Simhat Torah

This celebration encompasses all layers of society, young and old, rich and poor, learned and less learned.

The holiday's celebratory dancing is a custom which is not required to fulfill any of the core obligations.

Being an American by birth, it has been important to me to search resources to find out how my forebearers there observed the holiday in the traditional manner.

A special feature of the service is calling all children under 13 years to the Reading of the Law.

Traditionally, on the Jewish holiday, distinguished male members of the community are appointed Chatan Torah and Chatan Beresheet. United Synagogues introduced an Eishet Chayil honor for women.

As the story goes, the congregation selected the town fool to receive the high honor of being the chatan torah – the groom of the Torah.

The visitation figure included the number of Jews who visited the site from the week before Rosh Hashanah to Simhat Torah, which ended on Monday night.

Celebrations took place across Israel, including Rabin square in Tel Aviv and at the Kotel in Jerusalem.

The single fruit is green and about the size of a large plum, and therefore far smaller than the fruit grown in Israel, Morocco and Italy for export during the holiday.

In this way, we acknowledge that even if we completed the yearly cycle of Torah reading, we still have much more learning in store.