Thousands of New York children accompany the archives

An emotional levaya took place yesterday (Monday) in Far Rockaway, at the 'Darcei Torah' Yeshiva parking lot: Nearly 2,000 children accompanied three truckloads of sacred writings to burial which were destroyed by the hurricane Sandy.

Rosh Yeshiva, Rabbi Yaakov Bender, said that twenty-five years ago, he took the children to watch the burial of archives, and one of the teachers indicating that it is bitul Torah. Rabbi Bender said that he called Rabbi Eliyahu Shwey zt"l and asked his opinion. In response Hagaon Shwey cried and answered: "It's not a question of eliminating the Torah, but a matter of the existence of the Torah."

The Rabbi also told the children about the avreichim who lost their 'chidueshi Torah' which they worked on for years, about the Rabbis and Roshei Yeshiva who lost ancient holy documents, including letters from the Chafetz Chaim, and more, and about hundreds of bar mitzvah boys who lost all the books they received as a gift on their Bar Mitzvah .

Rabbi Shlomo Avigdor Hilltosky also spoke at the levaya.

Following the speeches the children recited Tehillim with emotion, and escorted the trucks to the special cemetery by the Chesed shel Emes - Souza Folsberg in the mountains of New York.

Meanwhile, due to the workload of the archives damaged during the hurricane, Yeshiva students were recruited last Friday to help the Chesed shel Emes organization dig graves for the sefarim.

Another funeral was held on Sunday morning, where Rabbi Shimon Meizlish, the Rabbi of Seagate spoke emotional words of waking up to Teshuva. The trucks pulled away - but when they reached their destination, they found that the pits which were dug laboriously on Friday were filled with water.

Chesed shel Emes volunteers rushed to raise special water pumps to the scene. For hours they pumped water, when a special bulldozer which also arrived started sinking in the mud. Only in the late afternoon was the work completed – and the holy books were buried in the burial pits.

'בחדרי' גם ברשתות החברתיות - הצטרפו!