Torah on the Move

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Link to Transcript here: https://madlik.com/2025/02/26/torah-on-the-move/

People of the Book, or Ahl al-Kitāb (Arabic: أهل الكتاب), is a classification in Islam for the adherents of those religions that are regarded by Muslims as having received a divine revelation from Allah, generally in the form of a holy scripture. The classification chiefly refers to pre-Islamic Abrahamic religions.

Historically, in countries and regions following Islamic law, the religious communities that were recognized by Muslims as People of the Book were subject to a legal status known as dhimmi, meaning that they had the option to pay a special head tax called jizya in exchange for being granted the privilege to practice their faith and govern their community according to the rules and norms of their own religion. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People_of_the_Book

Beginning on May 10, 1933, Nazi-dominated student groups carried out public burnings of books they claimed were “un-German.” The book burnings took place in 34 university towns and cities. Works of prominent Jewish, liberal, and leftist writers ended up in the bonfires. The book burnings stood as a powerful symbol of Nazi intolerance and censorship.

In the aftermath of the book burnings, the Nazi regime raided book stores, libraries, and publishers’ warehouses to confiscate materials it deemed dangerous or “un-German.”

In 1933, Nazi German authorities aimed to synchronize professional and cultural organizations with Nazi ideology and policy (Gleichschaltung). Joseph Goebbels, Nazi Minister for Popular Enlightenment and Propaganda, began an effort to bring German arts and culture in line with Nazi goals. The government purged cultural organizations of Jewish and other officials alleged to be politically suspect or who performed or created art works which Nazi ideologues labeled “degenerate.”

The text never states where in the Temple the tent was brought. Richard Elliott Friedman has argued, based on a comparison between the size of the Tabernacle in Exodus and the space underneath the wings of the large cherubim in the Temple’s Holy of Holies, that it was set up in that space.[15] Rabbinic tradition suggests that it was disassembled and stored in the Temple’s treasury.[16] Like the Ark of the Covenant, the Tabernacle’s ultimate fate after entering the Temple, remains a mystery. https://www.thetorah.com/article/the-tabernacle-in-its-ancient-near-eastern-context

“The Sabbath service in a Reform synagogue may not include reading from the Torah or may include reading only a few lines rather than the entire weekly portion, but it will include a rather elaborate ceremony in which the Torah scrolls are taken out of and returned to the highly ornamented ark in which they are kept. A bar mitzvah ceremony in a Reform synagogue might have the rabbi removing the Torah scroll from the ark and handing it to the parents or the youngster whose bar mitzvah is being celebrated. The parents, in turn, hand the Torah, in this case a symbol of Jewish tradition, to the bar mitzvah celebrant.” In this case, the actors do not believe their actions to be a mitzvah requiring precise and detailed rules determined by generations of rabbinical authorities. Their performance is a symbolic act whose social nature in this case is quite explicit. As Liebman continues to explain, “The ceremony symbolizes the ties between parent and child in a Jewish context; the centrality of generational continuity and the special role of the parent-child relationship in transmitting the Torah (i.e. tradition). The ceremony clearly manifests and affirms the participation and identification of these actors in the Jewish social order. In the words of Malina (1986, p. 7), a culture projects “collective communication.” See: The Symbolic Representation of the Torah Scrolls Simcha Fishbane Touro College New York See http://www.maqom.com/journal/paper35.pdf

Van Der Toorn (pp. 243-234) also suggests interesting analogies between religions believing in images and the Sefer Torah. First of all, in the religion of images, as founded by the Babylonians, the followers took an oath by touching their idols. In Judaism, people make their oath by touching the Holy Book. "The physical contact with the sacred object exposes the juror to divine punishment may He not speak the truth." (p. 243) Second, idol worshiping societies would go into battle accompanied by their divine statues. The idol was carried at the head of the military convoy as a symbol that the deity was leading armies into battle and thus protecting them. It was the Ark of the Covenant and the Torah that accompanied the Israelites to battle. The Mishnah (Sanhedrin 2:4) stated that the king, who also served as the military chief, carried with him a copy of the Torah, serving not only as a source of information but also as a symbol of G-d’s presence. Finally, when the Sefer Torah was damaged or could no longer be used, it was buried, reminiscent of the behavior of the idol worshippers who buried their irreparably

broken cult statues. see: http://www.maqom.com/journal/paper35.pdf

Rav Auerbach then answered cryptically, that in his opinion the answer is the following: The need to stand for the honor of the Torah scroll is only when the Torah is taken from its stationary place and moved from place to place. On Simchat Torah, the entire synagogue is its place! https://tjpnews.com/simchat-torah-right-to-sit/

The closest parallel to the form and function of the Tabernacle stems from pictorial evidence of a military tent camp that Rameses II used to fight the Hittites in the Battle of Qedesh.[33] This battle was so important to Ramesses II that it is described in hieroglyphics in 10 different pla

ces throughout ancient Egypt, and scenes of the battle were depicted artistically in five locations. The Egyptian camp of Ramesses II, which parallels the Tabernacle, is portrayed at Abu Simbel, Luxor, and twice at the Ramesseum. https://www.thetorah.com/article/the-tabernacle-in-its-ancient-near-eastern-context