This is a Simchat Torah like none other. Many of us will recall the horrors of the largest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust and attempt to honor the memory of those lost on Oct. 7—which was also Simchat Torah. This year, many are choosing to reclaim the celebration of the joy of Torah and the start of the new cycle of reading the weekly portion—with the help of a collaborative Jewish communal effort initiated by the Margaret and Daniel Loeb Foundation.
We wondered, why would Jews—many of whom have little to no connection to reading the weekly Torah portion—decide to do so in response to the losses suffered on Oct. 7? To find out, we have collected short reflections from participants in the Simchat Torah Challenge. These stories share readers’ rekindled or new draw to Torah and shed light on their hopes for reading along in the new Jewish year. We plan to check back next year to see how things developed and what people learned.
The Simchat Torah Challenge has already inspired thousands to sign up. To join the group, visit www.simchattorahchallenge.org.
Jaime Herndon
Jaime Herndon is a science writer and editor.
I grew up Conservative, going to Orthodox and Conservative day schools, but during high school, I found myself resenting what I’d been taught, and how. (I attended in the 1980s and ’90s, so the sexism was significant and we were discouraged from challenging teachers or asking questions—and yes, I now see the irony in this, for a people who “wrestle with G-d.”) I fell out of observance for the next 25 years or so, until my son brought me back into observance. He attended a Jewish preschool, and when the pandemic hit, he wanted to attend Friday night services via Zoom so he could see his beloved rabbi and his friends. So I found myself attending Friday night services for the first time in decades, albeit on a computer screen. In 2021, because his preschool was Reform and I wanted to raise him Conservative, we found ourselves back at the shul in which I grew up—which was now egalitarian, and much more inclusive.
My son has the kind of faith to which I can only aspire, and a love of Judaism that I’m not sure I’ve ever known, especially at his age (he’s 8). Thanks to him, we are regulars at Friday night services, have Shabbat dinner every Friday night, and have even started going to morning minyan sometimes. That being said, my faith coexists with plenty of doubt and skepticism.
Though I attended shul regularly, there’s a difference between observance and unquestioning belief. I may attend services but there are prayers at which I bristle; prayers I find that I just cannot say; prayers that I find myself arguing with in my mind.
So when Oct. 7 happened, I was shocked to find myself turning to prayer and Jewish texts.
I am a pragmatist: I don’t believe that baking challah or doing mitzvot will move the needle to bring the hostages home. I am under no illusions that the Messiah will come any time soon, if ever. The IDF will rescue the hostages, not G-d.
And yet I found myself praying. But even as I would pray, I found myself questioning: Why am I doing this? What is it that I am holding onto here? I started to read more and more about Judaism, rabbinic literature, faith, and prayer, and had to reexamine what I believed and various self-concepts when it came to religion and belief. It’s something I’m still unpacking and examining, and I think it’s a good thing.
I haven’t formally studied parsha since graduating day school in 1994, but since May 2024, I’ve started to teach my son parsha with Hadar’s Devash weekly magazine, and I’ve been reading the weekly chapters from Rabbi Elyse Goldstein’s The Women’s Torah Commentary and Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks’ Covenant & Conversation. But there’s something nice about knowing other people are doing the same thing you are, which is what drew me to the Simchat Torah Challenge. It’s why I started studying daf yomi in December: I’m part of something bigger than myself. I’m hoping that the weekly emails and any kind of additional structure or supplemental material adds something to my reading that I wouldn’t have gotten on my own.
I wanted to do the Simchat Torah Challenge because it’s a more formal, organized extension of what I’ve been doing for nearly the last year or so with my own self-directed Jewish study. I am hoping to get a better understanding of the Torah. I wasn’t always the most attentive student in my chumash classes, and it’s been so long that I’ve forgotten much of it. Now as an adult, I want to get a more nuanced, layered exploration of the text.
Olivia Friedman
Olivia Friedman teaches Judaic studies at Jewish Leadership Academy in Miami.
Every Friday night, I watched my father reach for his tikkun and pore over the words. He would leyn, chanting Hebrew aloud as part of Jewish tradition. A little girl, my task was to follow along in my vocalized chumash, Hebrew Bible, and catch any of his errors. I played an essential role in ensuring that he would read the Torah properly the next day in synagogue.
And so reading the parsha, or Torah portion, became integral to my identity. I was the baal korei’s daughter, the master reader’s helper. Parsha was my birthright. I read fantastical stories and gleaned moral lessons about the weekly portion from The Little Midrash Says, prepared words of Torah to say at my parents’ Shabbat meals using Rabbi Ari Kahn’s Explorations, and ultimately became a person who would speak in public forums about the parsha.
As an adult, my time became limited. But I was endlessly fascinated by parsha. Thriving on external deadlines, I created a Substack called Parsha with Chana to record my study of these texts. The next time we cycled through, I created a podcast called Parsha for Kids, geared to children ages 7 and up.
Last year on Simchat Torah, right after I had finished recording my podcast for the year, tragedy struck. It was a tragedy of biblical proportions. As I listened to Ness & Stilla’s song “Harbu Darbu,” the words they used to describe Hamas, Bnei Amalek, children of Amalekites, struck me. A midrash compares Amalek’s initial attack in the wilderness to a man jumping into a cauldron of boiling water. Though he scalds himself, he succeeds in cooling off the water for others. Similarly, in 2023, Israel was dealt a blow by Hamas. Where was the country’s famed intelligence? Where was its deterrence? If Hamas could succeed with paragliders and bulldozers, was it not open season for all of Israel’s enemies?
Like so many, I found comfort in other words of Torah. In Exodus 14:14, Moses assures his brethren: “The Lord will fight for you.” Reading the parsha of the week is an affirmation of that concept; we are children of the covenant. There is a God who is just, a God who is mighty, and a God who will defend His nation against all odds. The world may spew hatred; the world is not what matters. It is in God that I find my strength; it is to God that I turn when the world is darkest.
The Simchat Torah Challenge is thus a defiant act. Hamas deliberately inflicted pain on our joyous holiday, where we dance with the Torah and affirm our love for God. We resist by declaring: There is nothing you can do to break that bond. We will strengthen it, joining together as Jews to read from our holy book and reflect on God’s words. Our study is an offering to uplift the souls of our fallen.
Although I have read the parsha many times before, I am looking forward to beginning again. I will join a community of readers experiencing these ancient texts through fresh eyes. My colleagues’ insights are sure to spark new insights and fresh perspectives in me. Moreover, this program enables Jews from across the religious spectrum, with different political affiliations, and varying levels of Hebrew fluency, to come together to experience our shared heritage. This sense of unity fulfills the vision behind the popular cry “Yachad Ninatzeach,” together we will win. Religious and secular Jews died together on Oct. 7, murdered by an enemy that did not differentiate between them. How fitting, then, that religious and secular Jews are coming together to read the Torah, which is an etz chaim—a tree of life. These bright words, black fire on white fire, form a bridge between us. I hope to walk this bridge now—and always.
Simone Heymann
Simone Heymann is an operating room nurse in Portland, Oregon. She attends Neveh Shalom, a Conservative synagogue.
When my family emigrated from South Africa to the United States in the early 1960s, they severed all ties with Judaism, except for a mezuzah on the front door and the celebration of Hanukkah—likely for us children. There were no Shabbat observances, no High Holidays, no temple, no Hebrew school, no summer camp, and no Torah. My parents held a proud contempt for religion. We were, as the comics say, Jew-ish.
For most of my life, I felt utterly unmoored, a stranger in my own family, too vivacious for their stoic, lugubrious nature. My paternal grandparents barely escaped Germany, losing 26 family members to the camps, while my mother grew up amid alcoholism and poverty. Both my parents endured the violence of apartheid in South Africa.
Growing up in Berkeley, California, in the 1970s, I was raised on a steady diet of liberalism, social justice, and assimilation. We had few Jewish friends, and as time went on, my lack of Jewish education left me embarrassed and hesitant to connect with others in the community. I didn’t know the “rules,” the habits, or the customs. My parents even ate bacon. Yet, there was always a tug, a whisper calling me—an echo of some other life, distant but insistent. My Mount Sinai soul murmured. Ironic, my name, Simone: “the one who listens.” I heard, but I failed to heed.
Then came Oct. 7. My world of assimilation shattered; the betrayal was profound, and the loss of innocence disorienting—a tsunami of confusion. As Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove puts it, I was transformed from “another” to “the other.” I have yet to catch my breath.
In my grief, I turned over every idea, examined every corner of my life, and shook my fist at the institutions I once cared for deeply. I peered into the abyss, screaming at its darkness, but no answers came. I sat with feelings of betrayal, abandonment, and shock. Then I paused long enough to listen. First, a whisper; then a call; and finally a triumphant song: “Am Yisrael Chai.”
Am. The People. My people. Millions of hands and hearts reaching out to enfold, cherish, and celebrate me. The story has already been told; the remedies have been written for thousands of years. Like milk and honey, the answers began to flow. In every generation … you know the line. The Talmud states: “My children, I have created an evil inclination, which is the wound, and I created Torah as its antidote” (Kiddushin 30b:4). There are many questions, so I look to the source of all our answers: Torah.
I join the Simchat Torah Challenge hoping to be enveloped in the warmth of kehilla, inoculated with the antidote for my grief. This mitzvah is a conscious act of revolution (for Hersh), a rejection of outward seeking, to look within. This is my story, interwoven with the countless others who have come before me and the many souls who will follow after. I am gathering up my shards of light and turning toward Sinai.
Jaime Kinyon
Jaime Kinyon is a creative project manager living in Queens, New York.
I first encountered Judaism right before the pandemic began and the entire world shut down. Suddenly, everyone was doing something new. Some folks picked up knitting or decided to learn a new language. More than one friend chose pet adoption. I chose to Zoom my way through conversion studies. We were all engaging the world in a different way, so my unorthodox onboarding didn’t feel strange at all. As it turns out, I’m terrible at knitting and never did finish that super-cool Virginia Woolf embroidery kit, now stashed in a bin labeled “Failed Pandemic Crafts,” but I’m excelling at Jewish temple life.
At the end of my conversion celebration, a retired rabbi gave me the best advice: “Enjoy it!” I still feel joy and wonder every time I walk into a Friday night service. I’m delightfully curious, waiting to discover something new in Torah study, even on those Saturday mornings when I’d rather sleep in. In the rhythms of Jewish life, Shabbat is the grounding, the tethering that ties me to the beautiful and complicated history of the people I’m becoming.
As a “newish-Jewish” member of the tribe, I still struggle with the question of membership. Judaism has accepted me but I’m still learning what that means. Can the parsha help me find the right places to land in an evolving history filled with so much complexity and nuance? The story of the stranger in a strange land never changes, and questions of identity are always the same. What is mine to hold, and what isn’t? More recently, how do I convey “what happens to you, happens to me” without misappropriating Jewish grief? I’m mindful of how I use the term “I” and “we” in the context of Israel, a place I’ve never been and have no family residing, and the terrible tragedies that have occurred within Jewish communities there. I, like so many others like me, just want to do the right thing by the people we love. Maybe I’ll be better equipped to answer those questions through Torah.
I’ve never committed to weekly parsha study before. When you become part of a 4,000-year history, the sheer amount of knowledge is intoxicating, but also overwhelming. As a COVID convert, there’s something familiar and nostalgic about participating in an online communal experience together. We’ve always been one people sleeping under the same set of stars and now, rather romantically, also utilizing the same internet links that enable us to see exactly how big and beautiful our tribe really is.
I can think of no better response to the Oct. 7 attacks than to embrace my Judaism more than ever—to grow stronger and dig deep into the well of communal knowledge.
Wendy Rosenfield
Wendy Rosenfield is a Philadelphia- and Colorado-based arts and culture critic, editor, journalism professor, and freelance writer.
My earliest memory of Judaism’s importance in my life occurred at age 3 after the death of my beloved Grandpa Harry. Every night, my father and I stood on the balcony outside my parents’ bedroom at sunset reciting the rolling, hypnotic passages of Yizkor and Psalm 23.
Our house was situated inside an arboretum, a bluestone and rock-walled design by the sons of Central Park landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted. Thus, the prayer’s imagery of green pastures and still waters felt very real, as though I dwelled in the house of the Lord at that very moment and would remain happy and peaceful there forever.
We lived in an area teeming with synagogues and chose to attend Beth Sholom, a Conservative congregation housed inside Frank Lloyd Wright’s famous ark-shaped monolith. It’s tough not to catch the spirit at a place like that, and paired with our kindly rabbi and a few excellent Sunday school teachers, the combination was intoxicating. By fourth grade, I was so into it I skipped two grades and started studying with the middle schoolers.
Out went our “Hanukkah bush,” up went mezuzot for the front door and my bedroom. I dutifully strung popcorn for Sukkot, and hassled my elementary school teachers to add blue and white to their red and green December classroom decor. My parents played along, but really, it was my thing now.
At the same time, our still waters began to roil. My parents broke up for the first, second, third, and then final time. We switched to my best friend’s Reform synagogue and though my religious fervor waned, I kept overachieving Jewishly, the first person in that congregation to chant their Torah portion.
And then, that was it. After my bat mitzvah, I ended formal Hebrew schooling. Though my high school and college circles were largely Jewish, I never returned to services until my husband arrived with a bursting bag of internalized antisemitism and reawakened my religious zeal.
We had children and started the process over again: Jewish preschool, Hebrew school. I hosted the holidays, planned the simchat bat, the bris, the b’nai mitzvah.
Throughout, if I didn’t always feel connected to the words, I took solace in Judaism’s love of interpretation and analysis. Haggadot could be improved and angled toward contemporary concerns; I delighted in Bob Marley’s “Exodus,” and The Melodians’ “By the Rivers of Babylon.” Zionism meant many things to many people, but we all agreed on its centrality to survival of the Jewish people.
I’m not sure what year it was, or which High Holiday service we were attending when it happened, but sometime in the 2010s I lifted my head from the pages of my machzor, looked around, and thought, “I cannot do the same thing in this same place with these same people every year for the rest of my life.”
It wasn’t a moment of clarity or epiphany; it was pure terror. I felt as though awakened from a trance; the rituals I once found comforting turned cold and rote.
So here I am. I hope that getting back to basics, to Torah as a source of depth and meaning rather than performance and ritual, will kick-start something that’s gone dormant.