Berlin – The robot’s quill runs across the paper scroll, from right to left, scribbling down ancient Hebrew letters with black ink. It is penning down the Torah, the Jews’ holy scripture, and it is doing it much faster than a rabbi could because it doesn’t need to take breaks.
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The Torah-writing robot was developed by the German artists’ group robotlab and was presented for the first time Thursday at Berlin’s Jewish Museum. While it takes the machine about three months to complete the 80-meter (260-foot) -long scroll, a rabbi or a sofer — a Jewish scribe — needs nearly a year. But unlike the rabbi’s work, the robot’s Torah can’t be used in a synagogue.
“In order for the Torah to be holy, it has to be written with a goose feather on parchment, the process has to be filled with meaning and I’m saying prayers while I’m writing it,” said Rabbi Reuven Yaacobov. The Berlin rabbi curiously eyed the orange-painted robot as it ceaselessly wrote down the first book of Moses. Yaacobov then showed visitors the traditional way of writing the Torah the way it’s been done for thousands of years.
Matthias Gommel from robotlab said the robot initially wrote down the Christian Bible in German, Spanish and Portuguese before it was reprogrammed with the help of an Israeli graphic designer.
Both the robot and the rabbi are part of the exhibition “The Creation of the World” about the significance of Hebrew handwritings in Judaism. The show also presents Hebrew scrolls, wedding contracts and other medieval documents from the Braginsky Collection. The robot will be on show through January 2015 — the rabbi and the scrolls will only be there until Aug. 3.
I assume it’s kosher for a minyon of robots who recite their tefillah by wrote.
Is this what the holy Divrei Chaim was thinking when he proclaimed that machine matzoh is chometz?
Is this Kosher? Does it need to be L’Shmaa?
Will Mr. Roboto please come down for minyan?
This invention is great. Can’t wait to buy a robot like this to produce Gittin, teffilin and megilos.
Soooooo not good.
It will be great for a minyan of cell phone users davening on auto pilot.
Does it go to the mikveh before writing Hashem’s name?
the tagim looked a little shvach.
You lot write such cool comments – some of them are really funny (sadly a little truth in them as well)
If the Germans would have left a few Jewish scribes alive decades ago, perhaps they wouldn’t need robots today.
It doesn’t have to be written with a goose feather, and a sofer doesn’t say prayers while writing. It must me written Lishmah.
I think I had heard that R2D2 was a jew. C3PO was a righteous gentile. They got along well. R2 might have really liked this robo-sofer. But of course, no one really thinks that it matters in the Rebellion. Most people are more interested in the reasons why the Force is more bestowed on the Jedis.