(JTA) – Ohio’s attorney general obtained a court order this week prohibiting the financially struggling Hebrew Union High School-Jewish Institute of Religion from selling books from its Cincinnati library, which has a significant collection of rare and precious items from throughout Jewish history.
Attorney General Dave Yost’s request for a temporary restraining order came in response to recent reporting in Cincy Jewfolk, a local outlet that published a detailed article in April about the struggles of the educational institution, a seminary and university affiliated with the reform movement. of Judaism.
Cincy Jewfolk uncovered plans to sell rare books and reported that a library administrator may have resigned after being pressured to carry out the plans. The outlet also revealed that representatives from the auction house Sotheby’s had been hired to examine the library’s collections.
The sale of library items could potentially undermine donor intent toward the library in violation of Ohio law, Yost said in a news release.
“These sacred texts are priceless artifacts – religious and cultural treasures,” Yost said. “Their sale would not only betray the trust of donors but could also violate legal restrictions placed on gifts. We are committed to ensuring that these irreplaceable items remain available to the public and are cared for as their donors intended.”
Although Hebrew Union College, which also has campuses in New York, Los Angeles and Jerusalem, is phasing out its Cincinnati rabbinical school, it has said the campus will remain a center for Jewish research. He has denied plans to sell rare books from the library’s collection.
Rare book controversy
“Rumors that we are planning to sell our rare books, and subsequent legal and media attention, are based on incomplete and misleading information,” Andrew Rehfeld, the institution’s president, wrote in an email to the campus community after the Yost’s announcement on June 4, according to Cincy Jewfolk. “We have no plans to sell or ‘de-accession’ the collection and none of the staff have been asked to sell our books.”
The 14,000 rare texts stored in the seminary’s Klau Library could be worth millions of dollars, according to the news release from Yost’s office. The collection is one of the most significant of any Jewish library in the world and includes Jewish textual artifacts and landmark works of philosophy, history, and liturgy in more than a dozen languages.
Librarians and administrators at Jewish educational institutions across the country are likely paying close attention to the situation because of concerns about the collection and the possible implications of involvement by legal authorities as Hebrew Union College grapples with financial challenges that others do as well. they face.
At the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York, for example, administrators have sold real estate assets as well as library items in recent years due to declining enrollment. Meanwhile, in Los Angeles, the American Jewish University sold its campus earlier this year and has not yet announced what will happen to the university’s rare book collection.
A court hearing to evaluate the restraining order at Hebrew Union College has been scheduled for July 12.
