Closed on purpose

A couple of weeks ago I told you that on the second day of Rosh Hashanah we struggled to get a minyan. I'll admit that it stayed with me more than I let on. You stand counting heads, eight, nine... and doing the math on whether the Torah comes out of the ark. Then this week, in a group chat with some fellow Chabad rabbis, I read something that put my counting in perspective. Several of them serve in far-flung places, the kind of town where the nearest Jewish neighbor is a mile away. They already know they won't have a minyan this Simchas Torah. Even the chance of it being tight is slim. Without a minyan, you can't read from the Torah publicly. On the day of the year devoted entirely to celebrating the Torah, their Torah will stay closed. And they aren't sad about it. They ARE excited. Planning the dancing, the l'chaim, the kids up on shoulders, the full party! To Paraphrase: “We are celebrating the Torah that is ours; our heritage, our inheritance, even if we can’t read it.” Here's a detail about Simchas Torah that most people miss. Even in the most packed shul in the world, when dancing, the Torah is closed. It's rolled tight and wrapped in its cover. Not one word gets read during hakafos. We just dance hugging it, holding it, or kissing it as we circle the bimah with it. If Simchas Torah were about how much Torah we understand, the scholar would dance the most and the rest of us would stand along the wall and watch. An open scroll shows the gap between who knows and who doesn't. A closed scroll makes that difference disappear. The Rabbi and the person who never learned the alef beis celebrate the Torah in the same way. What we celebrate isn't that we know Torah, it’s that it is ours. Most of us carry some quiet disqualification around. I don't read Hebrew, I’m not observant, I don't keep enough, when I know more, I'll get more involved, I’m a “reform” Jew, I’m unaffiliated …. etc. My colleagues in those remote towns are answering without saying a word: you don't have to be able to read the Torah to celebrate and dance with it. Here's what turned my own counting around. Those rabbis would give a lot for what we have here in Harford County: a pretty regular minyan. To be able to open the Torah and read from it on a Shabbos. That's a blessing, not a given. Let's hold it tight and dance on Saturday night! In addition, come by Sunday morning as we celebrate the yearly completion reading. This Shabbos is Shemini Atzeres, with Yizkor during morning services. See the full weekend schedule and RSVP at harfordchabad.org/sukkot. Come hold it with us, no reading required :) Good Shabbos and gut yom tov, Rabbi Kushi Schusterman