Dancing in the Streets as Jewish Community Center Celebrates Its Torah

DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES — Music and dancing filled the streets around 7th and Broadway this afternoon as members and friends of the Jewish Community Center – Chabad of Downtown Los Angeles celebrated the completion of the synagogue’s first Sefer Torah.

The Torah, handwritten in Israel by a scribe known as a sofer, was completed just moments before it was carried into the streets. Upstairs in LoftSEVEN, Rabbi Moshe Greenwald called a line of individuals and families who had played a part in the new Torah up to stand by the scribe as he filled in the last letters.

Then it was down to 7th street to begin the procession, in which the Torah was carried around the block underneath a Chupah, accompanied by dancing and loud music.
After completing a circuit that took it down 7th to Hill, up to 6th and then back down Broadway, the Torah was carried into its permanent home inside the synagogue, located on the second floor of the Haas Building at 7th and Broadway.