Submission #21725 by Temple Israel Men'S Club - Norfolk, VA (1121)

I have read the 2021 Torch Awards Program Guidelines.
Club Name
Temple Israel Men'S Club - Norfolk, VA (1121)
Geniza Book Burial
Club Representative
Person completing form
Norman
Soroko
Club President at time of convention if known at this time
James
Gordon
Club President Now
James
Gordon
Community Outreach

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The Men's Club of Temple Israel of Norfolk, Virginia took on the task bury several thousand old prayers books, tallit's, and religious old documents that had been in the temple for yeas. The United Jewish federation of Tidewater donated an 8 grave plot to allow us to do this and involve the Sunday school as part of a learning project.
We met at the temple and loaded all of these items into three vans. When we got to the cemetery, they were still digging the grave. People in attendance helped us unload the books and documents for burial. After all the books were buried, we said special prayers. since these were books, Kaddish and Crea and meal of consolation was not done. Our Rabbi spoke to all of us about the importance of burying these items and not destroying them This was a huge leaning experience since this had not been done before at Temple Israel.
Attachments
Self Assessment
Our Club wanted to give back to the Community by performing the Mitzvah of burying sacred books. The temple had been accumulating them for many years. we came up with a book burial and we were able to get the eight plots donated to us for this purpose. The program was most successful and drew attention from hundreds in the community, both Jewish and non Jewish.
Giving back to the Community by performing this mitzvah to show our people we care about our history and we bury it and do not destroy it.
All clubs should experience this mitzvah. We just did not dig a small hole and throw 4 books in. We had a huge 8 grave ploy dug to bury our historical documents that aged as proper as we would bury our love one.

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Original Program
Previous Submission
Yes
Gold