The Morgan Collection includes many firsts, such as the Leeser Bible—the first complete American Jewish translation of the Hebrew Bible (Christian Old Testament). Its translator, Isaac Leeser (1806-1868) immigrated to the United States from Germany in 1824 and became one of the most influential Jewish-American figures of the 19th century. Since most Jews at the time were not able to read Hebrew fluently, they would encounter the biblical text in the form of the King James Bible. Leeser’s translation, therefore, was based on the Masoretic text and guided by traditional Rabbinic commentators, became the standard Jewish Bible until well into the 20th century. Leeser notes his aim in the preface, “to present to my fellow Israelites an English version, made by one of themselves,” adding further the hope that “they will have now an opportunity to study a version of the Bible which has not been made by the authority of churches in which they can have no confidence.”

The Pitts copy contains the inscribed family records of the Wise family, a Jewish family in Pennsylvania, covering the period of 1873 to 1979.

This item and dozens of other treasures from the J. Michael Morgan English Bible & Psalmody Collection are featured in our current exhibition “The Very Meanest Translation: Reading, Revising, and Replacing the King James Bible in America,” open until December 2023. The gallery is open to visitors during all of the library’s open hours (visit pitts.tl/hours for complete information).

By Armin Siedlecki, Head of Cataloging and Rare Book Cataloger