Ask the Rabbi
- Halacha
- Sections of the Prayers
- Torah Reading
Question
is it permissable for a non-Jew to roll the Torah and for the Rabbi to place sticky tape to mark the Parsha and Aliyots?
Answer
Thank you for your questions.
1. You shouldn't have a non-Jew roll up the Torah scroll. (see Rema 88:1 that discussed the problem of a ''nida'', who is ritually impure (tamei) to touch the Sefer Torah, and non-Jews are considered tamei (see Rambam, mishkav u'moshav 2:10)). Along this line of thinking Harav Mordechai Eliyahu ruled that a non-Jew should not be allowed to touch tefillin.
2. The Rabbi should not place sticky tape to mark the Parsha and Aliyots in the Torah scroll. See Harav Yaakov Ariel's answer about placemarks in a Torah scroll in our hebrew website here.
All the best!

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