It finally happened: automobile marketing has infiltrated the Hebrew seforim market. A major book publisher in Jerusalem has just offered a new twist on an old standby of car dealers. They call it “Mivtza Trade-In/Operation Trade-In: Bring in a used book published by us and receive credit on a new one!”
Sounds like a great idea. That same Chumash I have been using for so many years to review the weekly portion could definitely use some rehab. Wouldn’t it be nice to trade it in for a newer model? (Some religions tried this unsuccessfully millennia ago but let us not get into interfaith matters…) In a newer model the print would be less faded the pages crisper the cover design different. Wouldn’t it be appropriate to have a Chumash with better binding and a sparkling new jacket?
Well no.
Thanks for the offer but my bookshelves are creaking with old books some far older than I am and I am not willing to part with any of them. Nor would I want to part even with the relatively recent “old books” — those I have had for only a few years and are thank G-d showing signs of age. Like wine when it comes to classic Hebrew seforim older is better well-worn is de rigueur.
Truth to tell there are few things more dispiriting than bookcases filled with obviously unopened new books: a 20-volume edition of the entire Talmud untouched unhandled intact; Rambam’s Yad Hachazakah the classic compendium of all halachah; the classic Shulchan Aruch; newly issued commentaries on the entire Tanach; shelf upon shelf of classical Jewish texts — all in perfect condition.
Perhaps one should not belittle such fine Hebrew seforim on a bookshelf. At the very least the owner has good scholarly taste: even unopened books demonstrate the trajectory of the owner’s mind what he hopes some day to study the ideas that he values. Even books that one never opens also speak if I may say so volumes.
Nevertheless how can brand-new books match the delicious sight of a shelf overflowing with venerable albeit dog-eared faded musty old Hebrew seforim with spines slightly shopworn covers scarred with time pages bent from use bindings no longer firm pages blurred by finger marks —a sight to warm the heart of any Jewish bookworm. (Figuratively speaking of course: bookworms and old books are best not mentioned in the same breath.)
Old books have experienced life. They have seen joy and sadness have heard both laughter and sobbing. Fresh new volumes bedecked in their fine new covers and displaying their crisp new pages are in essence callow inexperienced unread and literally unemployed.
Some day in the fullness of time decades from now these new seforim if they are fortunate will grow older with use and then the wisdom distilled in their pages will come shining forth. But right now brand-new books all wrapped up in themselves — in what they call mint condition — make me a bit uncomfortable. I am most at ease in the company of books that have been pored over and studied and analyzed that have stayed open all hours of the night and whose pages worn with use contain jottings and addenda and glosses in the margins.
Old books like old friends offer comfort when one is distressed; inspiration when one is defeated; friendship and solace when one is wounded and alone. Mostly they offer memories: I studied this blatt Gemara with my late father explained this section to many students learned this from a brilliant teacher still remain stumped by certain inscrutable passages. When old books surround me I feel protected and secure. One does not turn to a fresh-faced child no matter how lovely for such blessings.
As for that trade-in offer here is a counterproposal for that bookdealer: I have some brand-new books on my shelves in mint condition waiting patiently to be aged. Perhaps I can trade them in for some older models you might have lying around? —