Gallery 8: Postwar Years, 1944 to the present
TorahTorahIn the narrow sense, Torah refers to the first five books of the Bible. In the broad sense, Torah refers to all Jewish sacred teachings stemming in one way or another from the written Torah. The handwritten Torah scroll is the most sacred object in Judaism. scrolls profaned by the Germans during the Holocaust were discovered just after the war in the Łódź ghetto area. The burial of the scrolls at the Jewish cemetery in Łódź was captured on film. Torah scrolls, the most sacred object in Judaism, must be treated with the same respect as a human body, and if damaged, given a proper burial – or stored in a safe place. Bodies in mass graves were exhumed and also given proper burial. Listen to a cantorCantor(Hebrew: ḥazan, Yiddish: khazn) – a professional prayer leader with musical ability who conducts the synagogue service. A rabbi or layperson may also conduct the service. chanting El male rakhamim (God full of compassion), a prayer for the dead.