Cherry Hill rabbi donates Torah to new synagogue in Idaho
CHERRY HILL N.J. (CBS) - It's the holiest object in any synagogue, and it's read during multiple Jewish religious services: the Torah.
"It contains our traditions. It contains our history. It contains everything that we're about as a Jewish people," Rabbi Micah Peltz, of Temple Beth Sholom in Cherry Hill, said. "When you place that Torah on the table and you open it up, it's something that really, always is a beautiful feeling."
It's a feeling shared by the congregants he invites up to read from the Torah, particularly 13-year-old Bar and Bat Mitzvahs.
Since Temple Beth Sholom's Torah arrived at the temple 74 years ago, hundreds of 13-year-olds have read from it, including Joe Fastow.
"As an almost 80-year-old now, I wonder where the time went," Fastow said.
He's also in wonder over how Temple Beth Sholom's Torah ended up in Cherry Hill.
His own father brought it to America from Ukraine in 1910, and when he helped establish Temple Beth Sholom, he donated the Torah in 1949.
"I think second to being an American, founding Temple Beth Sholom was my father's proudest moment," Fastow said.
Now, the son is following his father's path.
Fastow is establishing a synagogue in Sun Valley, Idaho, and Rabbi Peltz is giving the Torah back to Fastow, whose new synagogue will use it.
"They can have as much joy and celebration and love with it as we've had over the years," Rabbi Peltz said.
Fastow said, "I think [my father] would be very proud of the fact that there were Jewish children learning from his torah this many years."