Who is wise? One who learns from everyone.
Pirkei Avot
Ethics of the Sages 3:1
In December last year, the Milestone founders visited London and were graciously received by the members of the West London Synagogue (WLS). Hence it was up to us to play host to them in Budapest in order to deepen our partnership, which we established as part of our Knowledge Port strategic plan for 2020. As secular partners of the London reform congregation, we support their efforts in developing a Hungarian hub in the British Capital.
The highlight of the WLS visit to Budapest was a ceremony at the Institute. Adam Solin, Rosalind Copisarow, and Rabbi David Mitchell from WLS signed an official partnership agreement, which includes several scholarships for our students. The Lyons Scholarship is awarded “to increase the number of Jewish children able to benefit from the Milestone Institute’s outstanding, internationally recognised education programme for Hungarians with high academic ability and strong leadership potential.”
The signing was accompanied by the planting of a symbolic tree. Rabbi Ariel Pollak and Dániel Léderer joined hands in planting a young maple, which we envisage to be the first of many to grace the garden of the Institute’s future campus. Before the ceremony, the young Hungarian Rabbi of the WSL, who lives in Berlin and returned to Hungary for this special occasion, performed blessings and highlighted that the tree symbolises the growing relationship between the parties and knowledge itself, by referring to the Jewish tradition of seeing the Torah as a tree.
After singning the official partnership agreements
At the event we also received a generous gift from Rabbi David Mitchell. In memory of his Hungarian-born grandfather Otto Rosmarin, he and his family donated books on Jewish faith, history and culture to our library.
Books donated to the Milestone Institute
For more information about the Lyons Scholarship, see: https://archive.milestone-institute.org/…/432-lyons-scholarship-for-…
The photos were taken by our Junior student, András Győri.