Foto: Karl-Heinz Stadtler
Circumcision nappy of Richard Steven Rau, born on 5 November 1953. Textile, 250x23cm (once cut into pieces)
The nappy on which a newborn boy lies during circumcision is then cut into four strips, which are sewn together to form a long ribbon. This is called ‘the pennant’ in its original general meaning. It is embroidered or painted with a text that is usually the same in its basic content: it first states the name of the child and its father, who is wished a long life with the abbreviation ‘SCHeLlTa’, then the day of the child's birth, followed by the wish that God may allow it to grow up to know and observe the law (the Torah), to marry (symbolised by the chuppah, the canopy used at the wedding ceremony) and to be charitable, which is finally concluded with ‘Amen. Sela.". On the child's first birthday, when it is ‘carried into the school (= synagogue)’, the pennant is presented there as an endowment and is then used to wrap the Torah scroll, thus protecting it. On the Sabbath after the boy's 13th birthday, when he is called to read for the first time in the synagogue as a bar mitzvah (‘son of the law’) of religious age, the corresponding Torah scroll is presented to him wrapped in his pennant. This custom, which was mainly practised among West German Jews, is intended to symbolise the individual's close connection to the Torah. The Torah pennant shown here is a donation from the synagogue congregation Congregation Beth Hillel & Beth Israel, Inc. in New York City. Walter Mildenberg and his sister Ursula Behrend presented it to the Förderkreis Synagoge in Vöhl e.V. in September 2000. It is the circumcision nappy of Richard Steven Rau, born on 5 November 1953.