Space Torah Project highlights astronaut who brought Judaica to space in new documentary

The Space Torah Project has begun a tour through Israel, connecting national leaders with a historic connection to launching Jewish tradition beyond the confines of planet earth.

The Space Torah Project was founded after Rachel Raz, a Boston-based Israeli-American, met Dr. Jeff Hoffman. Hoffman is a retired NASA astronaut, an MIT professor, and MOXIE (Mars Oxygen ISRU Experiment) Deputy Principle Investigator, amongst his many titles.

Hoffman is a Jewish pioneer in space, an embodiment of dreams of diasporic Jews.

When Raz, an educator, entrepreneur, and consultant based in Boston, Massachusetts met Hoffman, she was moved and intrigued enough to build an initiative to portray his story in the best light possible.

Dr. Jeff Hoffman became a NASA astronaut in 1978. In his career in this position, he had participated in five space missions, soon becoming the first astronaut to log 1,000 hours of flights aboard the space shuttle.

Dr. Hoffman has performed four spacewalks, including the first unplanned, contingency spacewalk in NASA’s history and the initial repair/ rescue mission for the Hubble Space Telescope. He was the first Jewish American male astronaut to fly into space. 

Jewish sacred objects officially launch into space

Over five space missions, he chose to bring several significant Jewish objects, the highlight of which was a small and light Torah scroll that he took with him on his fifth and last mission.

Rabbi Shaul Osadchey, Jeff’s spiritual leader, was instrumental in making it possible for Jeff to take a Torah scroll — eventually dubbed “the Space Torah” — into space. Hoffman saw the act of bringing religious objects into space as part of bringing his own tradition with him, but bringing the Torah into space had the added further symbolic meaning and significance of “bringing the holiness of human life into space.”

The Space Torah project was founded in 2016 by Rachel Raz to preserve and share the journey of NASA astronaut Dr. Jeff Hoffman with communities worldwide.

“I first met Jeff in 2016 and was inspired by his story. As an educator, I wanted to share it with students, educators, caregivers and the wider community. I founded the Space Torah project to preserve this story and share it in educational programs,” Raz told The Jerusalem Post. “[His is] a story of how family, educators, scientific and religious communities achieve great things and bring our identity to new realms.”

The project includes a tour through Israel, where next week, Hoffman and Raz will meet with Israel’s President Herzog. They also engaged in special ceremonies, and gave a series of speeches at museums and other cultural landmarks throughout the holy land.

The project culminated in a short documentary, brought to life by Verissima Productions under Boston-based director, Rob Cooper. The film has already been selected for more than 40 film festivals across at least 10 different countries.

On Sunday, March 26th, Israel will be able to see the work of one of their own highlighting the work of exceptional Jewish individuals and support teams throughout the diaspora.

The film is set to premiere at Tel Aviv University. Registration for the premiere is advised and available here.