{"id":288,"date":"2011-06-06T07:19:57","date_gmt":"2011-06-06T11:19:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lilith.org\/?post_type=articles&p=288"},"modified":"2012-07-23T07:57:23","modified_gmt":"2012-07-23T11:57:23","slug":"cherkassy-ukraine","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/lilith.org\/articles\/cherkassy-ukraine\/","title":{"rendered":"Cherkassy, Ukraine"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Sheri Sandler<\/strong> (L) took her daughter, Eva<\/strong> (R) to Ukraine \u00a014 years ago on a mother-daughter trip organized by Project \u00a0Kesher, they were part of a discussion on what makes a home \u00a0Jewish when there is a total absence of Jewish objects. \u201cNo \u00a0candlesticks, kiddush cups, mezuzahs, dancing rabbis and the \u00a0like,\u201d comments Sandler. At a Shabbat in the woods, when a \u00a0partial Torah scroll was presented for use during the service, \u00a0\u201cI asked if it would be okay to have it restored for the community.\u201d \u00a0The Cherkassy Jews entrusted them with the object \u00a0that had been the centerpiece of their religious activity, and \u00a0the Sandlers restored the Torah scroll, adding a cover embroidered \u00a0with the Hebrew in the feminine.<\/p>\n

Interestingly, the restored Torah spurred several outcomes \u00a0in Cherkassy. Because Project Kesher, a U.S.-based organization \u00a0formed to give voice to Jewish women in the Former Soviet \u00a0Union, was the facilitator of the Torah restoration, women \u00a0in Cherkassy were given full access to chant and dance with \u00a0the Torah in the progressive congregation there, an unprecedented \u00a0egalitarian opportunity. And recently, the Torah \u00a0had its Cherkassy bat mitzvah debut when Lena<\/strong> \u00a0Pyssina<\/strong> (center), 25, Next Generation coordinator for \u00a0Project Kesher, marked her bat mitzvah with it. Pyssina \u00a0was in the U.S. this spring to speak about Kesher\u2019s work \u201cto \u00a0ensure Jewish women\u2019s needs are represented within the Jewish \u00a0community and their voices heard at the grassroots secular \u00a0level.\u201d The three women had the opportunity to meet for \u00a0the first time during her visit. They were photographed at \u00a0Manhattan\u2019s Rodeph Shalom congregation, where Eva had \u00a0celebrated her Bat Mitzvah. \u201cIt\u2019s amazing that a Torah is what \u00a0connected two young Jewish women from opposite parts of \u00a0the world,\u201d Pyssina told Lilith. Sheri Sandler said, \u201cThis story is \u00a0about women trying to fix and repair and restore.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Sheri Sandler (L) took her daughter, Eva (R) to Ukraine \u00a014 years ago on a mother-daughter trip organized by Project \u00a0Kesher, they were part of a discussion on what… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","tags":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lilith.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/articles\/288"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lilith.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/articles"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lilith.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/articles"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lilith.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lilith.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lilith.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=288"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lilith.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=288"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}