Obj. ID: 56390
  Sacred and Ritual  Mizrah, Jerusalem, circa 1870

The following description was prepared by William Gross:

Mizrah (Hebrew: מזרח "east") is the Hebrew word for "east" and the direction that Jews in the Diaspora face during prayer. Jewish law prescribes that Jews at prayer face the site of the Temple in Jerusalem. In addition, "Mizrach" refers to an ornamental wall plaque used to indicate the direction of prayer in Jewish homes. In a synagogue, that direction would be obvious as it is the side of the building on which the ark was placed. But in a home or Sukkah the direction had to be indicated. It is customary in traditional Jewish homes and the Sukkah to mark the wall in the direction of Mizrach to facilitate proper prayer. For this purpose, people use artistic wall plaques inscribed with the word Mizrach and scriptural passages like "From the rising (mi-mizrah) of the sun unto the going down thereof, the Lord's name is to be praised" (Ps. 113:3), Kabbalistic inscriptions, or pictures of holy places. Such plaques were most often manuscript forms or printed sheets, ranging from the simplest idea of the word only to elaborately decorated pages with a wide range of images and texts. These plaques are generally placed in rooms in which people pray, such as the living room or bedrooms. The four letters of the Hebrew word MiZRaCH are sometimes indicated as the initial letters of the Hebrew phrase Metzad Zeh Ruach CHaim (From this side the source of life).

Printed Mizrachs were an important part of Jewish art around the end of the 19th century. For the first time, the increasing efficiency of the printing and paper industries made such printed sheets available at reasonable prices to a much wider public that previously. Such Mizrachs, used to mark the east wall of the home or Sukkah for the direction of prayer, were a popular item from printers in the Holy Land: for use in that country, for sending as gifts abroad and as souvenirs for tourists. To this Mizrach has been added a panorama of holy places, with the center occupied by a scene of the Kotel and surrounding area. There are other Holy Land sites depicted as well as other images often used by the first printer in Jerusalem, Yisrael Bak. In the Gross Family Collection there are numerous examples of printing, both of single sheets and books.  This Mizrach represents one of the earliest single sheet prints to come from the Bak press.

Yisrael ben Avraham Bak was born in in1797 in Berdichev, Ukraine. In 1815, he founded a printing press in Berdichev where he published 30 books until the press closed. Finally in 1831 he made Aliyah to the Holy Land and settled in Safed where the following year began Hebrew printing for the first time after 245 years. His press was damaged in both the peasant revolt of 1834 and the earthquake of 1837. The final destruction came with the Druze revolt of 1838, after which Bak left Safed and went to Jerusalem. In 1841 he once again established for the third time a Hebrew press in a different city.  This was the first Hebrew press ever in the Holy city of Jerusalem. For 33 year Bak continued to print in Jerusalem, some 130 volumes in all and many single sheet publications, until his death in 1874. In addition to the importance of his printing activity, Bak was also a leader of the Chasidic community and with his son Nisan established the Tiferet Israel synagogue in Jerusalem for Chasidim.