Torah Scrolls
The Torah (or Pentateuch) contains the five books of Moses: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Azusa Pacific University Special Collections contains two Hebrew manuscript Torah scrolls.
The first Torah scroll was scribed in a Central European Jewish scriptorium in the mid-19th century. The manuscript is in Hebrew (in an Ari Chassidic script), on cow vellum, sewn, and scrolled. It is approximately 19” tall, 242 columns, 61 panels, and 126 feet long, comprising the Torah, or Pentateuch, with modern nesting wood rollers, bronze-gilt on the rough.
The second Torah scroll was scribed in Morocco in 1907. The text is written in 264 columns, 42 rows per column, on 157 panels. It is 124 feet long and is approximately 19½ inches tall. This scroll is particularly interesting due to the unusual signed scribal colophon which states:
“the respected Moshe Avi-T‘bul ... this Torah Scroll for the sake of his father, his mother, and his brother, he has written it ... In this Torah Scroll no letter is missing and it is completely accurate ... Year 1907. To the memory of Israel son of Yanay. To the memory of Shimson son of Shlomo son of David Nissan. To the memory of Yehudah-Chayim son of David Nissan.”
