The Mysterious Sefer Torah

stuart mintz was born and raised in cleveland in the 1950s for the first 35 years of his life he had no connection to his heritage and was not really interested in pursuing anything other than my bar mitzvah as soon as i was done with my bar mitzvah i was basically done with my jewish education but in 1988 stuart and his friends were offered a subsidized trip to israel and they decided to take advantage and go they arrived very early friday morning and before they knew it shabbos rolled around and i find myself wide awake very very early in the morning shabbos morning there's nothing to do everything is closed down you can't get a taxi you can't get a bus the six of us were just like what to do today one of stuart's friends gets up and he says you know guys why don't we go show hopping synagogue hopping let's check out some synagogues in the area go to show i don't understand go to show that's not yom kippur rosh hashanah they all walk out of the lobby and they start walking the streets of yerushalayim they walk 50 minutes they pass by dozens of shoals and suddenly they come to this white building a big shoal with the windows open and stewart can hear people from the inside davening and he turns to his friends and he says why don't we walk into this school and check it out there was the very first time i walked into an orthodox show so much so that we were saying you know we don't want to look like tourists like conspicuous and everything so let's go upstairs so they get upstairs and stuart leans over the balcony and what he sees left an indelible impression and him he saw it for the very first time of his life he sees people around the bhima wrapped in prayer shawls and talism white beards old ancient savor torah open on the bhima and they're reading from it and he thinks themselves wow if i can go back into time 2 000 years ago i would see the exact same sight a bunch of old men reading these exact words in this exact order at this exact time of the day that's why we as jews are still here today it was that moment that became a turning point in stuart's life he realized how little he knew and how much more he wanted to know grow and connect to his heritage ten years after i'm already show me shabbos i'm sitting at this table with my father and mother having shabbos stewart's father turns to steward and he says stuart you know i don't have ever told you the story about your grandmother while you were in the hospital when you were a baby stewart was born with a certain illness a certain blood condition that threatened his life and he was hospitalized for many weeks when he was born his grandmother was home in cleveland and she hears a knock on the front door she opens the door and she sees this young rabbi who introduces himself as menachem mendel taub the khalifa rebbe he survived the holocaust auschwitz originally from hungary and he came to settle in cleveland and he opened this show and they were looking to buy a safer torah so she says how much is the torah she says well the torah is going to cost thirty five hundred dollars so my grandmother says if you promise on the very first shabbos to do a special mr bear across royal eliezer ben zev that's me i'll buy you that torah so my grandmother wrote a check to this young rabbi for thirty five hundred dollars and obviously he said to mr barack and here i am today so he asked his father he says dad whatever happened to that safer torah he told me that the rabbi with a number of hezbollah about them made joint aliyah to israel and took the you know the entire shoal lock stock and barrow including the torah and they moved to israel at this point stewart cannot believe his ears he's thinking to himself wait a second there was a safer torah in israel 10 years ago that changed my life is it possible that that torah that was being read at the time that started this whole process was the torah that my grandmother actually bought in my mind and heart i know that's a tour because it makes no sense that this would have happened to me but for that fact you know the posix says it's higher the torah is a tree of life for anyone who supports it anyone who connects to it anyone who learns it so many years ago stewart's grandmother decided to support the torah by giving 3 500 to the khalifa and that saved stewart's life twice once physically and once spiritually connect to it learn it support it because ultimately you will realize that it will support you [Music] you