A MAGNIFICENT MICROGRAPHIC OMER CALENDAR, PORTLAND: 1883

An outstanding example of American Jewish folk art.

This monumental omer calendar, intended to facilitate the practice of counting each of the forty-nine days between the start of Passover and Shavuot, continues the long Jewish tradition of micrographic artwork that first appeared in medieval Hebrew biblical codices. At head is the blessing over the counting of the omer, while the forty-nine circles all around contain the specific formulas recited each day, together with the corresponding word of psalm 67 and of the kabbalistic hymn Anna be-koah, as well as the sefirah (divine emanation) of the day. The four cornerpieces include kabbalistic prayers said before and after the count and a reiteration of psalm 67 and Anna be-koah. The document also doubles as a mizrah plaque, with the words of Ps. 113:3 inscribed below the blessing and the intentional text “Know before Whom you stand: before the King of kings, the Holy One Who is blessed” appearing above the crown.

All throughout the document, written in minute script, is the entire text of the book of Psalms (preceded and followed by special devotional prayers), as well as the beginning section of each of the fifty-four weekly Torah portions. The elaborate decorative central panel features representations of pairs of creatures skillfully fashioned from these words: two birds supporting a regal crown, two lions rampant holding aloft the Tablets of the Law, and two deer on either side of a menorah inscribed with the verses of psalm 67.

The plaque is signed and dated in Hebrew in a cartouche below the menorah by David ha-Kohen, who can be identified with David Solis-Cohen (1850-1928), a man of many talents. Scion of a prominent Philadelphia Sephardic family, Solis-Cohen came by way of California to Portland in 1878, becoming “the single most important Jew of that Oregon community.” He established an auction house, imported and exported “toys and notions”, and later formed a law partnership. Throughout this time, he was highly involved in Jewish religious and communal affairs. He played active roles in congregations Beth Israel (Portland’s first synagogue) and Ahavai Shalom, supported children’s and adult Jewish education in the city, and organized and founded B’nai B’rith lodges.

An inscription on the verso records that the plaque was presented by Rabbi Dr. Alexander Rosenspitz to Rev. Herman P. Bories, both of whom had served as senior rabbis of Portland’s Congregation Beth Israel. Rosenspitz, born in 1839 in Hungary, immigrated to the United States in his early twenties. A talented orator, he led a noteworthy rabbinic career establishing synagogues throughout the United States and serving no fewer than fourteen communities, including in Galveston, TX; Omaha, NE; Titusville, PA; San Antonio, TX; Nashville, TN; and ​Owensboro, KY.

This remarkable, intricately patterned artwork is thus both a beautiful object of Judaica and an important piece of history from the frontier of the nineteenth-century American Jewish community.

Literature

Robert Scott Cline, “Community Structure on the Urban Frontier: The Jews of Portland, Oregon, 1849-1887” (M.A. thesis, Portland State University, 1982).