More than 200 people turned out on a sunny Sunday morning to participate in the completion and dedication celebration of a new sefer Torah, which was dedicated to The Shul of the Nation's Capital in honor of Gladys Hirschman, by her family.
A District resident, Hirschman headed the pediatric nephrology program at the National Institutes of Health.
This Torah is believed to be the first to be completed in downtown Washington, D.C., in decades. After a ceremony in which Daniel Cyper, the sofer (ritual scribe) who wrote the Torah, inscribed the final letters many with the help of friends of the Hirschman family the Torah was marched from the Churchill Hotel to the Lubavitch center, which houses The Shul of the Nation's Capital.
Accompanied by burning torches and klezmer music, men, women and children of all ages and affiliations carried the scroll under a chuppah into its home. A Web cast allowed family members who couldn't make it to the ceremony to watch it live.
Once inside, there were hakafot and festive dancing, after which Bernardo Hirschman placed the Torah in the ark and recited the Shehecheyanu.
The Hirschmans are from Argentina, and had hired an Argentinean scribe to write the scroll.
"This special day and moving celebration is yet another clear sign of the quickly expanding dynamic of Jewish life in downtown D.C.," said Rabbi Levi Shemtov, director of the Washington office of American Friends of Lubavitch and spiritual leader of The Shul.
The event on Sunday was actually the culmination of a special weekend at The Shul, which featured Cantor Jeff Nadel of Beth Sholom Congregation and Talmud Torah and The Shul choir.
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