A stone tablet believed to be engraved with the Ten Commandments sold for $5 million at a New York auction on Wednesday.
The estimated price was $1-2 million, which has been far exceeded. The final bid, including fees, came in at $5 million after intense bidding, with offers escalating to $4.2 million before the hammer fell.
The authenticity of the stone tablet in question
The 115-pound (52-kilogram) tablet, which features a Paleo-Hebrew script, was said to have been discovered in 1913 during excavations for a rail line in what is now Israel. Despite its hefty price tag, the tablet’s authenticity has been called into question by several experts.
Though not claimed to be the original Ten Commandments tablet from the Bible, some scholars have raised doubts about its provenance, which dates from 300 to 800 CE. Furthermore, the tablet only contains nine of the ten commandments, excluding the one against taking the Lord’s name in vain.
The tablet was privately held until an archaeologist in Israel recognized its potential historical significance and acquired it. It later made its way to the Living Torah Museum in Brooklyn before being sold to a private collector.
Sharon Liberman Mintz, a specialist on Jewish texts at Sotheby’s, described the tablet as “an object of antiquity” that is “unlike any other stone in private hands.” While Sotheby’s stated that the tablet has been studied by leading scholars and published in various academic works, some experts remain skeptical.
Brian Daniels, director of the Penn Cultural Heritage Center, acknowledged the possibility of the tablet’s authenticity but warned that objects from the region are often subject to forgery. Christopher Rollston, a professor at George Washington University, questioned the tablet’s dating, citing the lack of documentation from the time of its discovery in 1913.
