Rabbi Moshe Hillel Hirsch Urges Public Support for Gerim Bride’s Wedding Costs

Rabbi Moshe Hillel Hirsch, head of a yeshiva and a leading figure in the Torah world, made a public appeal yesterday for assistance with the wedding expenses of a righteous convert preparing to marry. He described her as a woman who completed conversion and is now engaged to “a very great Torah scholar.”

Hirsch said the bride has no family to bear the costs of the wedding and the new household. He noted that a family who raised her cannot take on the financial burden, leaving her without the support normally available to a bride.

Calling on the public to join the mitzvah of helping a bride, Hirsch said, “Certainly this is a very, very great mitzvah, that anyone who can give should take part in this great mitzvah of bringing a bride to her wedding.” He added a blessing for donors, saying that God would grant them “blessing and success with divine assistance in all matters, good livelihood, good health, joy from the children, and every good thing.”

Officials at Kupa Ha’ir said the appeal is especially rare and important because it combines helping a bride with supporting a righteous convert. They said the goal is to ensure she can go to her wedding happily and calmly and begin her home in Israel with public support standing in for a family. Contributions of 619 shekels, matching the Hebrew word for convert, can be made through Kupa Ha’ir to fund 5793.