Gishrei Shalom Jewish Congregation (GSJC) in Southington held a special ceremony on Sunday, Sept. 18 to celebrate the rededication of a 17th-century Torah that survived the Holocaust. The ceremony marked the conclusion of a lengthy restoration project to preserve and enhance the 300-year-old Torah – a project that Sue Kleinman, chairperson of the Torah Restoration Committee, called the project “a labor of love.” At the ceremony, the Torah was presented along with saved scrolls brought in from representatives of other congregations throughout the state. The Torah scroll came from the Memorial Scrolls Trust – the repository for saved scrolls – at the Westminster Synagogue in London, England. It was recorded by the Jewish Museum in Prague as having been collected from Caslav-Golcuv-Jenikov. GSJC raised more than $20,000 from grants and donations to restore torn sections of the scroll, as well as faded or missing lettering.

CAP: On hand at the Gishrei Shalom Jewish Congregation ceremony to rededicate a Holocaust Torah scroll were (l to r) the congregation’s spiritual leader Rabbi Shelley Kovar Becker, former congregant Jeff Israel, who brought and blew the shofar his grandfather smuggled out of Nazi Germany, and Restoration Committee Chair Sue Kleinman.