Object numberM1995/018:001
DescriptionTefillin for the head; long black leather straps; parchments and protective cover is included; These tefillin were found after the war under Menashe Rosenthal's house in Berkeescaba. He had hidden them when he and his family were taken to Auschwitz in 1944. None of the family survived. The tefillin were given to a relative who later brought them to Australia.
Putting on Tefillin is the first mitzvah assumed by a Jewish male upon his Bar Mitzvah at age 13. Tefillin, an item of Jewish ritual, are worn each weekday morning by observant Jews, except on the Sabbath and most Jewish holy days. Tefillin consist of two black leather boxes containing scrolls of parchment inscribed with verses from the Torah, and straps to hold them on. One is worn on the biceps, and its strap, tied with a special knot, is wound by the wearer seven times around the forearm and hand. The second box is worn on the forehead at the hairline with its straps going around the back of the head, connected at the top of the neck.
Four passages in the Torah call upon the Israelites to keep God’s word in mind by “binding them as a sign upon their hands and let them serve as a frontlet between your eyes.” Certain Jewish groups, like the Sadducees, (religious movement between 150BCE and 70CE) understood the last verse to be figurative, meaning only that one should always be preoccupied with words of Torah, as if they were in front of one’s eyes. The Pharisees took the text literally: the words of the Torah are to be inscribed on a scroll and placed directly between one’s eyes and on one’s arm.
Putting on Tefillin is the first mitzvah assumed by a Jewish male upon his Bar Mitzvah at age 13. Tefillin, an item of Jewish ritual, are worn each weekday morning by observant Jews, except on the Sabbath and most Jewish holy days. Tefillin consist of two black leather boxes containing scrolls of parchment inscribed with verses from the Torah, and straps to hold them on. One is worn on the biceps, and its strap, tied with a special knot, is wound by the wearer seven times around the forearm and hand. The second box is worn on the forehead at the hairline with its straps going around the back of the head, connected at the top of the neck.
Four passages in the Torah call upon the Israelites to keep God’s word in mind by “binding them as a sign upon their hands and let them serve as a frontlet between your eyes.” Certain Jewish groups, like the Sadducees, (religious movement between 150BCE and 70CE) understood the last verse to be figurative, meaning only that one should always be preoccupied with words of Torah, as if they were in front of one’s eyes. The Pharisees took the text literally: the words of the Torah are to be inscribed on a scroll and placed directly between one’s eyes and on one’s arm.
SubjectRitual Object, ritual prayer, hiding
Object nametefillin
Materialleather
Credit lineSydney Jewish Museum Collection, Donated by Moshe Federer