More than 500 people celebrated the completion of the first Torah scroll to be written in the birthplace of Communist leader Vladimir Lenin.

Donated by the local Feldman family, the historic scroll symbolized a generation-long turn for the city of Ulyanovsk, Russia, said Rabbi Yossi Marazov, a Chabad-Lubavitch emissary to Volga River port.

“The Jewish community has grown tremendously in these four years,” said Marazov, who arrived four years ago. “We have Torah classes, a Hebrew school, youth club, and a dance troupe. Our newly-renovated Jewish Center hosts a synagogue, kosher store and café, library, and classrooms.”

Tuesday’s event began at Ulyanovsk’s Drama Theater with a ritual scribe filling in the scroll’s last Hebrew letters as the local Jewish band Nefesh played in the background. The crowd then paraded the Torah down a blocked-off Lenin Street towards its new home at the synagogue.

“Everyone remembers how not long ago, they had to hide their Jewish identity,” said Marazov. “Now, on the very streets where Communism [flourished], they are proudly parading as Jewish with the full support of the government.”

Dancing continued at the synagogue, where participants departed with gift bags containing community calendars, photo albums and Shabbat candle-lighting kits.


Chabad-Lubavitch Rabbi Yossi Marazov, left, helps place an ornate crown atop the first Torah scroll written in Ulyanovsk, Russia, at a Tuesday ceremony at the city’s Drama Theater.


More than 500 people paraded the historic scroll from the theater to the synagogue by way of a blocked-off Lenin Street.


Overjoyed participants cried at the site of a Torah scroll being openly celebrated in the city of Lenin’s birth.


Participants dance along the parade route.


A buffet and more dancing greeted celebrants at Ulyanovsk’s central synagogue.


“Everyone remembers how not long ago, they had to hide their Jewish identity,” said Marazov. “Now, on the very streets where Communism [flourished], they are proudly parading as Jewish with the full support of the government.”