Berger Family gift to Chabad: The Torah that escaped destruction twice

When Jacquelyn Berger, Ph.D., along with her son Jeffrey and his family and daughter Marni Stahlman and her family, expressed a desire to acquire a Torah with a history of Jewish survival for Chabad of Greater Orlando, little did they dream their search would uncover a Torah buried by a rabbi to prevent its inevitable destruction by Nazis in the darkest days of the Holocaust.

Dr. Berger feels that donating this Torah is a means to give a legacy of inspiration and joy to her family and way of showing the many ways that Rabbi Sholom Dubov and Chabad has brought joy and peace into her life. "As a family, Marni, Jeff and I wanted to give a gift of positivity, resilience and joy thru generations and our community," she said.

With the sacred scroll in their possession after a nearly-year-long search, the elated Berger and Stahlman families and Rabbi Dubov intended to dedicate the Torah on Yom Kippur but their plans almost went up in flames - figuratively and literally.

Just weeks before the high holidays, fire swept the Chabad of Greater Orlando's Maitland synagogue destroying much of the structure. The sacred scroll was pulled safely from the blaze, tarnished but intact. Once again it had survived a disaster, much as the Jewish people have throughout history.

Undaunted, the resourceful Dubovs conducted high holiday services at the Winter Park Hilton, but for the very special Yom Kippur dedication, they secured the Woman's Club of Winter Park where the Berger and Stahlman families and Rabbi Dubov led a spirited, triumphant service and break fast.

Tracking down an historic Torah was not a simple task. Masterminding the search was Rabbi Dovid Dubov, son of Rabbi Sholom Dubov, who began by contacting a scribe he knew in New York City. Scribes, he explained, keep track of Jewish records and documents. "They have contacts everywhere," he said. "From there I was directed to a scribe in Miami who owned several Torahs. One of them needed work but once I learned its history, I knew it was exactly what we were looking for."

The Torah was purchased and then sent to New York City where Jeffrey and Erica Berger happened to be. They examined the Torah and ordered the refurbishing. Once completed, it was sent to Maitland, the final chapter of a stirring saga of a brave rabbi who managed to save 19 Torahs but couldn't save his own life.

The rabbi was Isaac Hallemann, director of the Jewish Orphanage in Furth, Germany. As such, he was father to generations of children, many from broken homes and disadvantaged backgrounds.

Fearful for the safety of his 42 children from the impending Nazi regime in the 1930s, Hallemann time and again attempted to move them to Israel but failed. At that point, he made a conscious decision to stay with them in the orphanage where he continued to care for and educate them.

Then came the fateful night of Kristallnacht - the night of the broken glass, Nov. 9, 1938. A pogrom, initiated by the Nazi Party against the Jews, broke out. Nazi rioters destroyed 267 synagogues throughout Germany and Austria. More than 7,000 Jewish businesses were destroyed or damaged and 30,000 Jewish men were arrested and incarcerated in concentration camps.

When Rabbi Hallemann got word of the impending disaster, he scrambled from synagogue to synagogue in Furth and collected 19 Torahs. In the dark of night, he stealthily buried the Torahs in the backyard of the orphanage.

The next morning, he reached out to a neighbor whom he trusted, a Christian maid. He told her that he had buried the Torahs in the backyard of the orphanage and asked her to keep it a secret as long as Hitler was in power.

"Do it for the sake of the future of Jewish generations," he said. "There will come a day when all this chaos will end. The Jewish people will be reestablished and will return to the Torah and Mitzvos."

He asked her to tell the leaders of the next generation about these Torahs "so they could be used as Hashem has commanded."

Just as Rabbi Hallemann had requested, after the war had ended, the maid told Rabbi Dovid Shapiro who was rebuilding the only synagogue in Furth that survived the pogrom, about the buried Torahs. The leaders of the Jewish community, exhilarated when learning the news, dug up the Torahs, the few of which were salvageable, including the one the Bergers-Stahlman acquired.

Sadly, Rabbi Halleman and his family did not survive the Holocaust. He and his wife Klara, daughters Eva, Beate and all 42 children in his care were deported to Izbica and then to Belzec where no one ever returned.

But the Torah he saved from destruction by the Nazis, brought to Chabad by the Berger and Stahlman families, lives on, and in our community, now stands as a testament to the fortitude and indestructibility of the Jewish people.