By Rabbi Abraham Unger, Ph.D.
Executive Director
This Week’s Torah Portion
Stay a Little Longer
We think of Yom Kippur as the culmination of the period of Teshuva, the penitential season, but that isn’t quite the case. The chance to fully return to G-d and get back to our best selves is extended to Shemini Atzeret, the festival that starts this Friday night to close out the autumn holidays.
Rashi comments that Shemini Atzeret is a day that G-d asks us, the Children of Israel, to linger with Him one more day before we all get back to our daily routines. Shemini Atzeret does not have the loftiness of the blowing of the Shofar, or the existential inwardness of the fast of Yom Kippur. In fact, it has no unique ritual at all.
Shemini Atzeret is simply a time to spend with each other, with ourselves, and with the Divine. We end these fall Chagim, festivals, not with a trumpet blast, but with quietude, preparing with focus for the year ahead.
How will each of us make individual use of this additional Yom Tov? Its absence of a unique ceremony allows us the creative space to make Shemini Atzeret a deeply personal spiritual experience. Some of us might reflect on our families and family histories, and the lessons bequested by those who came before us. After all, we recite Yizkor on Shemini Atzeret.
Others might think about how to grow closer to the Land of Israel, since we are just wrapping up Sukkot, which celebrates the land’s fall harvest. Especially in these times, that is certainly a worthwhile commitment. Others might read a bit more about Judaism or learn a bit more Torah. Still others will just concentrate on how to make the best of the upcoming year.
However one draws from the well of extra time afforded by Shemini Atzeret to move forward, it is a day that asks us each to take one more step in realizing our potentials.
Weekly Parenting Message from the Parsha
When Learning is Joyful
In education there is a raging current debate between those who believe in classical learning and those who support progressive education. Classical learning is teacher-centered and focuses on traditional skills such as grammar, while closely reading classic texts for the sake of knowledge of great ideas and narratives as well as moral formation. Progressive education is tactile and experiential, making it student-centered. Children build things, explore new concepts through guided discovery, and over time have the opportunity to reflect upon their own autonomy, both as individuals and as members of the larger community. These twin pedagogical paths may seem diametrically opposed, but in Judaism, they are woven seamlessly together.
On Simchat Torah coming up this Saturday night through Sunday, we celebrate the annual completion and renewal of the Torah-reading cycle. We read from the Torah – a form of teaching – and we call all children present in the synagogue for an aliyah to see and experience the Torah scroll’s uniqueness firsthand, from its calligraphy to the feeling of majesty it may inspire.
Many synagogues, ours included, will have a children’s holiday program on Sunday, Simchat Torah morning, to both learn on the Torah’s own terms the portions being read [a teacher-centered classical approach] while then exploring the students’ thoughts on the readings and reactions to an immediate experience they just had on the Bimah/pulpit [a student-centered progressive approach].
The Jewish tradition came well before the modern educational binary of just last century that separated learning frameworks into classical and progressive. Judaism sees no conflict between skills and technique combined with experience and play. All of these moments contribute to shaping the whole person. Of course, Torah asks for moral formation. That comes from both reading the text and interacting in real life with it. As parents, Torah offers us a way to give our children the most joyful and yet meaningful education possible.