A Torah Scroll Hidden in Poland for 75 Years Is Getting a Makeover

In 1939 Poland, the Jews in the village of Filipów were forcibly expelled. In an effort to save the synagogue’s Torah scroll, the rabbi of the town gave it to his non-Jewish neighbor, Tomas Wroblewski. The rabbi begged Tomas to hide the Torah until he came back for it. If he perished, he should give the Torah scroll only to a Jewish person. The rabbi was killed in Treblinka.

True to his word, Tomas kept the Torah scroll under his living room couch for 75 years. Not knowing what it was or that it was considered to be a holy object, he and his family would cut pieces of the Torah from time to time and use it to make everyday items, like handbags and shoe insoles.

In 2015 students from the University of Warsaw volunteered to travel to Filipów to search for hidden Jewish cemeteries. They randomly knocked on the doors of locals, asking if they knew any information regarding Jewish gravestones. They knocked on the Wroblewski’s home.

The elderly couple opened the door and stared at the group of students. Tomas and his family assumed they were Jews. They were about to hand them the Torah when they asked, “Wait a minute, are you Jewish?”

When they realized the group wasn’t, they insisted that their “secret” could only be shared with a Jew. So, the students brought Jonny Daniels, a British-Israeli Jew who founded the organization From the Depths, back to the house.

As Daniels walked in, Tomas lifted his couch to reveal a worn-out Torah scroll. Daniels was shocked and moved to tears. He was inspired to fix and revive the Torah scroll in a unique way. “This Torah really was the last survivor from this village. All the Jews from this village were taken to Treblinka and killed, but this Torah scroll survived. Now, we have an opportunity to bring the Torah back to life.”

Daniels initiated The Survivors Torah Project. He dreamed of having Holocaust survivors around the world complete the Torah scroll by filling in the missing letters. Because portions of the Torah had been ripped, there are still more 100,000 missing letters remaining.

Daniels is slowly accomplishing his mission. He often travels the world, speaking in various cities for pro-Israel advocacy, and he makes time to meet with survivors and have them fill in a letter.

“I’m in a unique position. I have visited all the places they would have come from. I speak a lot of those languages. This enables me to connect with them in a slightly different way.”

Daniels doesn’t just listen to the sad parts of their stories. He asks them questions, like:

What lullaby did your grandmother sing to you as a child?
What was your mother’s best dish?
What was your favorite Sunday activity as a family?

Johnny claims those types of questions bring about a very different experience for the survivors.

Jonny Daniels filling in a letter of the Torah scroll hidden in Poland (Photo by Riddle Films)

When he was in New Jersey, an organization reached out with the names of a bunch of survivors. They connected him with a 94-year-old survivor. As soon as Jonny entered his home, the survivor called out, “I will not be partaking in the project because I do not believe in God!”

Jonny calmly replied, “Okay, that’s your right. You can feel however you want to feel. I understand.”

He then encouraged the survivor to speak his mind, as Daniels attempted to open up the conversation. “We spent about 3.5 hours in a deep, philosophical conversation about what everything means. It was a challenging conversation since his pain and beliefs have been with him for years.”

By the end of that meeting, the survivor decided to partake in the project and wrote the Hebrew letter vav, for Vilna.

Daniels has had hundreds of remarkable experiences. “When survivors see the Sefer Torah, it triggers a variety of emotions.”

“When a survivor writes a letter, we pick something that is significant to them. If they don’t know Hebrew or are forgetful, we pick a certain town or their father’s name or zeide’s name. We connect the survivor to their letter because it gives them closure. It is a very, very emotional experience for them.”

The letters have all been outlined by a scribe to make for a more convenient and uniform experience. They simply need to be filled in with ink. Some survivors choose to sit next to Daniels as he fills it in for them.

“There are 613 mitzvahs, commandments, in the Torah,” Daniels explained. “Writing a Torah scroll is the 613th commandment. The vast majority of survivors have never had the opportunity to write a Torah. To bring them this mitzvah in that last part of their life is very powerful.”

Many of the survivors’ grandchildren are the ones to reach out to Daniels. They will write him impassioned pleas, asking him, “Please come to my grandma or my grandpa.”

“It is amazing to see these young people, their children and grandchildren, come in their Sunday best—suits and ties for the occasion. It’s an experience that means so much to them.”

Two survivors, from the Jonas family and the Greenfeld family, are dedicating a new cover for the Torah scroll. The Jonas family lives in New York and created a very successful upholstery business. Their family even upholstered the White House.

Daniels is racing against time. Many survivors have passed away, some even while trying to secure meetings.

Regardless of the challenges, Daniels believes that being the ambassador for this project is a blessing and honor.

“When I started the foundation 11 years ago, the first person I met with was Elie Wiesel. I said to him, ‘I want to do this, but who am I? I don’t have letters before or after my name.’ Weisel told me, ‘You have it all wrong. You have to stand up. If you don’t stand up and be witnesses, everything will be forgotten.’

“I don’t know why God handed me the task, but I accepted it with deep gratitude and I feel incredibly blessed.”

Survivors often give Daniels their books. He asks them to sign each one, and to make it out to his children. “I do this for them,” he explained.

Early on, a journalist asked him, “Don’t you feel that this project is a bit heavy? You are basically carrying the weight of six million people.”

“To the contrary,” he responded. “I feel like six million people are lifting me.”

If you have any leads on Holocaust survivors, please contact Jonny Daniels on Instagram @jonnydaniels