Yikes!

A Refreshing Voice on the Peace Process

I don't know Rabbi Yosef Kanfesky, the rabbi of B'nai David Judea (just down the street from me), but he's pretty well respected by Jews of all denominations in this town. From what I hear, members of his congregation think he's just the bees knees.

So I was pretty fascinated by his article in this week's Jewish Journal, entitled, "An Orthodox rabbi's plea: consider a divided Jerusalem." He writes:

To be sure, I would be horrified and sick if the worst-case division-of-Jerusalem scenario were to materialize. The possibility that the Kotel, the Jewish Quarter or the Temple Mount would return to their former states of Arab sovereignty is unfathomable to me, and I suspect to nearly everyone inside the Israeli government. At the same time though, to insist that the government not talk about Jerusalem at all (including the possibility, for example, of Palestinian sovereignty over Arab neighborhoods) is to insist that Israel come to the negotiating table telling a dishonest story -- a story in which our side has made no mistakes and no miscalculations, a story in which there is no moral ambiguity in the way we have chosen to rule the people we conquered, a story in which we don't owe anything to anyone. Cries of protest, in particular from organizations that oppose Israel's relinquishing anything at all between the Mediterranean and the Jordan, and which have never offered any alternative solutions to the ones they are protesting against, are rooted in the refusal to read history honestly. And I -- for one -- cannot lend my support to that.

Wow.

Lets stop asking the same old questions.

"What's Wrong With Hebrew School?"

That's the big question Mindy Schiller asks in the latest issue of "World Jewish Digest" (a publication whose name suggests an international following, but all the advertisers are from the Chicago area, as are all the schools cited in Schiller's article).

The article piqued our interest at work because, well, we're in the Hebrew school business. And in the end I have a number of major concerns.

1. The article asks all the same questions that we've been asking for twenty years, and offers a whole bunch of the same, tired answers. For example:

So, if Hebrew schools aren’t making the grade, what’s the reason?... [A] problem repeatedly expressed by critics of Hebrew school focuses on the teachers. Put simply, most are part-timers looking to earn a little extra money. (Unfortunately, educators say that hiring full-time teachers is something that most Hebrew schools cannot afford.) In fact, the United Synagogue for Conservative Judaism estimates that approximately one third of Conservative schools employ a full-time education director. “If you’re working this as a supplementary job, with a supplementary salary, then that means it’s not your main focus,” says Saul Kaiserman, Director of Lifelong Learning at Temple Emanuel in Manhattan. “Even if you have a great, committed, involved teacher, they’ve got other things that are vying for their attention.”

Are you kidding me? Next the World Jewish Digest is going to ask the question, "Why are Jewish communities shrinking?" and they're gonna answer it with, "Well, it turns out that one major factor may be intermarriage."

The article keeps doing this. It sets up Hebrew school as being this giant failing enterprise, offers evidence that is mostly from Jewish adults whose experience reflects the state of Hebrew schools circa 1984, and then offers the same quotes from the same people (Jack Wertheimer and Steven M. Cohen... whoopdeedoo... No offense to those guys -- who are brilliant -- but isn't this just a rehashing of the same stuff they've been saying for years?).

Nothing new to see here.

(The author herself basically admits this when she quotes one source as saying: “The fact that Hebrew schools haven’t been working is old news.”)

2. The article's author takes it as a given that Hebrew schools are failing.

She gives some anecdotal evidence, quotes Wertheimer and Cohen (and their research), then declares, "Hebrew schools aren’t making the grade."

This is ridiculous. All of her evidence is from a handful of Chicago area schools. She doesn't look at programs anywhere else. She doesn't look at truly innovative programs happening right in her own back yard. She doesn't really look at all.

A better-written article would include commentary from people who would say things like, "Yeah... Hebrew schools have been a problem for a long time. But there are a lot of really good Hebrew school programs out there." This article doesn't do that.

3. Halfway through the article, the author gives up her whole entire premise. Wait... let me say that again. Half way through the article, the author suddenly (and without warning, or any indication to the reader that she's even aware she's doing it), the author totally changes direction.

She starts talking about a school at B'nai Tikvah in Deerfield, Ill. that -- wonder of wonders -- doesn't actually suck. As I read this, I'm thinking, "Hey wait a minute. This school isn't exceptional. I know lots and lots of Hebrew schools that are just as good as that one." And then... we get this:

The question is: is B’nai Tikvah representative?

According to JESNA’s Kraus, the answer is yes.

Wait a minute! Didn't she just say that Hebrew schools are broken? Now she's saying that this one excellent school is actually pretty normal, and that lots of schools are doing really great things.

So why did we need this whole long stinking article?

4. The author has a whole section that looks at ways in which new, interesting stuff has to "compete in the marketplace." Then, she talks about CHAI and Mitkadem, and the Conservative movement's educational/curricular initiatives. That's all fine and good. All that curricular stuff is great.

But nowhere does she even consider that new, innovative stuff has been coming out of the for-profit (and the non-movement-affiliated non-profit) world for years now. Are we cold borscht? What about A.R.E. (now part of Behrman, but still), or K'tav? What about the all those non-movement non-profit initiatives? Coming out with curricular "initiatives" (my boss loves to riff on why the word "initiatives" should scare us all) is all fine and good, but it is definitely not a new idea.

Case in point: The author, talking about the problems with Hebrew school curriculum, writes, "Critics cite a holiday-based curriculum that recycles the same topics year in and year out."

If she'd bothered to talk to anyone who actually works in a Hebrew school, she'd know that a few years ago, we released the Whole School Holiday series. The whole idea behind the series is that [a] schools only need to spend about one day per year on most holidays, and [b] kids should learn new, developmentally appropriate things each year. This set of materials offers kids something new to learn (as opposed to a curriculum that "recycles the same topics year in and year out") in every grade.

Anyway... I could go on for a while, but I don't want to take too much time disparaging this article. In the end, if it gets people to talk about Jewish education, then good. I suspect that the World Jewish Digest of Greater Chicago is actually pretty small potatoes, and that the few people who read this blog and then click over to the article will probably triple its readership. But whatever. It was a nice excuse to rant about the fact that Hebrew schools aren't actually all failing. I like talking about that.

Quote of the Day

“The only way I wouldn’t see God is if I stopped looking.”
- Dvora Weisberg

Favorite Things to Never Say on Hebrew School Report Cards

"Your child has exhibited no signs of a personality this semester."

"You child is about as useless as a poop-flavored lolly pop."

"Your kid might actually learn something if you stopped picking him up an hour early to take him to baseball practice."

"There isn't enough ritalin in the world."

"Your kid is very social. Too social. Please advise him that he may not remove his pants during Hebrew school."

"Your child can't read Hebrew, doesn't know Abraham the patriarch from Abraham Lincoln, and doesn't know any of the prayers. But it's ok... He'll have his bar mitzvah, and you'll feel like you got your money's worth."

"What's more important: your Lakers season tickets or your kids Jewish education? Nevermind. Don't answer that."

Saving Darfur

I teach an 8th grade Hebrew school class on Tuesday nights.

Tonight, I was teaching about generosity and tzedakah. After discussing some text, I split the class into three teams. Each team was given a hypothetical $100. I asked them to, as a team, figure out a way to spend their $100 that would most help the world.

One group was discussing whether or not to donate some of their money to (in their words) "save Darfur." One of the girls in the group asked, "What's 'save Darfur'?" Another girl answers, "It's for black people far away."

Thank God another of the kids in the group was able to give a real explanation.

D'var Torah: Chayei Sara

Things might have been easier for Eliezer, Abraham’s servant, if he’d had the assistance of GPS.

He had a long journey to go on. He was a man with a mission.

GPS – which stands for “global positioning satellite” – is a technology that allows a device, which can be held in someone’s hand or mounted in a car navigation system, to communicate with specially designed satellites. Using trigonometric calculations, the device figures out your location anywhere on the globe, and can help you map a course to your destination.

I learned a lot about GPS this weekend, when Dan Medwin and I participated in a global treasure hunt called “geocacheing.” People who participate in the game leave “caches,” little treasure troves, in out-of-the-way spots around the globe, then post the GPS coordinates on a website. Using a handheld GPS, geocache hunters trek through wilderness, looking for little plastic boxes hidden under rocks.

Eliezer is on a mission, too. He’s taken an oath to his elderly boss to find Isaac a wife among Abraham’s own people. According to Midrash Rabbah, Eliezer isn’t on the treasure hunt we think he’s on. When he journeys to Aram-Naharaim and brings his camels to a well, he’s trying not to find a wife for Isaac. Abraham has given Eliezer an out. If he cannot convince a women to come back with him, “you shall then be clear of this oath to me,” Abraham says in Genesis 24:8.

Eliezer, seeing opportunity, is hoping that his journey will end a certain way. He hopes not to find a wife for Isaac, according to the midrash, because he wants Isaac to marry his own daughter. Eliezer is a man on a strange mission. He must fulfill his master’s wishes, but he’s hoping to fail.

When Eliezer arrives at the well, he prays to God, asking for a woman to present herself. But as he speaks, the word vayomer in verse twelve is marked with a rare shalshelet. According to Rabbi Lee Buckman, the shalshelet indicates how “apprehensive, how worried, how desperate” Eliezer is. He’s a man on a mission, and it’s a little scary.

On our treasure hunt, Dan and I embarked on a mission to find a geocache at the top of Cuyamaca Peak in eastern San Diego County. We trekked straight up the hill, gasping for breath as we approached 6500 feet above sea level. Using the GPS, we found the location of the cache, a tree on the hilltop, located a few feet from where a fire lookout station used to stand.

But the geocache wasn’t there. We dug around. We uplifted rocks. We reached under branches and leaves. The plastic container we were seeking was missing.

A similar thing happens to Eliezer. A moment after uttering his half-hearted prayer to God, Rebecca appears and gives him and his camels water to drink. The Torah recounts an interesting moment in Eliezer’s consciousness: וְהָאִישׁ מִשְׁתָּאֵה לָהּ מַחֲרִישׁ. “The man stared at her, silently.”

After our mission seemed to be a bust, Dan and I wandered around the mountaintop, hopelessly trying to not be failures. It was then that we found our treasure. It wasn’t the plastic box we were looking for, but a blind man named Crazy Dave. Dave, who has no eyesight at all, has hiked to the top of Cuyamaca Peak dozens of times. He told us that the mountains heal him, and he recounted stories about his life.

וְהָאַנָשִׁים מִשְׁתָּאוּ לוֹ מַחֲרִישׁים .We stared at him, silently

It was at that moment that Eliezer’s true treasure became apparent to him. His mission was not about marrying his daughter to Isaac, but about connecting Isaac with his b’shert, this woman of kind heart who just-so-happened to be from Abraham’s clan.

According to the Midrash, one lesson of Eliezer’s journey is that there are moments when you need to take a deep breath and realize that you might have to redefine your vision of success. For Eliezer, this meant fulfilling his oath to his master. For Dan and I, it meant meeting a clear-sighted blind man.

Dear Editor... Please Send Jane Ulman to Journalism 101

Dear Editor,

I'm writing to express my disappointment with Jane Ulman's article about Tisha b'Av observance ("Tisha B'Av Dilemma: Day of Solemnity or Celebration?", July 20).

Ms. Ulman suggests that Reform Jews don't celebrate Tisha b'Av, relating an anecdote about a synagogue in Cincinnati, Ohio that held a rummage sale last year on the fast day. Her only source for the story is an unnamed "spokesperson" for the temple's sisterhood.

The story serves little purpose to the article. Who cares if she can find some congregation somewhere (in this case, suburban Cincinnati) who doesn’t commemorate Tisha b’Av? It is inappropriate that she infers generalizations about Reform Jews from this one example.

Furthermore, I challenge the factual accuracy of her assertion that Tisha b’Av is “a non-event in some, usually Reform, congregations.” What evidence does the author have to support such a claim? Has Ms. Ulman done a statistical survey of holiday practice at synagogues in America? Since she failed to cite such research, I gather that her statement was based on her own assumption, a reflection of popular stereotypes about Reform Jews. What is the value of a newspaper article in which the author simply shares her own assumptions, reinforcing stereotypes?

It is particularly strange that Ulman reported on last year's activities in Cincinnati instead of reporting on Tisha b'Av observance at local Reform congregations. For example, Temple Judea in Tarzana planned an event entitled "Lunch Without Lunch - Does Tisha B'av Have Meaning For Us Today?" I wonder why Ulman chose to discuss a congregation thousands of miles away that didn't commemorate the holiday when a congregation right on her doorstep did indeed mark the occasion.

Later in the article, Ulman writes, "Some Reform Jews, as did 19th century Rabbi David Einhorn, actually see the holiday as celebratory." While the author's understanding of Jewish history is not incorrect, her inference that modern Reform Jews celebrate on Tisha b'Av is ridiculous. She mentions "some Reform Jews" who "actually see" (present tense), but then fails to cite any examples or quote anyone born after 1809. As an active Reform Jew, I can say that I've never met anyone who celebrated on Tisha b'Av, and I would challenge Ulman to find a normative Reform Jew who does.

Einhorn -- it should be noted -- believed a lot of things that today's Reform Jews would find ridiculous. Citing Einhorn in a discussion of modern practice is like a political writer reporting that, "Some members of the Democratic Party, as did 18th century President Thomas Jefferson, actually believe in owning slaves." Like Ulman's mention of Einhorn, such a statement is an over-simplification of Jefferson's complex views and, more importantly, has nothing to do with today's Democratic Party. Unlike Einhorn, today's Reform movement is outwardly Zionist, chants Kol Nidrei on Yom Kippur, and believes that the Jewish textual tradition is important. And many of us commemorate Tisha b'Av.

Ms. Ulman's reporting was irresponsible, inflammatory, and contrary to norms of journalistic standards. In the future, I urge you to give her writing the much closer editorial supervision it deserves.

Sincerely,

Josh

Amalek's Big Toe

A few months ago, Rabbi Jack Riemer decided that Islamo-Fascists are an incarnation of Amalek.

Last week, Rabbi Marc Gellman made a similar declaration in his Newsweek column. It turns out, according to Gellman, that Amalek utilized the same tactics as Hezbollah:

What made Amalek so dastardly was that unlike any other enemy who attacked the Israelites fleeing slavery in Egypt from the front, Amalek attacked the rear. This meant that his soldiers could kill women and children, the elderly and the infirm and in so doing avoid engagement with the soldiers at the front. In this way he could produce maximum carnage and maximum terror.

Of course Deut. 25:17-19 instructs us to remember Amalek for a good reason. Sayeth Gellman:

I believe this is because the planned and plotted slaughter of innocents even during wartime cannot be condoned and must be remembered as a bright moral line which can never be crossed.

Sorry. I have a bullshit meter that buzzes whenever someone uses the Torah to score political points. But maybe that's just me. Perhaps the Amalek label is appropriate here.

[Don't worry. Newsweek's erudite readers bash Gellman plenty in this week's Letters to the Editor.]

Cross-posted on Jewschool.

"Folks haven't been reading their bibles."

If there was ever any doubt that Barack Obama should be the next president of the United States, his recent speech on religion in politics should be proof enough. An excerpt:

Moreover, given the increasing diversity of America's population, the dangers of sectarianism have never been greater. Whatever we once were, we are no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers.

And even if we did have only Christians in our midst, if we expelled every non-Christian from the United States of America, whose Christianity would we teach in the schools? Would we go with James Dobson's, or Al Sharpton's? Which passages of Scripture should guide our public policy? Should we go with Leviticus, which suggests slavery is ok and that eating shellfish is abomination? How about Deuteronomy, which suggests stoning your child if he strays from the faith? Or should we just stick to the Sermon on the Mount - a passage that is so radical that it's doubtful that our own Defense Department would survive its application? So before we get carried away, let's read our bibles. Folks haven't been reading their bibles.

You can find the full speech here.

A Different Germany

Sitting in the Bundestag’s Paul Löbe Building, home to the parliamentary committees of the German government, the high-ranking political advisor was trying to be candid with us, a group of American Jews peppering him with questions on his party’s policies regarding foreign relations.

“We have yet to find a final solution to the oil crisis,” he said, innocently.

Twenty Jews sat around the conference table. Twenty jaws dropped.

Had an American politico uttered the same sentence, we probably wouldn’t have noticed. But in Germany, things are different.

The country has come a long way since the reunification of East and West more than 15 years ago, and an even longer way since the end of World War II in 1945. I was in Berlin as a participant in a trip through Bridge of Understanding, a German governmental agency which invites young Jewish Americans to make their own direct contacts with modern Germany in light of the fact that their feelings about Germany dominated by the overwhelmingly negative image of the past.

Germans don’t want to forget the past, and they’re in no rush to “move on.” It’s just that they’ve spent the past 60 years being ashamed of their culture and of their national pride. If they’re ever going to get that pride back, they need to show the world – especially the Jewish world – that they’re trying to make teshuvah.

So we heard from Israelis about how Germany is Israel’s second-best friend in the world. In Buchenwald, we heard about struggling to erect an adequate memorial. We went to Jewish community centers and old-age homes, and visited with young rabbinical students. We wandered through the new Jewish Museum in Berlin (meant to celebrate Jewish life in Germany), as well as the new Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe (meant to mourn the loss of Jewish life in Germany).

The Jewish Museum is an interesting place. Its architect, Daniel Libeskind, is the child of Holocaust survivors. The building is shaped like a jagged zig-zagged line, with sharp turns and edges. Its windows look like giant gashes on the façade. Libeskind won’t let visitors ever forget his architecture. Inside the museum, the walls take sharp angles at every turn.

It’s a perfect metaphor for understanding Judaism in Germany. The museum is supposed to be about the thousand-plus years of Jewish history, but – like the architecture – you just can’t escape the Shoah.

I had this sickly feeling in my stomach every time I got on the subway and saw that the stop after mine was in Wannsee. And when someone yelled for us to get back on the train (even though it was just because we’d gotten off a stop early). And when a German politician innocently used an infamous phrase.

In Germany, things are different.