One of the huge failures of our education system is that we spend so much time teaching nuts and bolts, curriculum topics, this perek of Chumash or that sugya of gemara, etc. that we forget to teach the big issues of what Judaism is all about and how to apply it to life. I keep meaning to post a list of the top 10 issues / questions that anyone religious who comes in contact with secular society (even by just reading the news) must confront just to prove that our schools do not address any of them and leave our kids ill equipped to deal with them, but I'll leave that for another time. For now, as we think about You HaShoah and the rising anti-Semitism around us and as we look forward to Yom HaAtzmaut, I just want to highlight one area: how many of our Rebbeim and Moros sit down with kids in high school or beyond and have a serious discussion with them about the benefits (I dare say the need) of planning to live in Israel as opposed to the US or elsewhere? Why do we assume this idea will come to kids by osmosis instead of being mechanech them that this is the correct derech? Isn't a discussion like that about what to do with the future of one's life at least as important as learning one more Ramban or one more Tosfos?
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They don’t teach the kids about alyah because you take away from them there parnassa !!! simple
ReplyDeletegood point
Delete"have a serious discussion with [kids in high school or beyond]...that [to live in Israel] is the correct derech"
ReplyDeletewhat sort of example would the "Rebbeim and Moros" be, if they themselves cannot pause at Rachel's tomb to let her know, 'it's not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me'?
-- "a discussion...what to do with the future" that includes "one more Ramban" (he who lives in Israel is as if he has a G-d; whoever lives b'chutz is as without), but omits "one more Tosfos" (their reference to Rav Chaim haKohen regarding Israel, on Ketubot 110b)...