Torah that survived Holocaust finds home
MIAMI (AP) – Rabbi Danny Marmorstein uses the Yiddish word “bashert” to describe how a Torah created in 19th-century Eastern Europe survived the Nazi regime in near-perfect condition and landed a world away at his tiny synagogue.
“It means ‘meant to be,'” he said, “and this was meant for us.”
The 131-year-old Torah is being celebrated at Congregation Ahavat Olam for the first time on Rosh Hashanah, offering a powerful symbol on the endurance of the Jewish faith.
The sheepskin scroll was believed to have been completed in 1878, the date of the inscription on its wooden handle. The handle also bears the name of the couple who donated it to their congregation in Moravske Budejovice, in what is now the Czech Republic.
It was kept in a warehouse with other Torahs and Judaica after Hitler came to power, coming under the Nazis’ control. After the Nazis fell, the cache from the Central Jewish Museum in Prague was controlled by communists who eventually sold the scroll and 1,563 others to a London synagogue in 1963.
That repository, the Memorial Scrolls Trust, has given the Torahs to congregations, museums and other groups as symbols of survival of the faith and a connection to all the Jews lost during the Holocaust.
“We’ve sent them all over the world,” said Evelyn Friedlander, the London-based curator of the trust, “and they’ve come back to life.”
The scroll came to Miami after Marmorstein placed the synagogue’s name on a waiting list several years back. Like all the trust’s scrolls, it remains the property of the London organization, on indefinite loan to the temple. Congregations are chosen, in part, based on their desire to incorporate the scroll into their worship.
At Ahavat Olam, the Torah was welcomed last month with a procession from Marmorstein’s house to the Methodist church about a mile away where the 100-member congregation has been renting space for worship. It was to be read for the first time and be the subject of the rabbi’s sermon when the congregants celebrate the Jewish new year on Friday.
Already, its history has resonated with members.