Bound for glory
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A gathering to put on tefillin at Temple Emanu-El of Closter. Photos by bruce pomerantz |
About 95 people turned out at Temple Emanu-El of Closter on Super Bowl Sunday to put on tefillin as part of the World Wide Wrap, an international program of the Federation of Jewish Men’s Clubs that encourages Jews all over the world to practice and learn about wrapping tefillin. These are boxes filled with biblical verses and wrapped with leather straps around a worshipper’s forearm and on the forehead, in fulfillment of Deuteronomy, 6:4-8: “And you shall bind them for a sign upon your hand, and they shall be an ornament for your head between your eyes.”
While their parents put on real tefillin, sixth-graders from the synagogue’s Hebrew school made their own out of kits provided by the FJMC. They then decorated and filled their tefillin with their own prayers instead of the traditional parchment.
Altogether, more than 6,000 people representing more than 175 clubs around the world joined in the World Wide Wrap to spread the mitzvah of tefillin.
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