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March 21, 2003/Adar2 17 5763, Vol. 55, No. 30
Sun Lakes dedicates Torah
LEISAH NAMM
Managing Editor
Edie and Robert Mund participate in Temple Havurat Emet's Torah dedication ceremony on March 9.
Photo courtesy of Arlene Santis
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Three blasts of a shofar announced the beginning of Temple Havurat Emet's Torah dedication ceremony on March 9.
More than 500 people joined in a processional, led by Rabbi Lester Frazin, from the Phase One Country Club to the All Faiths Chapel in Sun Lakes.
"We woke up the entire neighborhood," Frazin says.
The synagogue's new Torah, kashered by Rabbi Schmuel Miller of Los Angeles, was accompanied by remnants of a 300-year-old Torah from Kyjov, a town in the Czech Republic. During a recent visit to the Westminster Synagogue in London, which stores Torahs for the Czech Holocaust Memorial Foundation, Frazin borrowed these remnants for the dedication then shipped them back to London.
Frazin relates the background of the Torah remnants: Before being sent to a concentration camp, the rabbi of Kyjov asked a non-Jewish neighbor to store the remnants of his synagogue's Torahs until the end of the war. In 1963, a London art dealer visited Prague and bought 1,564 Torahs - which had been seized by the Nazis - from the communist government. The Westminster Synagogue stored these Torahs and in 1965, after the synagogue publicized that the Holocaust Torahs were available for congregational use, the rabbis' non-Jewish neighbor came forth and donated the remnants.
The dedication ceremony included a performance by the Tri-City Jewish Community Center children's choir, Israeli dancing, Klezmer band performances and refreshments.
Joining the celebration were families from Temple Gan Elohim of Glendale and the Sun Lakes Jewish Congregation, Rabbi Zev Wellins and clergy from the Interfaith Council.
In the next few weeks, Temple Havurat Emet will receive a more complete Holocaust Torah, on "permanent loan" from the Westminster Synagogue. A second Torah will also be shipped, on loan to Temple Gan Elohim, where Frazin also conducts services. Although the Torahs are not kosher, and therefore cannot be used during a typical service, they serve as symbols that "we remember what evil does to us," Frazin says.
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