On the eve of Rosh Hashanah, during the morning service at the Central “Golden Rose” Synagogue of the Jewish Community of Dnipro, a special raffle was held, with the main and only prize being a kosher mezuzah written and donated for this purpose by the renowned Dnipro sofer Yitzchak Maltsev.
The winner of the raffle was the esteemed member of the Jewish Community of Dnipro and renowned philanthropist Natan Zolotarevsky, a regular participant in the morning minyan at the Central “Golden Rose” Synagogue. It was he who received the special mezuzah, measuring 15×15 centimeters, written in Kesav Ariza”l and meeting the “mehudar” standard.
What particularly drew the attention of those present was that Natan Zolotarevsky’s winning raffle ticket bore the number 18. In Jewish tradition, the number 18 is directly associated with the word “chai” – “life” – since the numerical values of the letters chet and yud, of which it is composed, add up to eighteen. That it was precisely this number that brought its holder a kosher mezuzah on the eve of Rosh Hashanah was perceived by those present as a vivid manifestation of Hashgachah Peratis – Divine Providence – seeing in this a symbolic blessing on the eve of the new year 5787.
“It is a great joy for me that the mezuzah I wrote went to none other than Natan Zolotarevsky, and that it was a ticket with such a symbolic number that determined the winner, for this is already the twelfth year that I have been engaged in the sacred art of Jewish calligraphy, and each time I feel a special emotion when a quality kosher scroll finds its place of service in a Jewish home,” noted sofer Yitzchak Maltsev. “I want to wish Reb Natan that this mezuzah bring blessing and protection from the Almighty into his home, that the new year be for him and his family a year of vitality, of following the paths of Torah and Chassidus, of success in all his endeavors, of great abundance and family happiness. And I wish from the bottom of my heart a ktiva va-chatima tova, a good and sweet year to him, to his loved ones, and to our entire united and cohesive Jewish Community of Dnipro under the leadership of Chief Rabbi Shmuel Kaminezki.”
