What Did the Sofer Do? Originally Published April 8-9, 2022.
Sofer David Haviv came to Beth Shalom on March 23rd to effect repairs on two sifrei Torah. Your correspondent was privileged to watch, inquire, and learn. One repair was to a seam which had separated in Parashat Re’eh, and the other was to a paragraph at the end of Parashat Beshallah, in which a tav […]
Please Give Us More About Soferut. Originally Published January 28-29, 2022.
Along the way to answering the question a couple weeks ago about whether a sofer must also be a rabbi, we did learn a few miscellaneous interesting facts about the soferut business. For one thing, as anyone who just looks at a Torah scroll - during an aliyah, for instance - can see, there are […]
Must One Be a Rabbi to Become a Sofer? Originally Published January 14-15, 2022.
One need not be an ordained rabbi to serve as a sofer, but one must nevertheless absorb and deploy a great deal of knowledge and skill. A sofer (סופר) is a scribe (the female sofer is a soferet) who transcribes onto parchment the words of sifrei Torah and tefillin and mezuzot. The acronym formed by […]