Ninth Unity Torah Scroll Dedicated to the People of Ukraine

by Nancy Hochman – chabad.org

More than 40 years after the launch of the first “Unity Torah”—a Torah scroll written for the sake of the unity of the Jewish people worldwide—thousands will gather in Montreal on Sunday, Sept. 10, to honor the completion of the Ninth Unity Sefer Torah, dedicated to the “merit and safety of the people of Ukraine.”

Montreal’s Chabad Houses, which collectively signed up 55,000 participants for the scroll’s 304,805 letters, will share the Torah scroll in recognition of their diligence and hard work in ensuring it would be completed in this Hakhel year, said Rabbi Moshe Shmuel Oirechman of Chabad of the Krayot, the cluster of towns north of Haifa, who has led the efforts for each of the nine scrolls since 1981, in which every Jewish person is encouraged to purchase a letter, thus uniting with all other Jewish people.

To celebrate the completion, Rabbi Mendel and Sarah Raskin, co-directors of Beth Chabad Cote S. Luc in Montreal, will host guests from Canada, the U.S. and Israel at their Chabad center. Simultaneously, a Torah scribe in Israel will begin writing the tenth Unity Torah.

The ceremony, which will include musical performances and inspirational addresses, will be broadcast live on Chabad.org beginning on Sunday, Sept. 10 at 7 p.m. Eastern time.

To further the unity Jews share with one another, with the Torah and with G‑d, the Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory, initiated the first Torah campaign on the evening before Rosh Hashana 5742 (1981). His goal was to encourage Jews worldwide to fund, to the degree they were able, the writing of at least one letter in what became known as a “Unity Torah Scroll.”

When the first scroll was completed, just three months later, the Rebbe noted that in challenging times, contributing to a “Unity Torah” helps bring stability to the world through uniting Jews, and protection to those who participate.

Additionally, the Rebbe stressed that taking part in helping finance a Torah scroll, regardless of the size of the monetary contribution, fulfills the commandment for each Jew to write a Torah. While recognizing that each Jew has a unique mission, the Rebbe told those gathered at the farbrengen that one means of uniting all Jews is through the eternally true Torah, shared equally by all Jews.

Brainchild of an Immigrant from the Former Soviet Union

Writing a Torah that will unite each Jew, regardless of geography, health, and socioeconomic differences came about through the efforts of Yisrael Gottlieb, an immigrant to Israel from the Soviet Union who became a paraplegic through a traffic accident. Eager to disseminate his idea of uniting thousands of Jews across the globe by having each purchase one of the 304,805 letters that compose the Torah, he asked Rabbi Oirechman, who paid him frequent visits, to pen a letter that Gottlieb would dictate, and give that letter to the Rebbe during Oirechman’s upcoming trip to Crown Heights.

The Rebbe responded to the idea with enthusiasm. Within days, a group of Haifa-area Chabad activists formed a committee to commission a new Torah and keep track of letter sales. By the following Passover, 304,805 Jews stepped forward to each purchase a letter in what the Rebbe referred to as “Sefer Torah Haklali—“The General Torah,” Some six months later, the final writing of the Torah took place in Meron on Lag BaOmer, the place and time the organizers expected would draw the largest crowd to honor the event.

When Oirechman, who has continued to this day his pivotal role in organizing the writing of each Torah in Israel, asked the Rebbe whether his group should continue to commission another scroll, the Rebbe replied that they should—on the condition that another and yet another be written, “as long as there is a single Jew needing to purchase a letter.”

Letters in the Unity Torah Scroll can be purchased here on Chabad.org