Campus Community to Celebrate Completion of New Torah Scroll
Students, Faculty, and Staff set to Participate in Historic Event

March 24, 2009, PRINCETON, NEW JERSEY – In a day of dedication and celebration, a Torah scroll will be ceremoniously completed and inducted for ritual use by the Chabad House at Princeton University, on Sunday, March 29.
The scroll will be dedicated in a formal ceremony in the Rocky College Common Room. This will be followed by a processional, with live music and dancing, from Rocky to the Torah’s permanent home in the Chabad House.
This scroll—which contains over 304,000 individually hand-written letters—was originally used by a synagogue in Europe 75 years ago.  It was completely restored by professional scribes. According to Rabbi Eitan Webb of Chabad at Princeton University, “we have laboriously restored the writing, and expect the scroll to last us many generations to come. This scroll is a fitting addition to the Chabad center as it represents the unbroken chain of Jewish tradition and survival. The ancient wisdom contained in this soul is the essence of our identity as Jews, and possessing our own Torah scroll at an academic center of learning is cause for great pride and celebration.”
Jewish tradition says that a new Torah is to be welcomed into a community just as one welcomes a bride and groom.
Accordingly, the scroll will be carried under a wedding canopy during the processional from Rocky to the Chabad House, and will be accompanied by live music and dancing, before being placed in the Holy Ark at the Chabad center.
The Torah Scroll is dedicated by Ms. Sandra Brand. A Holocaust survivor, Ms. Brand was witness to the destruction of European Jewry by Nazi Germany. After she immigrated to the United States, she created a project to bring the eternal lessons of the Torah to American youth by supporting the restoration of Torah scrolls and donating them to college communities through money she received through war reparations .  Her goal, in her words, was to allow young people who may have been estranged from their heritage to touch the Torah.
About the Torah Scroll:
The Torah scroll contains the entire five books of Moses in the original Hebrew and is read several times each week during prayer. It is hand-written by a Sofer or scribe on parchment, a detailed process that can last over a year. This is a laborious and precise task, where any error in transcription renders the scroll unfit for use until it is repaired by the scribe.
About Chabad:
Chabad @  Princeton University is celebrating its seventh year of offering a home away from home for the Jewish students and community at Princeton University. Located just across the street from the UStore at 15 Edwards Pl., the Chabad House hosts hundreds of students each month for weekly Shabbat dinners, services, classes, discussions and events.
For further information please contact Rabbi Eitan Webb at chabad@princeton.edu or 609-683-3780.