Tel Aviv University launches academic program to preserve knowledge of Ethiopian Jewish bible
Israeli ‘Kessim’ or religious leaders of the Ethiopian Jewish community lead the prayers during the Sigd holiday marking the desire to ‘return to Jerusalem’, as they celebrate from a hilltop in the holy city, on November 7, 2018. Image by Getty Images
(JTA) — Tel Aviv University announced the launch of what it says is the world’s first academic program focused on the holy scriptures of Ethiopian Jews.
The program, aimed currently at graduate students, was announced last week by the university’s Chaim Rosenberg School of Jewish Studies and Archaeology. It is is titled Orit Apprehenders, which refers to one of the central pieces of scripture in the Ethiopian Jewish community.
In a statement, Dalit Rom-Shiloni, the TAU professor who is leading the new program, called it a “rescue operation” to preserve understanding about the Orit.
The Orit is the Ethiopian variant of the Hebrew Bible, Rom-Shiloni said. Prior to the compilation of the text known today as the Hebrew Bible, Jewish communities had similar “but certainly not identical” versions, she added.
Ethiopian Jews brought the Orit with them when they immigrated to Israel beginning in the 1980s. The text is written in Ge’ez, a Semitic language used by clergy in Ethiopia. Around the Orit, an unwritten liturgy evolved over the centuries that includes songs, rabbinical interpretations and stories in Amharic and Tigrinya.
The new study program aims to preserve and teach that liturgy, which is fading as Ethiopian Jews integrate into Israeli society.
“These cultural treasures are facing extinction,” Rom-Shiloni said.
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
