May, 2010
SHAVUOT:AMARRIAGE OF TORAH AND OR CHADASH
On December 7, 2009, Congregation Or Chadash formally received Scroll
MST-1408. This Czechoslovakian Holocaust scroll survived World War II and
we will hold it on loan from the Czech Memorial Scroll Trust of Westminster in
the United Kingdom. Last fall, congregants Susan and Herbert Cohn contacted
the Trust to make this possible.
In 1996, while members of Temple Sinai in Lawrence, New York, Sue and
Herb, with Sue’s sister and brother-in-law, Rhoda and Val Yaverbaum,
arranged for this very scroll to be loaned to that congregation in honor and
memory of their parents. As a result of an upcoming merger for the Long Island
congregation, Scroll MST-1408 would have been returned to the Trust. The
Cohns, with the approval of the Congregation Or Chadash Board of Directors, acted quickly to
secure the scroll for our congregation.
We will dedicate our newest scroll on the festival of Shavuot. Z’man Matan Torah, “The Time
of the Giving of the Torah,” is one of the names given to this holiday and the Talmud (b. Shabbat
86b-88a) suggests that the Ten Commandments were given on this day. Tradition teaches that the
Torah, including subsequent sacred writings of the rabbis, was married to the Jewish people at Mount
Sinai. Congregation Or Chadash will celebrate this marriage, and receiving the particular gift of our
Holocaust Scroll, during Torah Celebration Week.
On Tuesday, May 18th, the evening before Shavuot, there will be a “Dinner and Discussion”
opportunity with Rabbi Louchheim at a local restaurant, where he will offer a teaching on “Relevant
Revelation Today.” At 10:00 a.m. the following morning, the congregation will observe Shavuot
with a festival and Yizkor service in our chapel. The culmination of the week will be the official
dedication by the marriage of this Scroll to our congregation at Shabbat service, 6:30 p.m., Friday,
May 21st at Handmaker.
Our Holocaust Torah will be a visual reminder to our members and students of our ongoing
responsibility to recall life’s tragedies as we live a life of Torah. By giving this Torah a place of
honor among our other scrolls, we offer it as an example to our community of the continuity of the
Jewish people, of the importance of survivability, and of the enduring quality of our religious values.
With its unknown origin and its survival during the Nazi era, our scroll symbolizes for us not
only the survival of the Jewish people but also hope in the midst of despair, compassion wherever we
witness alienation, and loving-kindness–signs of our Covenantal duty.
l’Shalom,
Rabbi Thomas A. Louchheim
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Rabbi
