Camarillo Jewish community welcomes new Torah

Sacred book brought from Israel, paid for by couple



PEOPLE OF THE BOOK—Ruth and Moshe Daniels, left, recently commissioned a new Torah scroll for the Chabad Jewish Center of Camarillo. With them is Rabbi Aryeh Lang of the center. A celebration of the new Torah will take place at 11:30 a.m. Sun., Oct. 1 at the Camarillo Public Library. BOBBY CURTIS/Acorn Newspapers

PEOPLE OF THE BOOK—Ruth and Moshe Daniels, left, recently commissioned a new Torah scroll for the Chabad Jewish Center of Camarillo. With them is Rabbi Aryeh Lang of the center. A celebration of the new Torah will take place at 11:30 a.m. Sun., Oct. 1 at the Camarillo Public Library. BOBBY CURTIS/Acorn Newspapers

When they immigrated to the United States from Iran in 1976, Moshe and Ruth Daniels arrived first in New York. In 2012 they moved to Camarillo.

When they settled in Ventura County, the couple said, they found a new place of worship at the Chabad of Camarillo.

“We found a community where everyone is always smiling, friendly,” Ruth said Tuesday. “We were also very fortunate to find such a great rabbi.”

As a way to serve their new hometown and their new synagogue, and to honor Moshe’s parents, Nuriel Ben Yochanan and Rachel Ben Moshe, the Danielses “at great expense” commissioned a new Torah for Chabad Jewish Center of Camarillo, Rabbi Aryeh Lang said.

“They don’t want to put a price on it, but it’s a very expensive undertaking,” he said of the couple’s efforts.

Moshe Daniels said he and his wife were following the spirit of the Torah when they decided to commission the new scroll.

“I wanted to honor my mother and father, which is one of the Ten Commandments,” he said.

Written by hand in Israel by a specially trained Jewish scribe that Lang contracted for the project, the more than 300,000-letter document took about eight months to complete, he said.

Last week, the couple traveled to Israel, a country they try to visit at least once a year, to pick up the new Torah and bring it home to Camarillo. At 11:30 a.m. Sunday at the Camarillo Public Library, Lang will oversee a celebration to mark the completion of the sacred book.

At the celebration, another Jewish scribe will fill in the last 700 or so letters in the book, including dedications.

“It’s appropriate,” Lang said of the venue. “The library is a place of books, and the Jewish people are known as the People of the Book.”

At 2 p.m., after the celebration, Chabad members will hold a procession with the Torah beginning at Mission Oaks Park and concluding at the Chabad Center in Santa Rosa Plaza. As worshipers dance and sing, the Torah scroll will be marched down Oak Canyon Road, protected under a chuppah, a ceremonial canopy often used in Jewish weddings.

“It is like a symbolic marriage, welcoming a new Torah,” Lang said. “In this case, the Torah is like a marriage license between God and the people.”

The celebratory homecoming will occur one day after Yom Kipper, the Jewish Day of Atonement, when the Jews were forgiven for worshiping the golden calf at the foot of Mount Sinai, according to the Bible.

“This is a very appropriate date,” Lang said. “It’s kind of like a clean slate, where everybody is atoned for their sins, and we’re also getting a new Torah.”

More than a book, the Torah is life’s guidebook for Jews, Lang said, adding that it contains a moral code to which all religious Jews try to adhere.

Copies of the Torah must be reproduced exactly as the original. Today, a computer program is used to ensure that every letter of the document is precisely and faithfully copied. One wrong or missing letter nullifies the entire Torah, the rabbi said.

“All of our laws come from the Torah,” Lang said. “It’s not just a history book. It’s about respecting life, respecting the planet, respecting the animals—all of that, the source of all morality, goodness and kindness, emanates from the Torah. The more that we align our lives to the Torah, that’s what we strive for.”