One of the challenges presented by medieval Jewish book art is understanding to what extent this art was actually “Jewish.” It is well known that both Jewish and Christian artisans participated in each other's book production. Manuscript illumination in particular, which did not necessarily imply knowledge of the other's language, often provided common ground for interreligious cooperation. The book under review, based on Franziska Amirov's doctoral dissertation, addresses this issue right away, referring in its title to the imagery of Hebrew manuscripts as “Jewish-Christian.” According to the author, her main goals are to uncover contacts between Jews and Christians through Hebrew illuminated manuscripts and to trace Christian influence on Jewish book illumination (38). To do so, the author focuses on Haggadah (Passover tale) manuscripts produced in Southern Germany and Northern Italy (Ashkenaz) during the fifteenth century.

To make the book accessible to a general audience that is not acquainted with Jewish literary genres, the author includes a history of the text of the Haggadah in the first chapter. The second chapter provides historical background to the discussion. It addresses the condition of the Jewish communities in late medieval Ashkenaz and their relationship to their Christian surroundings, with a focus on Jewish-Christian collaboration in manuscript production. Next, the author presents the state of research of late medieval Ashkenazi Haggadot and briefly describes the manuscripts to be used in the body of the work, whose codicological data are appended at the end of the book.

The body of Amirov's work consists of three chapters (chapters 3–5), in which the discussion focuses on three case studies: the Darmstadt, Munich, and First Cincinnati Haggadot, which were long suspected to have been illuminated by Christian artists, or at least heavily influenced by Christian book art. The structure of Amirov's discussion reflects a typical art historical approach with its traditional division into iconography (motifs) and style, the peculiarities of which the author demonstrates on the basis of individual illuminations from the three Haggadot. The illuminations chosen by the author as the most indicative for understanding direct/indirect Christian participation in their production are compared to those in other Ashkenazi Haggadot and in Christian manuscripts that belong to the same milieu. In both sections on iconography and style, the author distinguishes between typical and atypical elements of the illuminations with respect to their iconographical components, stylistic characteristics, and relation to the text of the Haggadah. These parameters allow the author to conclude which elements of the decorative program were typically Jewish and how the “non-Jewish” scenes were integrated or adapted to serve the narrative of the Haggadah. The fifth chapter, albeit not directly contributing to the discussion of the illuminations, reveals another kind of Christian involvement—namely, later Christian hands that left traces in some of the Ashkenazi Haggadot.

All in all, it is a beautifully produced, large-sized volume, accompanied by many color illustrations, an English summary, and a useful apparatus. However, Amirov's argumentation is rather formal, and she does not contextualize it within the specific circumstances of the manuscripts’ production. While modern scholarship has largely moved on to questions of how exactly cooperation between Jews and Christians was carried out and what the nature and dynamics of relations were between different Jewish and Christian parties involved in the production of Hebrew manuscripts (scribes, artists, workshops, patrons, users, etc.), Amirov's work is less innovative in its approach. Indeed, while it is often impossible to say with certainty whether the artists of Hebrew manuscripts were Christians, as Amirov states in her conclusion (216), it is nevertheless possible—even necessary—to address the professional framework of common Jewish-Christian activities, as well as the particular reasons and contexts for such activities, which depended on both internal and external developments in the Jewish and Christian communities. This omission, together with long verbal descriptions of the discussed images, which constitute the largest part of Amirov's work, and the lack of Hebrew titles in the bibliography, may be appropriate for a doctoral dissertation, but as an academic publication, it might not find its place in current discussions.