QUESTION: If one is short for a minyan, I have heard that one can open the Ark and count a Torah scroll for the 10th person. Is that true?
ANSWER: That is not only untrue, but it is somebody’s grandmother’s fable. I have heard this concept quoted from time to time and it is absolutely not based on Jewish law or tradition. One of my out-of-town colleagues had a humorous comment about the myth. He said, “If I could circumcise a Torah then I would count it for a minyan.”
I have no idea where people get these strange concepts and ideas and they live as folklore for generations. I understand that one of the congregations in St. Joseph, Mo., did utilize that practice for many years in the 1960s and 1970s during a period when they did not have a full-time rabbi. The idea of the Torah being so special to fill a role of a human being might be very mystical and romantic; however, it does not fit the bill as far as Jewish law is concerned.
Now that we are on the topic of traditions that are not based on Jewish law, I would like to address a very important topic that comes up all the time. Many Jewish people are under the impression that one has to have a mezuzah on one’s front door. That is very true. However, it is necessary to have a mezuzah on every door of one’s home other than the bathroom. The Bible is very specific when it mandates “you shall affix them, meaning the mezuzah, to the door posts (plural) of your home.” The Torah commands us to affix a mezuzah to every door post of our homes. Any room, in which you live or eat or study or have any kind of activity, requires a mezuzah. Even though many of the synagogues in the community, including my own, have beautiful mezuzot mounted, technically a synagogue, since it is not a place of dwelling, does not really require a mezuzah as your home does.
The other concern that we need to express is that so many mezuzot that are sold either online or even in some gift shops of synagogues around the community are really not “kosher.” By that I mean they have to be written by a scribe and on parchment. You can tell if your mezuzah parchment is not a “kosher one” by just trying to put a little tear into it. If it is parchment it will not tear. It also has to be handwritten by a scribe, like a Torah scroll, and not photocopied. Many mezuzot available online and around town have photocopied insertions to put into the mezuzah. It would be a shame for an individual to spend the money, time and effort of getting a mezuzah and a beautiful one perhaps at that, only to have it be not acceptable by Jewish law. Even though the primary purpose of a mezuzah is fulfilling a biblical commandment, the tradition is that they do protect our homes.
