The Catholic Review

October 13, 2005
Scroll Call:
St. Frances Academy students learn the Old Testament from a rabbi
By Stephanie Manowski

Rabbi Menachem Youlus ( left) explains scrolls to St. Frances Academy students after his presentation on Jewish studies Sept. 30. (photo by Owen Sweeney III)

Two yarmulke- clad rabbis standing behind a table laden with Torah scrolls may seem out of place in an inner- city Catholic high school, but for juniors at St. Frances Academy in Baltimore, it fit right in.“ It’s the same God, so that’s a good place to start,” said Rabbi Menachem Youlus with a chuckle. “ If you start with a belief in God, you can see the way ahead in what you have to do.”

Rabbi Youlus, who has also been a scribe of Torah scrolls, the sacred handwritten five Books of Moses, for 22 years, visited St. Frances Sept. 30 as part of the school’s Old Testament Scripture study program.

As a scribe, the rabbi has not only painstakingly created Torah scrolls but has rescued, repaired and resettled 470 of the precious works during the past 20 years.

During the presentation, Rabbi Youlus explained the intricate and exacting art involved in the creation of Torah scrolls to his captivated audience, who eagerly chimed- in with answers to the rabbi’s questions and laughed at his humorous stories. Each of the more than 300,000 Hebrew letters in a scroll must be correct, he explained. If not, the scroll is not suitable for use.

“If you took an exam and got 99.9 percent, you would think you had done very well,” said the rabbi, his young audience enthusiastically nodding in assent.

“Not with this. It has to be perfect.”

The other rabbi chiming in during the presentation was Rabbi Gila Ruskin, a full- time faculty member at St. Frances who teaches Old Testament Scripture, creative writing and SAT preparation.

In Rabbi Ruskin’s classroom before the Torah scrolls presentation, the students are working on covenantal partners, trying to determine who was the better partner ­ Noah, who did exactly as he was told, or Abraham, who debated with God. “ This is definitely a new, unique experience,” she said.

“I am learning so much every day. I am learning from the students.”

And the students are not only learning, but responding to a culture they know nothing about, said Sister John Francis Schilling, O.S. P., St. Frances’ president.

“We work with the parallels between the African American and the Jewish experience, like the Holocaust and slavery,” said Sister John Francis, noting that students take a trip to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D. C., and that one student even took a trip to Israel over the summer. “ We want them to understand and be open to other cultures.

That’s what education is all about.”