Kol Ami News

If your Torah scroll has cracked or faded letters, who you gonna call?

A sofer.

This Jewish craftsperson is trained in the art of copying holy texts.

Thus, Rabbi Samuel Spector of Congregation Kol Ami, Utah’s largest synagogue, engaged Rabbi Moshe Druin of North Miami Beach, Fla., to spend this week in the Beehive State, working over 10 sacred scrolls.

On Monday night, Druin, president of Sofer On Site, offered a crowd of about 70 attendees, many of them members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a glimpse of what his exacting work entails.

A Torah scroll is handwritten in Hebrew, using kosher ink, drawn with a feather pen on parchment made from the skin of kosher animals, the ebullient Druin explained, standing behind his work table, telling stories and gesturing excitedly.

Every letter in Judaism’s holy book — which roughly corresponds to the first five books of the Bible and when laid out flat would be the approximate length of a football field — “is counted and calculated,” Druin said. Each letter must be drawn by following strict standards for size, style and layout.

In addition to Torah scrolls, sofers also produce the handwritten texts for tefillin (black leather boxes some Jewish men wear on their heads or arms that contain verses) and mezuza (small parchments with 22 lines from Deuteronomy attached to doors) he said, and the Book of Esther.

A scribe must be able to hold his (nearly all are men) hand steady, sit in a chair for hours at a time, Druin said, and be fluent in the “art, wisdom and knowledge of writing Torah.”

Doing it is a religious act, he said. It is “more than calligraphy. It is Torah magic.”

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