‘“This is the Table that Stands before the Lord” – On the Synagogue Bimah or Teivah...

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2011 DOI: 10.1163/157007011X587585

The Review of Rabbinic Judaism 14 (2011) 208–220 brill.nl/rrj

“This Is the Table that Stands before the Lord:”On the Synagogue Bimah or Teivah Cover

Bracha YanivJewish Art Department, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel

[email protected]

Keywordssynagogue art, ritual objects, bimah, teivah cover

One of the most ubiquitous ceremonial objects (tashmishei kedushah)1 in the synagogue is the bimah or teivah cover: the cloth mantle used to cover the podium or table upon which the Torah scroll is read.2 This covering protects the scroll’s inherent sanctity and accords it honor by forming a barrier between the parchment and the table. In Ashkenazi synagogues, this role is absolutely vital as without such a covering the parchment of the unfurled Torah scroll would come into direct contact with the wooden podium upon which it is placed. In Sephardic or Italian synagogues, such direct contact is precluded by the scroll’s having been encased in a cloth, while in Oriental synagogues such contact is prevented by the fact that the Torah scroll is permanently kept in a protective wooden case that is placed vertically on the bimah when the scroll is read. Notwithstanding this ceremonial object’s importance, it has not yet merited scholarly attention, as to the best of our knowledge not even one article has been devoted to its study.

I would like to thank my colleagues Dr. Jeffrey Woolf and Dr. Meir Rafeld for their careful reading of halakhic issues in this article.

1 Since this study delves into the halakhic ramifications of an object’s being classified as a tashmish kedushah (pl. tashmishei kedushah), the term cannot be exclusively translated as a cere-monial or ritual object. Where relevant, the term will be transliterated, as the Hebrew quite liter-ally defines the object’s role of providing a service for more sacred objects. The Halakhah proclaims that in doing so the tashmish kedushah itself acquires a degree of sanctity.

2 The term “bimah” is customarily used by Ashkenazi Jews, while Jews of Sephardic or Oriental descent use the term “teivah.” To avoid confusion, the term bimah will be used in this article, except when the term teivah is cited in a primary source.

B. Yaniv / The Review of Rabbinic Judaism 14 (2011) 208–220 209

The earliest evidence we have attesting to a cloth mantle covering the bimah is a discussion in Babylonian Talmud Tractate Megillah that ranks the degrees of holiness of the tashmishei kedushah. The name given to the covering men-tioned in the talmudic discussion is perisa; the primary function of this cover-ing is unclear, but the medieval commentators suggest that it either plays a role inside or outside the Holy Ark.3 But in the ensuing discussion on B. Meg. 26b, another use is proposed for this cloth mantle: “however, when I saw that they fold it (aifei) and place the Torah scroll upon it, I came to the conclusion that it is a tashmish kedushah.” That is to say, since the custom was to fold the perisa and place the Torah scroll upon it, it may be defined as a tashmish kedushah, since by definition an object attains the status of tashmish kedushah by serving and being in direct contact with a holy object, in this case the Torah scroll.

This use of the term perisa clearly informed R. Nathan b. R. Yehiel’s (d. 1103; Rome) understanding when he authored what is considered to be the first Aramaic-Hebrew talmudic dictionary, the Arukh ha-Shalem.4 In defining the term paras, he also addressed the term perisa: “it denotes the vilon (curtain) which is hung before the Torah ark. . . .”5 The term “vilon,” which he uses to denote the covering, was used in the Middle Ages to refer to a generic woven cloth used for any purpose, so we may infer that the covering had no special name. The bimah cover was also mentioned in an eleventh-century (1080 C.E.) list of the Babylonian synagogue’s furnishings in Fustat, Egypt. The two “bimah covers”6 mentioned in this document are listed among other woven clothes used as parokhot, Torah ark curtains.

From the question that R. Eliezer b. Joel ha-Levi (d. after 1220; Bonn)7 asked of another twelfth-century, Ashkenazi, scholar, R. Ephraim of Regens-burg (d. 1175), “Tell me, my master, the me’ilim (textiles) that are placed on the bimah to accord honor to the Torah . . .,” we may deduce that the bimah

3 In the Middle Ages, Rashi (B. Meg. 26b) explained this term as “a cloth that is draped (porsin) around the Torah ark on the inside.” Tosafot disputed his interpretation, declaring that “it is hung (porsin) around the outside of the ark.” R. Eliezer b. R. Joel Halevi, who bases himself on the Tosafot’s reading, also declares that the perisa is a “curtain that is hung (porsin) before the Torah ark” (R. Eliezer b. R. Joel Halevi, Sefer Raavya hu avi haezri, Part 2, Megillah [ed. Aptowitzer; Jerusalem, 1964] § 590, s.v. maskinan bishma’ata.) All translations in this study are my own.

4 M. Rafeld, Mavo lepardes hamilonim (Ramat-Gan, 2003), p. 4 and n. 3.5 Nathan b. R. Yehiel, Arukh hashalem (ed. Kohut; Vienna, 1926), Part 6, p. 435.6 S. D. Goitein, “The Synagogue Building and Its Furnishing according to the Records of the

Cairo Genizah” (Hebrew), in Eretz-Israel, Archaeological, Historical and Geographical Studies, 7 (1964), p. 92, Document TS 20.47, lines 13, 14.

7 R. Eliezer b. R. Joel Halevi, Sefer raavya hu avi haezri, Avodah zarah, (ed. D. Deblitzky: Bnei Brak, 1976), §1049.

210 B. Yaniv / The Review of Rabbinic Judaism 14 (2011) 208–220

cover had no specific name. This is why R. Eliezer used the term ‘me’ilim’, a generic term for textile ceremonial objects.8 Mapah (cloth), another generic term used to refer to textile ceremonial objects, is employed by Maharil (d. 1427):

one may not remove the mapah upon which the Torah scroll is read from the migdal (literally, tower) in order to place it on the lectern in front of the Torah ark that is used for prayers; however, the inverse is permissible, as we may intensify in holiness, but we may not decrease.9

The term most commonly used today is mapah; however, in dedicatory inscriptions embroidered on these coverings, we find mikhseh hateivah (teivah cover) in Morocco10 and parokhet among the Crimean Karaites.11 Further-more, there is usually a term that means “bimah or teivah cover” in the ver-nacular spoken by the local Jewish community.12

The talmudic discussion about the perisa, cited from B. Megillah above, became the legal source for rabbinic decisors from the medieval period and

8 For other generic terms employed by the rabbis to refer to textile ceremonial objects that have no special names, see Bracha Yaniv, Ma’ase Rokem: Textile Ceremonial Objects in the Ashke-nazi, Sephardi and Italian Synagogue (Hebrew: Jerusalem, 2009), p. 75.

9 R. Jacob b. Moses Moellin, Sefer Maharil. minhagim (ed. S. Spitzer: Jerusalem, 1989), “Laws of the Reading of the Torah,” 452, sec. 4. R. Jacob b. Moses Moellin, the Maharil, was born in Mainz, Germany c. 1360. He studied in Austrian yeshivot and in 1387, following the death of his father, he founded a yeshiva in Mainz and quickly became the spiritual leader of Ashkenazi Jewry.

10 This term is found in the dedicatory inscription embroidered on the cover from the Ben Malka Synagogue in Tetouan, Morocco dating from 1923. In the 1990s this covering was used in a synagogue in Ashdod. The inscription is surrounded by a rectangular border and is situated on the cover’s front edge. It reads as follows: “The cover of the teivah/ which was consecrated by the brothers, may they not be separated, R’ Isaac Assayag/ may his Rock protect him and R’ Jacob, his brother, may his Rock protect him. . . .” מכסה התבה / שהקדישו האחים שלית' [שלא”) See also the phrase “the יתפרדו] הר' יצחק אצייאג / י"ץ [ישמרהו צורו] והר' יעקב אחיו י"ץ. . . .“)teivah cover,” which appears at the beginning of a dedicatory inscription embroidered on a cover from Morocco that was dedicated in 1951 (Index of Jewish Art, The Center for Jewish Art, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Sc. 345–35).

11 On the bimah cover from the Karaite synagogue in Evpatoria, on the Crimean peninsula in the Ukraine, dated 1824, is the following inscription: “this is the parokhet that is on the dukhan (lectern or podium) . . .” (The Gross Family Collection, Tel Aviv, Item 049.013.004).

12 In Italian, ‘copri-tevà,’ see D. Liscia Bemporad, “Argenti e tessuti rituali a Livorno,” I. Kahn and D. Liscia Bemporad, eds., La nazione ebrea di Livorno: Itinerari di vita (Livorno, 1992), pp. 93, 96. In Portuguese, among the Dutch community: “pano de tevah.” See Daniel M. Swetschinski, et al., Orphan Objects (Amsterdam, 1997), p. 123. In Serbian, “prekrivač za bemu.” See Vidosava Nadomački, Vezene tkanine iz jevrejskih zbirki u Jugoslaviji (Belgrad, 1978), pp. 100–104. See also hakisui shel ha’almemra, in the writings of the Maharam of Padua (n. 15 below).


onwards for classifying the degree of holiness ascribed to the bimah cover and its relative ranking on the hierarchical scale of tashmishei kedushah.13 R. Mena-hem b. Solomon Ha-meiri (d. 1316; Perpignan), who lived in Provence in the second half of the thirteenth and the beginning of the fourteenth centuries wrote:

the mantle that is spread . . . and sometimes as well the scroll is unfurled upon it when the chazzan prepares the scroll for the next day’s reading; it is a tashmish kedu-shah and therefore requires genizah (being placed in a repository or given a proper burial after it has worn out).14

That is to say, the unmediated contact between the scroll and the bimah cover automatically endows the bimah cover with the highest level of sanctity as a tashmish kedushah. This approach is validated by R. Meir b. Isaac Katznellen-bogen, who lived in sixteenth-century Italy:

And I will conclude with the following: if the custom is to sometimes place the Torah scroll on the parokhet then the cover of the almemra (bimah) and the mapot (plural of mapah),15 which are used for rolling up the Torah scroll, have the same degree of holi-ness as it (the parokhet) does; however, if the contemporary custom may be not to use the parokhet in this manner then it is not the same (in its level of holiness) as those mitpahot (referred to above as mapot) that are used for rolling up the Torah scroll or upon which the Torah scroll is placed for these are tashmishe kedushah while the parokhet would then be a tashmish de-tashmish (twice removed from the essential sanc-tity) as discussed above.16

Unmediated contact between the bimah cover and the Torah scroll endows the bimah cover with the same degree of sanctity as the item referred to as the Torah scroll’s mitpahat (singular of mitpahot) in the Babylonian Talmud. From this one may deduce that it is forbidden to place books of lesser sanctity

13 On this, see as well the remarks of the author of the Or zarua (1180–1250, Vienna): “a mapah or me’il which is draped over the kursiyya, that is the wood podium, and they place the Torah scroll upon it and read from it . . .” (R. Isaac b. R. Moses, Or zarua, Part 2, [Leipzig, 1860; repr., Jerusalem, 1960], §386.)

14 R. Menahem b. Solomon Hameiri, Qiryat sefer al hilkhot sefer Torah, tefillin, u’mezuzah (ed. M. Hershler; Jerusalem, 1957), p. 80, (Part 3), s.v. ve’od ameru.

15 In this case the term mapah refers to the Torah wrapper, which is used in addition to the Torah binder beneath the Torah mantle, in accord with the Sephardic custom in Italy.

16 R. Meir Katznellenbogen, Responsa Maharam Padua (Cracow, 1882) §82. In this primary source, the rabbinic decisor was asked whether the parokhet may be converted into a bimah cover (cover for the kursiyya). In his deliberations, he compared the bimah cover to the talmudic perisa and concluded that the Torah scroll endows the cover with sanctity, just as it endows its binder and wrapper with sanctity; hence, it may not be turned into a parokhet.


than the Torah scroll on the bimah cover,17 as is evident from R. Abraham b. Mordekhai Halevi’s (seventeenth–eighteenth century, Egypt) critique: “a cloth that is draped over the teivah, and since it serves the Torah scroll, how could it be used for other books . . . ?”18 The relative sanctity of tashmishei kedushah primarily comes into play when the community is faced with the issue of changing an object’s function, for the talmudic principle is that “we may intensify in sanctity, but we may not decrease” (B. Meg. 9b). That is to say, one may convert a bimah cover into a binder or wrapper for the Torah scroll, since these come into unmediated contact with the scroll; however, one may not turn it into a parokhet, since the latter possesses a lesser degree of sanctity by virtue of its attenuated connection with the Torah scroll.

In all locales, one of the bimah cover’s most evident formal characteristics is that it is made out of readily available luxury textiles. In recalling the bimah covers used in the Babylonian synagogue in Fustat, one author specifically describes one cover as being made from red and white siglaton, i.e., from a patterned silk fabric. The other fabrics named also lead one to conclude that the luxury textiles used were widely available; in other words, they were not necessarily produced for ritual use as bimah covers.19

The circumstances seem to have been similar in medieval Ashkenaz. In the continuation of the question cited above about placing “me’ilim on the bimah” that R. Eliezer asked R. Ephraim, we find the following:

. . . and if it is placed for a day or two in the synagogue and it has the figures of fowl and fish and horses and lions, is it permissible or not . . .?20

From the phrasing of this question, it is clear that this fabric was not designed originally for use as a bimah cover, as the figures on it might be seen as inappropriate for synagogue use.21 Without a doubt, in this case the covering was made from an especially valuable fabric, so its donors were willing to

17 Echoing M. Meg. 3:1 and B. Meg. 26a.18 R. Abraham b. Mordekhai Halevi, Responsa ginat veradim (Constantinople, 1716; repr.,

Jerusalem, 1970), Part 14, Kelal 3, Sec. 13, s.v. vero’eh ani.19 See n. 6 above, and see also S.D. Goitein, A Mediterranean Society: The Jewish Communities

of the Arab World as Portrayed in the Documents of the Cairo Geniza (Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London, 1971) vol. II, p. 151.

20 Sefer raavya, Avodah zarah, (ed. D. Deblitzky: Bnei Brak, 1976), §1049; and see n. 2 above.

21 R. Eliezer’s description suggests that the textile in question was a silk brocade, patterned with animal figures. In the twelfth century, there was no silk textile industry in Europe, so pat-terned textiles were extremely expensive since they had to be imported from Persia or Byzan-tium. The animal figures mentioned are characteristic of Byzantine brocades. On these textiles, see A. Geijer, A History of Textile Art (Stockholm, 1979).


compromise on the inappropriate pattern. We may assume that in most cases the coverings were made from monochromatic fabric, which was a cheaper and more readily available option, as can be seen from the description of a bimah cover in a prayer book of Ashkenazi rite that dates to 1427/1428 (fig. 1). In contrast, in Italy, which had assumed a leadership role in the textile industry from the end of the Middle Ages, the Jews had a far easier time pur-chasing patterned, luxury textiles. The red bimah cover patterned with golden flowers, illustrating the Arba’ah turim manuscript from Mantua, dated 1435, reflects this historical reality.22 In this painting, one can discern that the Torah mantle placed in the Torah ark is made from the very same fabric as the bimah cover, i.e., both articles belong to the same set, finimento in Italian. The same

22 For a color reproduction of this painting, see Thérèse and Mendel Metzger, Jewish Life in the Middle Ages (New York, 1982), fig. 92.

Figure 1 Torah scroll placed on the bimah, which is covered with a bimah cover devoid of decorative patterns, a prayer book in the Ashkenazi rite with kinot (elegiac poems) and customs, Rhineland, Germany, 1427/8. Staats und

Universitätsbibliothek Hamburg, Cod. hebr. 37, fol. 114 v (detail).


is true of the bimah cover and splendid parokhet donated to the synagogue in Verona in 1676 (fig. 2).23

This aesthetic sensibility—requiring that the bimah cover be made from a luxurious textile—was common to most communities. In some cases in which the same donor dedicated a Torah scroll and donated the parokhet and the bimah cover, they were all fashioned out of the same textile. The widespread practice of using locally available textiles prevented the bimah cover from attaining characteristic forms. Only a small percentage of bimah covers were made with cloth fashioned for this purpose; most covers were made from the fabric that happened to be available. Those few covers that were designed as bimah covers can be identified by the unique cut of their fabric or the slits cut in them that enable them to fit easily onto the bimah’s lectern or table. In these cases, the covers’ edges drape over the edge of the lectern, and in most

23 On this parokhet, see Susan Nashman-Fraiman, “ ‘The Fruit of Her Hands’: Original Ico-nography on a Parokhet from Verona” (Hebrew), in Timorah: Articles on Jewish Art (Ramat-Gan, 2006), pp. 73–80.

Figure 2 Bimah cover, Verona, Italy, 1676, 148.5 × 145 cm, Victoria and Albert Museum, no. 511a–1877.


cases they are decorated with fringes.24 Bimah covers made out of luxurious textiles that were cut for this purpose are found in Italian communities, and they are characterized by their resplendent edgings and the openings for the rods, which the sharvit rests upon (fig. 3).25

Luxury textiles were commonly recycled or reused to fashion textile cere-monial objects.26 Such a practice prevailed throughout most of the Jewish

24 An especially luxuriant bimah cover was fashioned for the Portuguese synagogue in Amster-dam on the occasion of Wilhelm III’s visit on Shemini Atseret (Dec. 23, 1883). The cover was fashioned out of lace segments joined together on an orange, silk, textile backing, the color of the Dutch royal house, the House of Orange. For a matching Torah scroll mantle, see Yaniv, ibid., p. 265. See also an ivory-colored, silk cover from the Portuguese synagogue in the Hague, dated 1858, that was intended for High Holiday use: D.M. Swetschinski et al., Orphan Objects (Amsterdam, 1997), p. 48.

25 The sharvit which was customarily used in the Italian synagogue, was an elegant metal pole that was attached to the tops of the Torah scroll’s staves when the Torah was lifted so as to pro-tect the parchment. On the sharvit, see Hayyim Talbi, “The Custom of Displaying the Torah in Jewish Communities” (Hebrew), in Knishta: Studies of the Synagogue World, 3 (Ramat-Gan, 2007), p. 135, figs. 1, 2, 4.

26 For an extensive discussion of this custom, see Bracha Yaniv, “Ceremonial Textiles for the Synagogue,” in Treasures of Jewish Galicia: Judaica from the Museum of Ethnography and Crafts in Lvov, Ukraine (Tel Aviv, 1995), pp. 101–113.

Figure 3 Bimah cover, Mantua, Italy, silk fabric with colored silk embroidery and gilded silver threads, 180 × 168 cm, 19th century. Reproduced by courtesy of the U. Nahon Museum of Italian Jewish Art, Jerusalem, On 427.


Diaspora, but it was especially prominent in the Jewish communities of the Ottoman Empire. In these communities, many ceremonial objects for the synagogue were fashioned out of everyday objects made from embroidered textiles, such as dresses, bed linens, and bundle kerchiefs. A dress could be easily converted into a bimah cover by undoing the original stitching and reas-sembling the pieces of fabric in a rectangular shape. Such a practice is attested to by the cover found on the bimah in the Señora synagogue in Izmir (fig. 4). If a bed sheet was donated for this purpose, there was no need to even adapt its rectangular shape as it fit perfectly on the bimah. Another item often donated for this purpose that had no need to be reshaped was the bundle kerchief, a velvet kerchief with gold embroidery, whose square shape was per-fectly suited for covering the surface of the bimah. The bundle kerchief was a common accessory in any Balkan woman’s wardrobe, be she Jewish or Mus-lim, as it was used to bundle up personal effects when she left the house.27 These kerchiefs were routinely donated to the synagogue, and they were either

27 On the bundle kerchief, see E. Juhasz, ed., Sephardi Jews in the Ottoman Empire: Aspects of Material Culture. Exh. Cat. (The Israel Museum: Jerusalem, 1990), pp. 68–75.

Figure 4 Bimah cover fashioned from a dress, Señora Synagogue, Izmir. Photograph: 1977, The Israel Museum, 3054 ET.


Figure 5 Cover fashioned from an Ottoman bundle kerchief, a purple-colored, cotton velvet with gilded, silver thread embroidery, 86 × 66 cm. Courtesy of the Center for Jewish Art, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem,

No. Sc. 509–11.

used as they were or with the addition of a dedicatory inscription (fig. 5).28 The practice of using local luxury textiles was so widespread in the Ottoman Empire that most donors did not even think twice about donating textiles that had originally been intended for mosque use. These Moslem prayer rugs, typically decorated with a central motif depicting a gate, had clearly

28 This kerchief, which was embroidered in the Balkans, was owned by an Israeli family with Sephardic roots. The embroidered dedicatory inscription attests to its having been donated by the parents of Mordekhai Hayyim Tagier, who was killed in 1921, “defending the honor of our nation.” The inscription is embroidered interstitially between the elements comprising the orig-inal pattern, the baskets and the flowers. For the documentation of this kerchief and a color photograph, see Ariella Amar and Einat Ron, Endangered Movable Objects, and Their Untold Stories: Vol. 1: Ritual Objects (Center for Jewish Art: Jerusalem, 2007), pp. 183–186. This project was supported by UNESCO, November, 2007.


enchanted the donors of the Torah ark curtains and bimah covers.29 This prac-tice is evident in the halakhic question addressed to R. David Amado, who lived in Turkey at the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries:

On the matter of the prayer rug, which some are accustomed to drape over the bimah in the synagogue when the Torah is read . . . is this forbidden since the entry way to the place where the Ishmaelites pray is depicted there . . . ?30

In North Africa, we find a completely different tradition. The twentieth cen-tury Algerian bimah cover is characterized—like the Torah mantle for the Torah scroll—by its dual purpose. The colorful, velvet side is intended for daily use, while the white underside is intended for High Holiday use. In Morocco, the only community where the parameters for the bimah cover achieved uniformity, the cover is made of velvet and decorated with gold embroidery. The cover’s cut enables it to be placed on the bimah and circular openings in it allow it to fit over the staves affixed at the bimah corners.

The dedicatory inscriptions embroidered on the covers are similar in con-tent to the inscriptions embroidered on the Torah mantles and the Torah ark curtains. They commemorate the departed or aggrandize the living donor. On rare occasions they open by referring to the object itself, as in the inscription embroidered on the aforementioned Moroccan bimah cover.31 However, several inscriptions reveal what might be referred to as the hidden role of the covers by quoting the passage, 'זה השזלתן אשר לפני ה “this is the table that stands before the Lord”—a phrase embroidered on the cover donated in 1937 to Budapest’s Great Synagogue on Dohány Street (fig. 6).32 This passage is

29 For examples of prayer rugs that were converted into Torah ark curtains, see A. Felton, Jewish Carpets: A History and Guide (Woodbridge, Suffolk, 1977), pp. 160–162, 166–167. For a comprehensive discussion of this subject, see Bracha Yaniv, Ma’ase Rokem: Textile Ceremonial Objects in the Ashkenazi, Sephardi and Italian Synagogue (Hebrew: Jerusalem, 2009), pp. 168–173.

30 R. David Amado, Enei David—likute dinim (Izmir, 1867), Letter Ayin (8), §77. R. Amado died in 1832. For a prayer rug used as a bimah cover in the Shalom synagogue in Izmir, see E. Juhasz, ed., Sephardi Jews in the Ottoman Empire ( Jerusalem, 1990), fig. 43.

31 Note 10 above.32 This cover was made by Judith Stern, the wife of Samuel Stern, the leader of the commu-

nity, as part of a set of ritual objects she made out of lace netting between 1933–1937. On this, see the article written by the artisan: P. Stern, “A női kézimunka,” in Almanach 1937–1938 5698 (Yearbook of the Federation of the Hungarian Jewish Women Associations [MINOSZ]: Budapest, 1937/1938), pp. 147–148. The personal dedicatory inscription on this cover is writ-ten in Hungarian, testimony to the ever-increasing, twentieth-century phenomenon of the ver-nacular languages entering what until then had been an exclusively Hebrew domain. This phenomenon is attested to by inscriptions on textile artifacts as well as by those on other ritual


excerpted from the verse uttered by Ezekiel the prophet when he speaks of the altar in the Temple: “And he said to me, ‘This is the table that stands before the Lord’ ” (Ezek. 41:22). In so doing, Ezekiel employs the term “table” to denote the Temple altar. This denotation, which was well-known in the Jew-ish community, gained expression in the embroidered verse, “this is the table. . . .” The use of this expression reveals the very crux of the bimah cover’s

objects, and especially on tombstones. This cover disappeared during World War II. For another instance of this verse’s citation, see the bimah cover from the synagogue in Zagreb, the capital of Croatia, dating from 1911/1912. For a picture of the cover, see Nadomački, ibid., p. 102.

Figure 6 Bimah cover, Budapest, knit lace, 1933–1937 (Artisan: Judith Stern. See note 32).


role: to cover the altar found in the synagogue—an institution that itself is traditionally referred to as a mikdash me’at (little sanctuary).33 That the syna-gogue bimah possesses this stature endows the bimah cover with special importance.

33 R. Israel Isserlein, second half of the fifteenth century in Ashkenaz, remarked on the bimah’s fundamental significance as an altar: “. . . when the Torah scroll is on the bimah, which takes the place of the altar . . .” (Israel Isserlein, Responsa terumat hadeshen [Warsaw, 1882; repr., Tel Aviv, 1974], §98. In the twentieth century, R. Isaac Jacob Weiss also notes this significance in addressing the custom of encircling the bimah on the festival of Tabernacles (Isaac Jacob Weiss, Responsa minhat Yitshak, 3 [London, 1962], §4, s.v. vehineh).

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