fully identifiable.
Astronomical/Astrological
(17 pages) - images
of partly nude women holding stars related to the signs of the Zodiac, although
the last two pages, namely Aquarius and Capricorn have been lost.
Balneological, the scientific study or
therapeutic use of baths, especially those using natural mineral waters (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/balneology) (20
pages) - small nude women, some wearing crowns, bathing in pools or
tubs connected by an elaborate network of pipes.
Cosmological
(14 pages) - illustrated
maps with images of islands with castles and volcanoes.
Pharmaceutical (16 pages) – labelled drawings of
isolated parts of plants such as leaves and roots in apothecary-type jars (a la
Harry Potter!) interspersed with text.
Recipes (25 pages) - text broken into
short paragraphs, each marked with a star in the left margin and at least 28
pages are missing, lost over time.
It is a document
whose meaning and bizarre undecipherable text has confounded experts for over a
hundred years and is currently stored at Yale University. The latest attempt was by Rainer Hannig in
2020 who claimed that it was written in a form of medieval Hebrew with some
words in Yiddish and Arabic. Sadly, he
died two years later and the Voynich Manuscript still holds onto its secrets six
centuries after it was written.
Despite
our being able to get man on the moon and back, split the atom and map the
human genome, a 250 (or so) page vellum manuscript still confounds the greatest
cryptological minds on the planet.
The
Hinnom Scrolls were discovered by Gabriel Barkay (d. 11th January
2026) in Ketef Hinnom, near the Hinnom Valley on the southern side of
Jerusalem’s Old City walls in a 1979-80 archaeological dig.
They
consist of two rolled-up silver Biblical scrolls that date back to the 7th
Century BCE. When they were unrolled,
the text revealed the ancient Priestly Blessing that we recite every morning in
our Shacharit Prayer, asking Gd to bless and protect us (found in Parashat
Naso, 6.24-26). This is the earliest
evidence of scripture found outside the Torah and is several centuries older
than the Dead Sea Scrolls. The script is
the ancient Ktav Ivri or Paleo-Hebrew characters that predates the Ktav Ashurit
that we are familiar with from our Siddurim, Torah scrolls and of course,
modern Hebrew. There is a debate in the
Talmud as to whether Ktav Ashurit was brought into use by Ezra Hasofer (the
Scribe) or whether it predated Ktav Ivri (i.e.
the Ten Commandments were inscribed in the latter), went out of use and
then reappeared centuries later.
The more
ancient script (Ktav Ivri) has evolved and been used by the Samaritans for more
than two millennia to the present day. They
helped scholars such as the Ramban decipher the inscriptions on ancient Judean
coins.
Unlike
the Voynich Manuscript, the scrolls do not contain images or indecipherable
language or codes and the text is familiar and understandable. Experts point to the scrolls as evidence that
the Torah was not written after the destruction of the first Beit Hamikdash.
Add in
the Dead Sea Scrolls which were written in the later script and the Nash
Papyrus, a second century BCE Egyptian manuscript that contains the Ten
Commandments and the Shema, and you have irrevocable proof that the holy texts
we use today are virtually identical to those that our ancestors read thousands
of years ago. (https://biblearchaeologyreport.com/2019/02/06/the-three-oldest-biblical-texts/)
This is
very much the case when it comes to the initial pesukim/verses in this week’s
Parasha.
Upon
entering the Land of Israel (Canaan), we are instructed to bring our Bikkurim/first
fruits in a basket to the Beit Hamikdash.
When you see the Cohen who is designated to deal with this, we make a
declaration that we have ‘come into the land that the L-rd swore to our
ancestors to give to us’. Thereupon, the
Cohen takes the basket and places it at the foot of the main altar in the
Azarah (the courtyard leading to the Bayit/House where the Ark of the Covenant
is situated). We are then instructed to make
a declaration that is instantly familiar to us as it forms a part of the Maggid
section of the Haggadah and begins with ‘Arami Oved Avi’:
You shall then recite as follows before the L-rd your G-d,
“My father was a fugitive Aramean. He
went down to Egypt with just a handful of souls and sojourned there; but there
he became a great and very populous nation.
The Egyptians dealt cruelly with us and oppressed us; they imposed heavy
labour upon us. We cried to the L-rd,
the G-d of our ancestors, and the -L-rd heard our voice and saw our plight, our
misery, and our enslavement. Gd brought
us out from Egypt by a mighty hand, by an outstretched arm and awesome power,
and by signs and portents, bringing us to this place and giving us this land, a
land flowing with milk and honey. And so,
I now bring the first fruits of the soil that You, O L-rd, have given me.”
You shall leave the basket before the L-rd your G-d and
bow low before the L-rd your G-d.
This is a
message that we can all relate to, taken from the Torah that is embedded in the
DNA of the Jewish people in a language that stems from the dawn of creation. Indeed, we learn that this is the very same
that Gd used to speak to Adam and Eve in Eden.
Like the
Voynich Manuscript, the Torah also contains examples of Biblical science (e.g.
the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah and the Ten Plagues), flora and fauna,
recipes (Yaakov famously sold his lentil soup to his older twin) and so much
more in language that is instantly recognisable, understandable and deeply
resonant to humanity. Who can fail to be
moved by Gd’s refusal to allow Moshe Rabbeinu into Eretz Yisrael.
The
Voynich Manuscript may hold its secrets for many more decades to come but its
relevance (beyond historical puzzlement) is limited to those who want to
attempt the challenge that has eluded so many others.
The Torah
meanwhile (and by extension, the rest of Tanach) talks to us, teaches us
lessons that are as relevant today as they were three millennia ago – without
images, indecipherable script, codes and the possibility that the whole tome
was written in a fraudulent manner. The
Torah is accessible to anyone at any time at no cost.
I know in
which book I would rather invest my time and effort studying!
