Marilyn Monroe’s Annotated Jewish Prayer Book Expected To Fetch A Fortune At Auction

Marilyn Monroe, thinking about pesukei dezimra (probably) Image by Getty Images

By Jenny Singer October 16, 2018

A bright white prayer book, published in 1922 and owned by American bombshell Marilyn Monroe, will be sold at auction on November 12. Jonathan Greenstein, of the auction house J. Greenstein & Company, says he’s sold Sammy Davis Jr.’s menorah and Alan Dershowitz’s judaica, “But nothing like this — Marilyn Monroe’s personal siddur.”

Hubba hubba.

Monroe hitched her wagon to the Jewish star in 1956, converting when she married playwright Arthur Miller and going on to practice Judaism through the rest of her life, even after the dissolution of the marriage. The Washington Post reports that Monroe marked up her prayerbook — some pages read “omit” or “skip” in the starlet’s hand. Does that mean Marilyn Monroe didn’t say asher yatzar? You only need a few thousand bucks to find out, according to Greenstein, who estimates that it could go for a minimum of $7,000, though more seems likely — in 2010, an x-ray of Monroe’s chest sold for $45,000.

The wear and tear on the prayerbook suggests that Monroe used it regularly — she chose to convert despite lack of pressure from Miller and was open about her love of Judaism. She was drawn, her rabbi Robert E. Goldburg said, to “the rationalism of Judaism.”

Jenny Singer is the deputy lifestyle editor for the Forward. You can reach her at Singer@forward.com or on Twitter @jeanvaljenny

Jenny Singer is a freelance writer with pieces in Vox, the Washington Post, The San Francisco Chronicle, Teen Vogue, and more. She was previously a staff writer at Glamour and the Forward, and she’s currently getting an MFA in nonfiction writing at the University of Iowa.

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