Expert scribe to finish Torah
restoration and give lecture
By DANA DUGAN
Express Staff Writer
Approximately 2,000 sacred Jewish scrolls
saved from the ravishes of the Holocaust once resided in decrepit condition in
London at the Westminster Synagogue. They are known collectively as the
Holocaust Torahs. Jews all over Eastern Europe buried or hid their centuries old
Torahs from the Nazis in milk cans, underground, in basements, in caves and in
attics.
But the Nazis were not deterred; they also
confiscated hordes of Jewish artifacts, including Torahs, and warehoused them.
They were to be displayed upon the Nazi’s supposed victory. By the end of World
War II many villages and entire families had been wiped out, but word spread and
many Torahs were recovered.
Rabbi Martin Levy displays the restored
Checkoslovakian Torah that belongs to the Wood River Jewish Community.
Express photo by David N. Seelig
Torah literally means teaching. The Torah
is the central teaching of Judaism. It consists of the Five Books of Moses,
Books of the Prophets and other writings. It’s what Christians refer to as the
Old Testament.
But the Torah scroll is not simply a book,
like a printed Bible. The scroll is sacred and necessary to a Jewish community.
"A temple needs a scroll," said Rabbi
Martin Levy of the Wood River Jewish Community.
The 110-year-old Checkoslovakian Torah in
the WRJC’s possession has been on permanent loan since 1989 from Westminster
Synagogue. It’s one of the recovered Holocaust scrolls that had been hidden in a
cave for the duration of the war.
On Feb. 10, Rabbi Moishe Druin is
presenting a talk and demonstration on his work with this and other Torahs at
the Sun Valley Center for the Arts in Ketchum from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. At 4:30
p.m. he will give a talk for children and at 7:30 p.m. there will be a
presentation for adults to the entire community on the spiritual life of the
Torah. He’ll explain how he went about restoring the scroll, said Levy.
Born in New York and now a resident of
North Miami, Druin is also a scribe, or sofer. Only a sofer can transcribe or
repair a Torah. Levy met Druin last summer, the day after Levy’s wedding in
Houston, and later sent him the still damaged Torah for final repairs. But Druin
didn’t finish some parts in the Book of Numbers. On Monday, members of the WRJC,
can, with his help, write a letter in the Torah to complete the project.
"It’s pretty miraculous that (the Torahs)
were found. Some were 500 to 600 years old," Levy said. Miracles are
circumstances that would otherwise be inconceivable to the imagination. The
story of the Holocaust Torahs could indeed be considered a religious miracle,
Levy said. Their existence means a way of life, and an ancient religion lives.
The entire third floor of the Reform
Westminster Synagogue in London has been given over to the Holocaust Torah
project. The process of sorting, cataloguing and repairing the Torahs has taken
years of devotion. The intent of the project’s organizers was to find synagogues
around the world that would essentially, adopt these orphaned Torahs. More than
1,500 have been given away to new synagogues since the late 1940s.
"They are rising like a phoenix out of the
ashes," Levy said. Because a Torah is the most sacred object for Jews, finding
and restoring these historical writings has enabled and inspired Jews all over
the world.
"A Torah is like a human being," Levy
said. "You never throw it out, no matter how damaged. The really damaged ones
are used for commemorative displays in museums. It reminds us to hold on to the
memories of all those families."
The story of how each Torah is made is
enough to convince even skeptics of the piece’s value.
First, a Torah is written on parchment,
which is made from a sheep or cow skin. The animal must be kosher, or clean
according to Jewish laws. It may not be killed for its skin but must come only
from an already dead animal.
No base metals are ever used when creating
the Torah, since metals can be made into tools or weaponry. It’s written with
either a turkey or goose quill, using kosher ink made from gall nuts. The
parchments are sewn together with thread made from kosher calves’ intestines. A
Torah scroll contains the Hebrew Bible from Genesis to Deuteronomy, in which
there are a total of 304,805 letters. Each letter is painstakingly inscribed by
the sofer only after he has preformed several rituals.
The sofer starts by taking a ritual bath.
He then goes to prayers with the minyan, a group of at least 10 Jews. Afterwards
he may begin the actual work. Torahs are always hand-written in Hebrew
calligraphy.
The sofer then sews the individual pieces
of parchment together using a thread called giddin. Then the scrolls are sewn
onto wooden rollers called Eitzei Chayim, or trees of life.
Using this painstaking method, a chapter a
day may be completed. As such, each Torah takes over a year to accomplish. Most
new scrolls are now made in Israel since there are only approximately 25 sofers
in the United States. But all training to be a sofer is done in Israel and
sofers are all orthodox. A new Torah costs approximately $50,000. A sofer also
makes his living by writing scripture to put in mezuzahs and teflins.
The Torah’s existence can be traced back
to Moses, who, the story goes, received the commandments on Mount Sinai in
approximately 1,300 BC.
The scroll he transcribed was placed in
the Ark of the Covenant, a wooden box overlaid with gold, which Israelites
carried with them throughout their 40 years of wandering in the wilderness, and
then brought to Israel. King David brought it to Jerusalem, when he made the
Holy City his capital.
"The Torah is a symbol of life," Levy
said. "It’s a great metaphor. It’s a tree of life to those who hold fast to it."