World’s Largest Chasidic Book Fair Opens in Jerusalem

More than 10,000 participants are expected to convene at Jerusalem’s International Convention Center Thursday through Monday to purchase or peruse some 250,000 books and attend workshops and lectures at the annual Chasidism Fair, the world’s largest event of its kind.

Book selections will range from classic Chabad texts to obscure pieces by Hassidic masters of Galicia, Poland and Israel, as well as the works of modern Chassidic academics. Speakers will include Rabbi Yoel Kahan of the Lubavitcher yeshivah in Crown Heights, Chief Rabbi of Russia, Berel Lazar, author and Kabbalist Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburg and author Rabbi Yehoshua Shapiro.

Additionally, the fair will have a concert featuring the Alter Rebbe’s religious melodies to be performed by Israeli singers Shuli Rand and Eviatar Banai, with the assistance of a choir led by world-renowned clarinetist Chilik Frank.

The fair, organized by Rabbi Moshe Shilat, founder and head of Torat Chabad Libnei Hayeshivot in Kfar Chabad and sponsored by the Chabad-Lubavitch Youth Organization in Israel, is scheduled to begin Thursday evening.