There was dancing in the streets of Naperville on Sunday afternoon.
Else Bruch had seen the festivities before. She has traveled the world in the many years that have lapsed since she and her family fled Nazi persecution when she was just 14 months old. Along the way she has seen the great excitement triggered by the arrival of Judaism’s most sacred documents into a town.
(Jonathan Miano/Staff photographer)
But it’s been a long time, so she found the celebratory spirit contagious Sunday afternoon, when she and her husband, Ernst, helped welcome Naperville’s first newly inscribed Torah scroll.
“This is overwhelming for me,” said Bruch, a white-haired woman who is affiliated with Temple B’nai Israel in Aurora and described herself as “a child of the Holocaust.”
The scroll – a painstakingly handwritten transcription of the Old Testament etched on 54 parchment sheets with a feather quill dipped in special ink – is a cherished acquisition. An overflow crowd in the Riverwalk Community Center’s community room conveyed its reverence for the event, which was arranged by the Chabad Jewish Center of Naperville.
“This is a celebration, a happy event because the Torah – the five books of Moses – is the basis of our religion,” Bruch said.
Many others were witnessing the dedication of a new Torah scroll for the first time.
“It’s like a new child,” said Michael Mayer, a member of Congregation Beth Shalom of Naperville, who came with his family. “What’s really cool about it is it brings people together from all different communities.”
Rare event
And it’s not an everyday event. Of the two dozen Chabad centers in Illinois, just two have welcomed new scrolls recently – one in Glenview and another in Chicago.
“It doesn’t happen too often that a new Torah comes to a city,” said Rabbi Mendy Goldstein of the Naperville Chabad.
Some traveled far to be on hand for the ceremony and celebration. Sporting the type of wide-brimmed black felt fedora and long beard worn by many of the men in attendance Sunday, Mendy Wilenkin flew in from Brooklyn, N.Y., to take part, along with Binyomin Levin. The men went to school with Goldstein.
Wilenkin surveyed the room and marveled at the diversity represented within the faith.
“We’re orthodox, (but) here there’s everybody,” he said. “This is a great event. This is community.”
Goldstein echoed the thought in his remarks.
“We are all one nation, one community,” he said. “And we are all here as one.”
About a year in the making, the scroll encompasses 600,000 meticulously written letters, which correlate to the 600,000 men who fled Egypt and received the word of God at the foot of Mount Sinai, according to the teachings of Judaism. Every character on the dozens of pages must be written perfectly, or the entire document is declared invalid.
“The shape of the letter is special, so only a scribe can write it,” Goldstein said.
Special connections
Much of the $60,000 cost of the scroll was underwritten by Boruch and Yonit Duchman, Florida residents who are related to Goldstein. But Chabad invited all of the area faithful to help fund the project, and many did.
“The way we do it is we support a word in the Torah. They purchase one word for $18,” Goldstein said.
Each supporter was encouraged to choose a significant word from their spiritual life, perhaps one that was used in their wedding or bar mitzvah. The outcome is that eventually every word in the Torah carries extra meaning for someone in the congregation.
“In that sense we are all connected,” Goldstein said.
As a connected entity, those who attended Sunday’s dedication shared readings before the new scroll was unveiled. Then, torches and the scroll hoisted high, the participants took to the streets for a brief parade – playing music, singing and dancing as they went.
“It’s such a joy,” said Alta Goldstein, the rabbi’s wife. “Everyone’s holding a part of a thing, and it’s a beautiful thing. It’s the basis of Judaism.”
Contact Susan Frick Carlman at [email protected] /a> or 630-416-5260.