During Rabbi Zushe Greenberg’s most recent trip to Israel in mid-March, he found a country in contrast.
“I was in Tel Aviv, Kfar Chabad and Jerusalem,” Greenberg told the Cleveland Jewish News. “I went to Bnei Brak and all around the center part of Israel. On one hand, I saw a lot of life. Life is in full force.”
Then, Greenberg met with a Chabad colleague from Kiryat Shmonah, near the Lebanese border.
“We were sitting and talking, and all of a sudden he got a notification that a missile hit really close to his Chabad building not far from his house,” Greenberg said.
The rabbi quickly called his son-in-law who was on site to find out if everyone was OK.
“He told me how Kiryat Shmonah is now a ghost town,” Greenberg said. “There’s nobody there, and even himself, he has moved out to a neighboring community.”
Talk about a dose of reality.
As Greenberg headed to Ben Gurion Airport after his five-day visit to Israel, something crossed his mind.
“I was thinking that I want to do something to unite the community,” Greenberg said. “To do something for the people who lost their lives, for the soldiers who are fighting now and defending Israel, the holy land – and most importantly for the hostages that are still missing. I also wanted to do something with the community that will connect them in a positive way.
“Because of the war, many people all over the world and in Israel are writing Torahs in memory or in honor of somebody that needs a special miracle. The Torah has an unbelievable power. There is a mitzvah for every Jew to write a Torah. Now, writing a new Torah is very costly. It’s one thing to commission someone to write the Torah, but when the community comes together and everybody chips in, then everybody is part of the mitzvah in writing the Torah. There is something uniting about it.”
By the time Greenberg landed at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport, the wheels were in motion for Solon Chabad’s soon-to-be new Torah. The cost of the Torah was underwritten by one of the Solon Chabad families.
Such an endeavor isn’t cheap.
“It costs about $70,000 to write a new Torah,” Greenberg said.
The rabbi plans to make this a participatory process.
“There is a very interesting expression in Hebrew, ‘Yesh, Sheesheem, Reebu Otiot La Torah,’ which means, there are 600,000 letters in the Torah,” he said. “Each Jew is like a letter in the Torah. We are offering to everyone in the community to buy a letter in the Torah for $1 so that they can be included in this novel mitzvah.”
Greenberg plans to kick off his new Torah plan at a Shabbat dinner at Solon Chabad at 6 p.m. April 19. The dinner will also be Chabad’s celebration of the birthday of Lubavitcher Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson.
Greenberg said he plans for the Torah writing process to be completed by Oct. 7, which will be the one-year anniversary of the Hamas surprise invasion of Israel.
“We will have the completion of the Torah between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur,” he said. “The war broke out on Simchat Torah, and we will invite everyone to come and to dance and to celebrate with the Torah.”
At that point, Greenberg will celebrate with this distinction.
“This will be the first Torah in Greater Cleveland to be written in honor of the hostages,” he said. “That’s the main thing. Whether you are in Israel or in Solon, we all use the same Torah. In every synagogue in the world, there is one thing that everybody agrees on – the Torah, that it is the uniting factor of the Jewish people. When you bring unity you bring blessings, and this blessing hopefully will bring the hostages to be released.”
To purchase a letter in the Torah, visit solonchabad.com/letterintorah.
Steve Mark is a freelance journalist.
