During the Lansing Holocaust Memorial Torah Dedication, there were ceremonial activities, a traditional meal and a procession to the synagogue to celebrate the new scroll.

Rabbi Hendel Weingarten, of the Chabad, said obtaining a new Torah Scroll is worth celebrating — it’s not something that happens every day.

“It’s one of the most important (events) because everything is based on this scroll,” Weingarten said.

Weingarten said the Chabad’s scroll was written in Israel and brought to East Lansing to be finished by attendees honoring those who survived or perished in the Holocaust.

In attendance at the celebration was Weingarten’s father-in-law, Moshe Yitschok Vorst, a Holocaust survivor from the Netherlands, who spoke and helped finish the scroll in memory of those perished.
In light of a recent alleged anti-Semitic incident at MSU regarding a Jewish student beaten for his faith, Zach Firestone, the vice president of the Chabad of MSU, said the timing of the celebration shows that the Jewish community is active and thriving.

“It’s nice that we can be here, in the Union in public, having this sort of event to show not only that we are not afraid and we’re not running away, (but also) that we are proud of who we are and everyone should be proud of who they are,” Firestone said.

Firestone, a senior studying business and interdisciplinary studies in humanities-pre-law, said today, it is not only important to have a Torah of their own, but this event is bringing the communities together and unifying them — adults, children and students.

Weingarten said the scribing process of the Torah is something so unique that some people might not even experience this in a lifetime, and for Grand Ledge, Mich., resident Meredith Erickson, this happened to be the case.

“I’ve never, ever, been to this before and I was born and raised Jewish,” Erickson said. “And I’ve never seen a Sofer who writes in the Torah.”