an honor

-
So this morning at services, the Rabbi looked at me and said "[songbird] will carry the Torah." And then, as an aside, he said "Don't worry, it's the small one."

The Torah, the Five Books of Moses, the holiest writings in Judaism. 

Physically, the Torah is a scroll, a series of parchments sewn together, with a wooden shaft at either end of the scroll.  When not in use, the scroll is covered with a mantle and adorned with a silver crown.  Most Torah scrolls weigh about 20-25 pounds.  (You can find a full description of the Torah and its accessories on the Chabad website).

The Torah is read on Mondays, Thursdays and Saturdays.  There is an elaborate ritual for reading the Torah, which includes parading the scroll through the sanctuary.    Members of the congregation show reverence for the Torah by touching it with their prayer shawls or prayer books, then kissing the shawl or book.

It is an honor to be asked to carry the Torah. 

But the Torah is heavy!

Good thing I've been working out at Planet Fitness.  No worries that I might accidentally drop th Torah -- that would be unbelievably horrible. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

It’s all coming back to me now

-
 So you should know that I am not a “shopper”.  I live in shopping mall heaven — I’m ten minutes from the Broadway Mall,  15 from Roosevelt Field and 25 from Whitman Shoppes — but I seldom go to the mall.  I prefer to shop on line.  And when I do venture into a store, I usually know what I want and buy it as quickly as possible.  I’m not one to browse through stores just to see what’s for sale. There’s a local chain,  Baked By Melissa , that specializes in mini cupcakes.  They’re primarily in Manhattan.  A few years ago Becca introduced me to their product - delicate little cakes, exquisitely decorated, very tasty.  I walk past their shop on 7th Avenue whenever we go to the theater. Well, last week I remembered that they used to have a second shop on 7th, right next to the original shop, but selling gluten-free versions of all their cupcakes. The gluten-free shop closed, but the company continues to make a gluten-free version of their product. So I thought that gluten-free cupcakes wou
Read more

DISboards nonsense

-
found a new blog today. Love it. http://secret-squirrel.webs.com/index.htm I've posted there under various names over the last 10 years or so. it went from a sweet little board that was Pete Werner's hobby to ....well, a real nightmare. that a board devoted to all things Disney can be such a nasty, racist, childish (not childlike) place.... loving the inside scoop, though. Did I ever tell you how "songbird" was banned from the DIS? I was a poster in good standing for 3-4 years. Even booked my trips through Dreams Unlimited, back when Pete was careful to distinguish between the disboards as a hobby and Dreams as his business. Pete and Webmaster Alex were struggling with server issues, the disboards would go down more often than they'd stay up. then Pete announced cosmetic changes to wdwinfo.com, which feeds into the disbaords forum. Like all other members of the forum, I was frustrated. so I was a bit sarcastic. I posted something to the effect of "would yo
Read more

Music Monday

-
Image
Another “your choice” week. How about new music from icons of the 60’s and 70’s? Let’s start with Jimmy Buffett’s posthumous hit, “Bubbles Up”. The Rolling Stones released a new song in 2023, it’s called “Angry”. The surviving Beatles (with some  help from AI) released “Now and Then”. And then Billy Joel …    The AI effects in the video blew me away… A note about the AI effects … the Beatles used it to isolate John’s vocals on an old demo.  Billy Joel had a young man play the piano then superimposed his own face onto the image of the younger man.   
Read more