Simchat Torah: Turning and spinning and dancing.
Dear Chevra, as is our custom, we will gather tonight at 5.45p ct to welcome Shabbat. These are the coordinates:
Zoom
Meeting ID: 963 5113 1550
Password: 1989
Phone: +1 312 626 6799
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Here we go.
When I lived in the East Bay of San Francisco, in a suburb called Pleasanton, my family and I belonged to a Reform synagogue, Congregation Beth Elohim. It was the synagogue where I converted with Rabbi Rick Winer. One year for Simchat Torah, Rabbi Winer did something very special that I’ve come to learn many rabbis and congregations do. He gathered the entire congregation together into a very large circle, facing towards the inside of the circle. Rabbi Winer brought a Sefer Torah inside the circle and had a congregant hold one end of the Torah straight up and down. He then began to unroll the Torah and each member of the circle was charged with holding up a section until the entire Torah was unrolled and was being held by everyone in the circle, one pole of the Torah next to the other completing the circle.
Rabbi Winer did a quick “tour” of the Torah, showing us some of the distinctive poetry layout - brick on brick and half-brick on half-brick. Then it came time for the Torah reading.
We turn and turn.
The big trick for the Torah reading on Simchat Torah is to read the very last of Deuteronomy and the very first part of Genesis in one breath. That’s the tradition. With one Torah scroll, this is impossible unless it’s unrolled the way we did it. The symbolism of doing the reading in one breath is to remind us that Torah continues. It never comes to an end. The learning will never finish. The earth turns. The moon turns around us. And we turn the Torah each week, every week. Turning and turning without end. And we dance and we dance with Torah. Spinning and turning.
Holding up Torah.
We learned a lot unrolling the Torah in the circle. Besides the tour of the Torah Rabbi Winer gave us, we learned how many people it took to hold up the Torah: all of us. It takes all of us to hold up the Torah. There are no bystanders. We don’t have a Temple. We don’t have any shrines. Through all the centuries, all we have that we can count on is Torah. It’s what holds us together. It’s what will keep us together.
And may it be for all of us a blessing.
See you tonight!
Gut Shabbes!
All my love,
brian.