The Challenges of Education in Our Generation

How can one educate without saying a word? What is important to check before choosing an educational framework? And why is it important to inspire our environment toward values-based education?

Sunday, 11th of Shevat, 5784 | Jan. 21, 2024 | 15:20

Education – Personal Example of the Parents

The greatest education is the behavior of the parents. If a son sees how his father gets up with diligence and how he rejoices in the service of Hashem, sees that for everything his father eats he says a first blessing and a final blessing, and verifies that everything he brings into the house has a good kosher certification—this influences the children. When children see their parents treating each other with respect, they too respect one another and behave appropriately toward their friends.

Guiding the Child on the Right Path from Early Childhood

One must know that education is not simple work, for children are compared to olive saplings: "Your children are like olive saplings around your table." If you want oil, you must crush the olives; it requires labor and is not simple. "Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of youth." As long as you have not released the arrow from your hand, you can direct it toward the target; but after you release the arrow, it is impossible to control or direct it. So it is with a child—"Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of youth." If from the beginning you direct them toward the right path, they will run on the right path; and if not, May Hashem have mercy.

Afterward, the parents regret what they did

There was a great Maggid in Jerusalem, Rabbi Shabtai Yudelevitz, may the memory of the righteous be blessed. I heard a story from him that happened at a Jewish history class he gave. One day, someone approached him and invited him to his home. He asked him, "What is going on today?" The father said to him, "I deserve a 'Mazal Tov'!" "For what?" "I am enrolling my son in a gymnasium (secular high school)." The rabbi said to him, "What kind of 'Mazal Tov' is this, not upon you or me? You are sending him somewhere that is not good. My friend, you are making a mistake." He replied, "No, what are you talking about?"

Two years later, Rabbi Shabtai saw him crying. "What's wrong with you?" "What can I tell you? My son doesn't want to put on Tefillin. He says it's unnecessary, there's no Tefillin. Little by little he deteriorated; he doesn't go to synagogue now in the morning. I ask him to put on Tefillin and he tells me he doesn't want to. I don't know what to do, and you were right when you told me that I didn't educate him, that I didn't treat him well. Now he wants to travel abroad to a party with kids for about two months. I'll send him, but I don't know what to do about the Tefillin—he needs to put them on every day! I'm afraid for him, how will he put on Tefillin?"

The Rabbi said to him, "I'll give you a piece of advice. How much money does he want for the trip?" "1,000 dollars." He told him, "I'll give you 200–300 dollars, and for the rest, tell him that you will send it to him right away. Take the money, put it inside the Tefillin, and if he puts on Tefillin even once, he will find the money. If he doesn't put on Tefillin—he won't."

The father says to him, "You gave me good advice." He did so. He put the package inside the Tefillin. Two days later, "Well, Dad, what's happening? Did you send me money?" The father says, "Don't worry, it will reach you. Did you put on Tefillin, what? Every day put on Tefillin! Are you primitive? Bring the money!" The father answers him, "I went on a trip, I want to rejoice with my friends, they go everywhere, I can't, bring me the money. But I told you to put on Tefillin."

A few days later, he calls him again, "Dad, did you send it?" "Yes, I brought it to you, but put on Tefillin." So every day he calls him, saying "Put on Tefillin." The son says, "What kind of father is this? I don't understand him." In the end, he gave up on everything and returned to Israel. "What, you didn't give me the money, I took a return ticket, I came back! What kind of father are you?" He says to him, "Did you put on Tefillin?" He says to him, "Yes. The treasure was right here, if you had put on Tefillin even once, you would have received all the money. You tell me I put on Tefillin?!"

That's it. If a person doesn't worry about his children, afterward, what will happen with him? Everything goes to ruin. Therefore, one must try very hard to care for his children so that they don't go astray, Heaven forbid. What will happen afterward with our children?

The Danger of Kindergartens and Public Schools

Today there is a big problem; today in kindergartens, where a person puts his child, they don't even tell a child Shema Yisrael, they don't give them [the instruction] to say the washing of the hands (Netilat Yadayim) blessing, they don't say with them Modeh Ani Lefanecha Melech Chai VeKayam (I offer thanks before You,
living and eternal King), —literally so, just as I am telling you.

Therefore, every person needs to care for his children, and not only that—everyone should go and care for another child too, it doesn't take much from you. Go to your neighbor, to your loved one, say, "Listen, I want to save you—take your child, how good it is to put your child in a good place, an important place where they will teach him Torah, so that he knows how to come tell you what they told him about the weekly Torah portion, who Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov are, what the Holy One, blessed be He, is, 'Shema Yisrael.'" They don't know—they aren't teaching them.

Today a boy came to me who made a Bar Mitzvah. I told him, "Do you want to pray Mincha with me, to get to know the Holy One, blessed be He?" The child says to me, "I have never prayed in my life, I don't know what it is to pray. I don't know what it is to pray!" And he is not to blame; the generation is difficult, we don't know how difficult the situation of the youth is. "For how shall I go up to my father, and the lad is not with me?"

To Make an Effort for Every Child

It is not only us the parents; we need to weep. Our teacher, Chacham Ovadia Yosef, peace be upon him, was crying on Yom Kippur with streams of tears. They said to him, "Does His Honor have sins, what are you [doing], every Yom Kippur, such weeping, such weeping?" He says, "I am weeping because I don't know how much I did to bring the children of Israel to good places. I saw the Messiah in my dream, and he said to me: How can you sit when about a million children don't know what 'Shema Yisrael' is?" "Therefore I weep, because who knows, maybe I am not alright and I did not educate them properly. Therefore, I weep because I am involved in their sins." One must know that every person has a responsibility—not only responsibility for his own family, but also responsibility for others, for after all he can reprove, he can speak with the relative, with the neighbor.

Heaven forbid, if we were to see the child of the neighbor standing in a dangerous place where he could fall, would I say, "I'm not getting involved, I am not going to dictate to him what to do?" No, we would run to warn the neighbor. Here too, it is a tremendous danger that that child will grow up as a non-Jew, Heaven forbid, therefore, one must hurry to speak—of course, to speak pleasantly, to explain to them what the importance is of preserving the tradition of Israel, and that in Torah education they have knowledge in professions no less than other places, what good manners (Derech Eretz), honor to parents. And may it be His will that we merit to educate our sons and daughters in the path of our holy forefathers, and may we reap satisfaction from them all, Amen.