The International STa"M Forum

ב׳׳ה On the Stringency of writing Megillas Esther, the beginnings of Safrus from Ezra hasofer, ksav Ashuris, ksiva tama, the 70 languages and on sirtut The Berditchever writes at length his view on ksav Asuris etc, in his Kedusha Shniya on Purim. As you’ll see below. The first part(kidusha rishona), concerning the stringency of megilla, does not have to do with  סת״ם  as much as comparing it to Sefer Torah, in general. The later points have more to do with  סת״ם  itself. Nonetheless, I trust this first part will still be of interest to the sofrim. Permission for use of the pictures of the text was given by the  מו״ל  of this edition (who happens to be a descendant of the Berditchever!) The stringency we find by Megillas Esther over a sefer Torah.  There is a stronger obligation to read the megilla than there is a to read the Torah. Yet the Torah is from Moshe from Sinai while the Megilla is only written  ברוח  הקודש ...

I am working on my first Megillat Esther and it's been an interesting learning experience. I am writing it for myself and G-d willing it should be done before next Purim. Looking at my progress, I am rather hypercritical of my work. I would like an objective opinion/critique/advice of my work. What I think: After a few experiments, I am getting the feel of my kulmus.  Spacing is still an issue for me, hopefully I will get the sense of it by my second column. Picture was taken at a slant, so the perspective is a little deceiving.  Thanks in advance.

A friend has asked me to do some basic repair work on his shul's megillah - it appears to be approximately 75-100 years old, and the lettering is virtually pristine, so in terms of reinking, it shouldn't be much work.  The larger problem is that the edges of the klaf are weak, and there are places where the klaf is almost torn/very heavily creased.  (In at least one place, the klaf has been reinforced with scotch tape, which I will obviously remove, and have told my friend that this is, to say the least, sub-optimal.) My plan is to use thin matleisim around the border of the megillah to reinforce as necessary, but there is one problem - the back of the klaf is mashuach and very, very crumbly.  (The front, luckily, seems to not be.)  My feeling is that if I glued a matlis to the klaf, it wouldn't adhere, and, to the extent that it did, the matlis would come off with the coating quite quickly. Does anyone have any suggestions for how to deal with this?  I...