Celebrates the
end and beginning of the Torah reading cycle.
We read the end
of Deu and the beginning of Gen.
Tradition: This
day combines joy and awe. The prooftext
verse is:
Ps 2:11 - And you shall rejoice in trembling.
The Torah is cause for joy and awe because it is portable, and an
inexhaustible well of knowledge and fulfillment. The Temple may be destroyed, we may be exiled
from the Land - we always have Torah.
And where there is Torah, there is the Shechinah, who rejoices with us in the Torah.
Though exiled, when Jews engage in Torah,
they are at home.
- Seder Elihayu Rabbah, 10th
Century
Finding
joy in Torah means joy in its observance as well as its study -
Simchat Torah means "theTorah's joy," and
implies that it is not enough for a Jew to find joy in Torah, but the Torah
should also find joy in him.
- Jose-Ber Soloveichik of Brisk,
1820-1892
Let
us read the verses together as we make the turn from the end of the Torah to
the beginning -
Deu 34
Chazak,
chazak, v'nit'chazeik - Be strong, be strong, and
let us
strengthen one another
Gen 1:1-5.
A few thoughts
on Torah:
The Torah is the map of the world.
- Zadok HaCohen Rabinowitz, 1824-1900
This goes with: Turn it over and over, for everything is in it.
- Avot 5:25, Ben
Bag-Bag
Every living soul is a letter of the Torah,
wherefore all souls taken together make up the Torah.
- Nathan of Nemirov, died 1845
The object of the whole Torah is that man
should become a Torah himself.
