Barber Family Completes Torah

Wednesday evening, many Crown Heights streets were blocked off, but this time it wasn’t because of the bulldozers and cement trucks that Crown Heights residents are all too familiar with.

A large Torah truck stood parked in front of the Barber’s residence, as friends, family and prominent community leaders came to fill in an “Ois” in the Sefer Torah that Rabbi Avrohom Barber had just completed.

With torches and flags ready, children anxiously awaited for the music to play, signaling the beginning of the Sefer Torah’s parade down Montgomery Street. The streets burst with neighbors and well-wishers who joined in the great celebration as they followed the Torah until Empire Shteibel where the Hakofos were held.

A Seuda followed the Hakafos. It was MCed by Rabbi Nuti Barber, who spoke about his grandparents Rabbi Eliyahu and Ita Barber Z”L, in whose memory the Torah was written. A Chossid of the Frierdiker Belzer Rebbe, Reb Eliyahu Barber lived in Krakow, Poland. Upon the birth of their son Rabbi Avrohom Barber, his wife, Ita, moved into her parents’ home in Lemburg, to rest. With the outbreak of WWII, Eliyahu, who was still in Krakow, was separated from his family and perished in Auschwitz. His wife and three children managed to escape to Siberia, where she shared her tiny shack with the Rebbe of Pshevorsk, Reb Itzikel Gevirtzman and his family. Reb Itzikel’s son-in-law, Reb Yankele Leizer, who was later to become the next Rebbe, taught young Reb Avrohom the Aleph Beis, along with his son Reb Leibush, the current Pshevorske Rebbe. After the war, Mrs. Barber moved to France and later immigrated to America. Against all odds she raised her children with a Chassidishe Chinuch.

In the style of his very popular Sunday Night Shiur at Empire Shteibel, Reb Berel Levin spoke about saying the Brocha of Shechiyanu at a Siyum Sefer Torah. Head of Chovevei Torah Smicha Program, Rabbi Yoseph Yitzchok Barber, expounded on the source of the Mitzvah of writing a Sefer Torah according to the Rambam. Reb Shmuel Heber, also a Magid Shiur at the Shteibel, discussed the background of making a Siyum in honor of a Torah.

The Torah was also in memory of Rabbi Barber’s brother, Dovber ben Eliyahu Z”L.