How is it possible to commemorate the darkest event in Israeli history on the most joyful day of the Jewish year?
This is not a rhetorical question. The massacre of Oct. 7 happened last year on the morning of Simchat Torah, the day when Jews are supposed to sing and dance with Torah scrolls in a state of total exuberance. But the disconnect between that spirit of joy and the massacre is so great that to commemorate that horrific event, much of the Jewish world has chosen the secular date of Oct. 7.
That makes sense: Why contaminate a day of ultimate joy with memories of ultimate grief?
This is why “October 7” has become a brand of its own, like “September 11.” Through countless films, songs, art exhibits, books, essays, stories, poems, memorials and other initiatives, Oct. 7 has become the definitive moniker for a day that will live in Jewish infamy.
But that still leaves us with an uncomfortable question: What should we actually do on Simchat Torah, which begins this year on Thursday night, Oct. 24? Should we sing and dance as if nothing had happened?
That doesn’t seem right.
Several initiatives have sprouted to find ways of marking the tragedy while still celebrating the holiday. One of the largest is the Simchat Torah Project, which has been in the works for many months. The idea is to have synagogues use a specially designed Torah cover to honor the victims of the massacre. According to its website, this cover has been created for “1,600 synagogues across the world” and “will proclaim that this Torah is dedicated in memory of the 1,200 souls and the many soldiers and hostages who have since died.”
Each Torah cover will feature the name of one of the victims embroidered onto it, so that when Jews who participate in this initiative hold up the Torah on our day of joy, they also will be holding up the names of those who perished and continue to live in our memories. As you’ll read in this week’s community story from our reporter Ryan Torok, a few local synagogues have jumped onboard, while others are finding their own ways to navigate the day.
One initiative that has especially caught my attention is the Simchat Torah Challenge, which goes beyond the Torah cover and into the Torah itself.
The idea is to transform the darkness of Oct. 7 with the light of Simchat Torah by encouraging the timeless ideal of Jewish learning.
“These are challenging times for Jews all around the world,” it says on its website. “So what can we do? The same thing we’ve always done: Take a few minutes each week and read the Torah. So grab a friend, a relative, or everyone you know, and join us on the Simchat Torah Challenge, where our community of 10,000 Jews [and growing] will read just one Torah portion a week and discover some surprisingly modern wisdom in a very old book.”
Two things in particular struck me about this initiative. One, it’s not limited to one day. Those who will learn Torah each week will be honoring the victims throughout the year, not just on the holiday.
The second thing that moved me is the action itself. It’s unusual to honor someone’s memory by improving ourselves. From what I gather, the idea came about when someone visited a Chabad rabbi in the hospital and asked if they could do something for the rabbi. Not surprisingly (for those who know Chabad), the rabbi asked the man to put on tefillin. Eventually, they began to learn Torah once a week for several years.
When the massacre struck on Simchat Torah, suddenly the second word of the holiday took on added significance. So when it came time to commemorate the first anniversary, a difficult dilemma became a holy challenge. Instead of agonizing over what to do on that most joyful of days, Jews would be encouraged to do what has kept us going for millennia: study Torah, the one book that brings us all together.
As you’ll see on its website (simchattorahchallenge.org), the initiative goes way beyond a simple suggestion and includes, among other things, user-friendly tools and the creation of a global “Torah community.”
I can’t think of a better combination for this year’s Simchat Torah: Dance with special Torah scrolls to commemorate the victims, and then begin learning a little Torah each week from those same Torah scrolls.
Gaining the wisdom of Torah every week is an unusual way to honor the memory of the worst day in Israeli history. But by transforming the deepest darkness with the light of learning, it’s also very Jewish.
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