This fall, a Torah scroll found a new home at BB Camp in Oregon. A gift from JWB Jewish Chaplains Council®, the Torah, which has linked Jews in the military to Jewish life for more than a century, is now also connected to a new generation of campers, families, and leaders.
The JWB Torah was dedicated during Shabbat at ReJewvenation, the fall women’s retreat hosted by BB360, the organization behind BB Camp. It was a full-circle moment for the JCC Movement, and one filled with Jewish joy.
During the dedication, the Torah was passed from person to person, beginning with BB360 CEO Michelle Koplan and then moving from the oldest participant to the youngest.
“Our new Torah is such a gift to our BB360 (BB Camp) community! We dedicated it at our BB360 Fall Women’s Retreat, ReJewvenation, at BB Camp. During Shabbat, starting with our beloved CEO, Michelle Koplan, the JWB Torah was passed through the arms of every person who was present. Each letter in this scroll connects us: our community, our BB campers, our BB b’nai mitzvah students, our BB360 Lev el Lev participants, our staff members, and our BB360 families. Keeping our tradition alive, we look forward to learning, growing, and building our future around these sacred words, season after season,” said Kim Schneiderman, BB360 director of Jewish life.
JWB Jewish Chaplains Council, a signature program of the Center for Jewish Peoplehood at JCC Association of North America, has supported Jewish life in the U.S. military for nearly 110 years. It serves Jewish service members, veterans, and their families, and supports the Jewish chaplains who bring prayer, holidays, and community to them wherever they serve. The Torah gifted to BB Camp is part of that story. Its exact age is unknown, but for decades it has traveled with JWB chaplains, most recently at Naval Station Great Lakes in Illinois, where another Torah has since taken its place. At BB Camp, that history now sits side by side with another. The new JWB Torah will live next to the camp’s generations-old Torah, with a history of its own.
“Building bridges between Jewish military service members and the JCC Movement is at the heart of my work, and this felt like a wonderful opportunity to do that,” said Hadassah Nitzan, director of operations and outreach for JWB. “This Torah has served and has seen battle. Rather than lay it to rest in the ground, as we do with Torahs that are retired, we wanted it to have a place where its story would continue and it would continue being cherished. A JCC Camp felt like just right place for it.”
“We are filled with gratitude for the gift of a Torah from JWB, which will last for generations, bringing wisdom to the heart, light to the soul, and blessings to all who cherish it,” Koplan said. “Our new JWB Torah will live next to our generations-old BB Camp Torah, which was carried on the back of a U.S. soldier-chaplain during the liberation of the Holocaust camps. Seeing both Torahs side by side is incredibly moving and meaningful. The JWB Torah will truly inspire BB campers and future Jewish leaders for years to come.”
“For more than a century, JWB has ensured that Jewish service members remain grounded in their Jewish faith, regardless of where their duty takes them, often in harm’s way. Seeing a JWB Torah placed next to a scroll that a JWB chaplain carried through concentration camps as they were liberated is deeply moving and symbolic. It reminds all of us that the Jewish life we protect and the Jewish joy we celebrate are part of the same story, and that story will now live on at BB Camp for generations of campers to come,” said Rabbi Irving Elson, interim director of JWB.
From JWB’s service to Jewish military families to a JCC Camp community in the Pacific Northwest—that’s part of North America’s largest Jewish camp network—this JWB Torah reminds us that the JCC Movement is one connected family. As BB campers, families, and staff gather around it season after season to tell and retell our people’s stories within it, its own story—and ours—will continue to be passed from one generation to the next.
Learn more about JWB Jewish Chaplains Council and Jews in the military on our website.