FROM THE TEAM
FROMTHE EDITOR
WWW.JEWISHLIFE.CO.ZA
PHOTOGRAPH: SUPPLIED
T
ere’s a picture that recently went viral of South African native,
Sydney Engelberg, giving a lecture to graduate students in Israel,
while clutching a baby in his arms. At first glance, it would be natural to
assume that it was one of Engelberg’s own grandchildren, but that’s not
the case. Because it’s a graduate course in Israel, where the obligation
to serve in the military likely makes the average university student
much older, many of Engelberg’s students are
parents, who balance family responsibilities
with their own continuing education. So
Engelberg actually encourages his students to bring their children to
class. But the picture doesn’t tell the full story. One of the babies who’d
been brought to the class had started crying, and his mother got up
to walk out with him. Then Engelberg walked over, took the baby,
soothed him, and simply carried on with his lecture while holding
him! Why would a professor allow such a thing? Isn’t having a young
child in class distracting? In an interview with Yahoo Parenting,
Engelberg explained, “The reason is that education for me is not
simply conveying content, but teaching values.”
And that’s where Jewish education is so different. No one expects
an ethics teacher to be ethical outside (or even inside) his classroom, but that’s not the case
when it comes to a teacher of Torah; we rightly expect our teachers to live in accordance with
what they teach. One of the reasons the picture resonates so much with me is that Jewish
education is really meant to be something that’s transmitted from parent to child, with love
and warmth. A Beis Medrash (a study hall for learning Torah) is meant to be filled with people
of all ages, and there’s something so beautiful about seeing a parent sitting with his child,
learning Torah together. Unfortunately, most of us just aren’t up to the task of giving our
children a Jewish education. Although public school education is a relatively modern
invention, the Talmud speaks of how a man named Yehoshua ben Gamla, who lived roughly
2 000 years ago, created the first Jewish day school system to ensure that no Jewish child got
left behind.
Jewish education is a subject that’s very close to my heart. I grew