New Torah Arrives at Chabad of Cobb

EAST COBB, GA — Chabad of Cobb in east Cobb welcomed a new Torah scroll from Israel on Sunday. The celebration was attended by rabbis and other community leaders.

The synagogue allowed members to help an expert scribe complete the final letters of the Torah scroll at Dickerson Middle School off Johnson Ferry Road before marching half a mile in a Cobb police-escorted procession to the synagogue on Lower Roswell Road near Indian Hills Country Club.

“It’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience,” said Steve Parker of Marietta.

In the Jewish faith, the Torah refers to the original Hebrew version of the five books of Moses: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. For more than 3,000 years, it has been studied and is considered sacred to many Jews. Torah scrolls are often not touched and are usually housed in a synagogue’s special cabinet known as an “ark.”

The Torah scroll received by Chabad of Cobb was written by a scribe in Jerusalem to foster greater unity and support for Israel, according to Rabbi Ephraim Silverman.

The scriptures used in services are written on parchment scrolls. The scriptures are hand-written in Hebrew calligraphy known as STA“M, an abbreviation for Sifrei Torah, Tefillin and Mezuzot. Hebrew is written and read from right to left, rather than left to right as in English.

With a feather and special ink, a scribe writes the Torah on roughly 54 pieces of parchment. It contains approximately 600,000 handwritten letters. The average process takes over a year to produce, said Ivan Sarembock of Marietta.

The new Torah was greeted by Chabad of Cobb’s other Torah scrolls.

Following the procession, members of Chabad of Cobb continued their celebration with live music, dancing and a Lag B’Omer barbecue. The name of the observance refers to the 33rd day of the counting of the Omer and is a day of rejoicing.

During Sunday’s event, Ava Weitz of Marietta said she had never been ”this happy in her life.”