Last year, 5776, was a Hakhel year. It would have started with the King of Israel reading from the Torah scroll, the same one that normally stayed all year round housed inside the Holy Ark inside the Holy of Holies.
The King would read the Torah scroll before the entire Jewish population on the 2nd day of Succot. The question is, how could he have read it then when on that day nobody must enter the holy Kodesh Hakodoshim? And how could the holy scroll have been returned into the Ark if nobody must enter that sanctity on that day?
It all starts on the 10th day of the Hakhel year, the day of Yom Kippur. That day the Kohen Gadol would enter the the Holy of Holies for his 24-hour workday service. The Kohen Gadol, when he would emerge from the Kodesh Hakodoshim, also would take out with him the Torah scroll. Five days later, on the 16th of Tishrei, the 2nd day of Succot, the King would read from it.
The Torah scroll then would remain outside the Kodesh Hakodoshim for an entire year, most of it spanning the Hakhel year!
When the Kohen Gadol would enter the Holy of Holies the next year on Yom Kippur, that’s when he would take the Torah scroll with him back into the Holy of Holies and return it to its place inside the Holy Ark.
Source: (תשובות ראבי׳׳ה השלם - מכון ירושלים - ח׳׳ג סימן תתקצ׳׳א)
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A word frequently used to refer to Torah is the Hebrew word עז. Its numeric value is 77. This new year 5777 has the acronym (תשע׳׳ז) that can read as:
“It will be a year of Torah”!
God, Torah and the Jews are one. May this year bring that revelation to full fruition!
