Measuring in at 40 centimeters in length, a just-completed panel of parchment bearing verses from the Torah is believed to be the largest mezuzah in the former Soviet Union.

Written by Chabad-Lubavitch Rabbi Reuven Margolin, leading scribe at the National Scribal Center of Ukraine in Dnepropetrovsk, the ritual item is now headed to Derbent, Russia, where it will be housed in a case attached to the doorpost of the city’s synagogue.

Rabbi Ovadia Isaakov, chief rabbi of Derbent, ordered the mezuzah in advance of the synagogue’s opening in the near future.

“It was an unusual order because of the size,” said Margolin, noting that the scroll is twice the size of what most people would consider large. “It is one of the largest in the world.”

According to Margolin, difficulties encountered in the project included selecting the proper ink and writing technique to ensure that the fibers of the special parchment absorbed the ink.

For more information about the Jewish practice of placing a mezuzah on a dwelling’s doorposts, click here.