The oldest and most complete Hebrew Bible, more than 1,000 years old, will be auctioned in May for an astronomical price of up to $50 million, Sotheby’s announced on Wednesday, as quoted by AFP.

The Sassoon Codex, named after its most famous owner, David Solomon Sassoon (died 1942), dates to 900 AD. and is “the most complete Hebrew Bible (…) valued at between $30 million and $50 million, among the most expensive manuscripts ever sold,” said Richard Austin, head of antiquities, AFP and manuscripts at Sotheby’s.

The sale will take place in May, during the classic spring auction season for Modern, Contemporary and Impressionist art.

When asked about the potential buyers of the codex, Austin stated that the list of buyers was a “bottomless pit”: it is “the foundational text of civilization, it is difficult to find a text that has had more influence than the Bible on the history of mankind”.

This Bible, written in Hebrew—the original language of the Old Testament, which also contains passages in Greek and Aramaic—“belonged to prominent collectors in the 20th century; it is clear that she can return to an institution for education, including abroad” and “regardless of religious beliefs,” the expert added, referring to Judaism, Christianity, Islam or atheism.

This Codex of Sassoon, in an exceptional state of preservation with only a few pages missing, links the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible taken from the famous Dead Sea Scrolls, dating from the 3rd century BC.

The Bible, which is more complete than the Aleppo Codex, has been confirmed by carbon-14 testing, “confirmed by paleographical and codicological research (…) and has been held for more than a millennium in the hands of public and private collectors.” Sharon Lieberman Mintz, a specialist in Jewish texts at Sotheby’s, told AFP.

The art auction company boasts in a statement that it is a specialist in the market for ancient manuscripts and books. In November 2021, she sold an original copy of the US Constitution for a record price of $43 million.

The document was purchased by American billionaire Kenneth Griffin, owner of the investment company Citadel, who was going to lend it to a museum in Arkansas.