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Torah · 1:28:45

From Learning Quran to Teaching Torah | The Story of R' Yaakov Sadigh

23K views · Sep 9, 2023

Meaningful People

Rabbi Yaakov Sadigh shares his journey from Iran to becoming an educator in the Jewish community.

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I was born in Tehran, so I was in a Muslim school and I remember learning Quran. And then in 1978, of course, um the country turned um on its head and I'm seeing the uprising happening right outside my window. Molotov cocktails being thrown, you know, bullets being fired and like, you know, it's pretty scary for for a 8-9 year old boy. Yeah. These are vivid memories that I have of you know, they're climbing the walls of the embassy to get in. Yeah. It's estimated that close to 200,000 Jews were living in Iran at the 200,000 Jews were living in Iran at the time of the Shah. It was it was pretty scary for Jews. Um there were Jews that were hung, prominent members of of the Jewish community. There were Jews that were jailed. The thing I remember from that night when my parents told me we're leaving, "We going on vacation cuz we we need a break from the revolution." They're like, "No, we're we're we're leaving." Till today there's a I mean, estimated between 15,000-20,000 Jews living in Iran and they're able to put on tfillin and go to shul. I think by the time I got to the States, I was 10 and I attended school.

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  1. 0:00I was born in Tehran, so I was in a Muslim school and I remember learning…
  2. 8:07you know, this is early early '70s is my you know, my childhood. So, um I…
  3. 13:43like just hey cousin, you know, like what what was it like? Yeah, pretty much were…
  4. 18:53I'm about 2, 2 and 1/2 years old and I'm standing right in front of the…
  5. 24:31He took really good care of me, but that announcement, you know, uh I think got…
  6. 33:42heart. At 17, it punctured my heart. You know. That's so it's I guess your it's…
  7. 39:18forego what is hundreds of thousands of dollars in free education. Yeah. I started late. I…
  8. 44:22reaching for my pocket to pay for another one. So, the guy at the kiosk pulls…
  9. 50:27there's music playing. The The teachers are out. They wear costumes based on different themes of…
  10. 55:32going on. Call 911 call out sala. In the meantime someone's holding me up from fainting…

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