Received via e-mail:
"I have some questions about Chinuch.
Boruch Hashem I have kids in various (Boro Park) schools, and I have struggled to figure out what my kids are getting vs. what are they supposed to be getting.
My girls are taught so little that I wonder if the goal is to teach them not to think. I admit that this is a supposedly Chassidishe school, and I’m sure that less Chassidishe schools will impart more Torah in the education. From people I’ve spoken with I hear that in Crown Heights they have much more תוכן, daven more, learn more, etc.
Why can’t I find a frum school that intends to educate my daughters?
Boys in Heimishe Yeshivos have learned that Yiddishkeit equals rules. I don’t have them in front of me, but my son brought home 15 pages of forbidden activities in small type. Does someone think this is normal? These kids sit for umpteen hours a day, they learn that G-d is mean & strict, and to hate learning. These kids are mostly frustrated, stressed out, and practice miserable Judaism. I’m shocked that even half these kids stay frum.
What is wrong with the educators? Is this a hard problem to recognize?
Then there are secular studies:
The Heimishe schools teach it, but it’s basically a joke and a Chilul Hashem. Can’t this be done in a more serious way? If you’re going to teach it, why not do it like you mean it?
What is supposed to be done? I think that my kids that can’t do simple arithmetic have been dealt a tough blow. Since when is adding, subtracting, multiplying or dividing antithetical to G-d? If you don’t want to teach Social Studies, I can understand that. But Mathematics??
I personally want my kids to learn math and even reading and writing English. I understand that the Rebbe was against Limudei Chol, but I can’t see how arithmetic is Limudei Chol. As to other subjects, I don’t understand what the Rebbe meant anyway."
17 comments:
I can relate to your e-mailer's dilemma.
I don't have many answers - although Kurenitzer has discussed this on the "other" blog.
HT, Could you fix some of the punctuation for this post?
This is a very emotional post...lets analyze the facts: you said:
"I’m sure that less Chassidishe schools will impart more Torah in the education."
B kitur: Less frum more Torah. who wants that?
"From people I’ve spoken with I hear that in Crown Heights they have much more תוכן, daven more, learn more, etc."
B'kitzur: more toichen, less mitzvas, tradition, and tznius compared to typical haimish girl. who wants that?
"my son brought home 15 pages of forbidden activities in small type"
What are the rules...yiddishkeit is filled with rules..maybe the shulchan aruch should get edited down a bit...
"Does someone think this is normal?"
please describe whats normal? no rules?
"These kids sit for umpteen hours a day, they learn that G-d is mean & strict"
kids do more than sit..they play plenty, eat lunch, and daven, and they learn a bit too....besides yiddishkeit ain't easy..
"and to hate learning. These kids are mostly frustrated, stressed out, and practice miserable Judaism."
most kids like yeshiva and enjoy learning...take a poll rather than project your views on all kinderlach...
"What is wrong with the educators? Is this a hard problem to recognize?"
This is an acusation..what do you think is wrong?
"The Heimishe schools teach it (secular studies), but it’s basically a joke and a Chilul Hashem."
sounds like a jewish inferiority complex...chilul hashem?
"an’t this be done in a more serious way?"
go to a hebrew day school...they'll teach it fine..
"I don’t understand what the Rebbe meant anyway."
you understand but you don't agree..thats a big diference.
R' Vaucher,
You sound like someone else who posts here, but I disagree with your entire response - and I think you missed the point of the entire post.
Voucher
we can deduce from thepost that the writer is referring to his kids, not all of them.
1)how can more Torah be less frum?
2)Yeshiva's rules are not necessarily Shulchan Aruch rules, especially if the rules contain things that the child was taught at home are OK
3) Some kids like Yeshiva, some don't. It depends if the child is well-liked, gets along with others, has a god Melamed, goes to a good, well-run Yeshivah.
4)Inferiority Complex? I beg to differ. You may say that it's not as important to them therefore they place less emphasis on it, but let's not embellish here, please.
I remember seeing in an earlier post that in previous generations the education of girls was not deemed important, so why bother with "frum" schools at all?
this is a tough post to respond to because it is multi directional, contains more allegations than descriptive fact, and is based on anectdotal frustration of the writer.
to heshy,
1)how can more Torah be less frum?
the trend toward a more academic torah and secular education is exemplified by the following leftward milestone in orthodoxy....yeshiva of flatbush...the students are far from frum and their beloved principal was just outed as a faigela .....
2)Yeshiva's rules are not necessarily Shulchan Aruch rules, especially if the rules contain things that the child was taught at home are OK
what rules are problematic in the booklet?
4)Inferiority Complex? I beg to differ.....let's not embellish here, please.
if here is not the place to embelish what are we doing..i don't understand this....
Voucher
you're using an extreme case and it doesn't even make your point!
Yeshiva of Flatbush has less Torah, the bare minimum to be exact. Most of the time is spent on Secular subjects, with some Hebrew language on the side. What we would talk about was a Bais Yaakov type school that places more of an emphasis on learning.
I am glad to see that other people are now realizing something that my brothers and I have realized for years now.
One need distinguish between education and indoctrination.
Most charedi schools especially those belonging to specific chasidic groups are chiefly involved in indoctrinating children and teen agers. Thinking for oneself is very dangerous and can lead to serious problems ... for the school and its sponsor. The goal is to keep everyone on a very childish level of thinking and understanding. Of course many kids do not fall for this sort of nonsense.On the other hand the definition of education is the pursuit of knowledge in tandem with the goal of being able to think for oneself rather than agre with everything that the teacher or book says.
Many of our present day Yeshivos of all (including so called Lithuanian schols)stripes have abandoned thnking in favor of indoctrination.
This method is easier , safer , requires teachers who are not so skilled and produces the sheep that these sponsors require to keep them and their children in power for another generation.
In Europe especially Lithuania students in higher yeshivos were taught to think for themselves , thus even when they left the world of Torah they became philosophers, intellectuals, poets, mathematicians (R. Lipman Lipkin) etc. Todays yeshiva slackers mostly become what can be called bums or street people, because they have no idea how to think and a serious college and especially graduate school is not something they can handle.
Why is it that the charedi comunity has hardly produced any men in the last t 50 years who are unique, baale hashkofe , thinkers rather than screamers and mochiachim or magide shiur who cna give a gute svora in talmud but can hardly think for himself in anything else.(which the BESHT opposessed bitterly).
Together with the gross materialism that marks Orthodoxy in the US , this combination is fatal for any SPIRITUAL future for Judaism in the US.
We need to get back to education rather than indoctrination.
Perhaps education will also lead to a dimunation of the role of materialism in our daily lives. AMEN
send them to vertzki so you'll feel chassidish
Kurenitzer,
Do you take kvitlach? Shtar Hishkasrus?
Well then, who decided this? why has it all changed? Is this the fault of the Hungarian majority who set the standards for "Torah Jewry" or just plain קטנות המוחין?
Vaucher Yid / N,
The point here is not which schools to choose - but it is a rant about why there aren't batter choices.
Also, if you ask around you will find that the Rebbe's position on this topic is not so clear...
I have been told that when R' Chodavkov was asked why the Rebbe didn't come out and push for "Limudei Kodesh only" in a stronger way (and why he supported learning secular subjects in other situations) R' Chadokov answered that the Rebbe wanted to make a point. And that was the reason for his Limudei Koshesh only approach - not that the Rebbe believed that it was the right approach for all situations. This leaves me unsure of what the Rebbe really wanted in my situation.
By the way:
The Rebbe criticized a mosad for Russian arrivals (R' Fish in B.P.) for not providing them "English."
Even Oholei Torah expected kids to have English tutors - they felt the point was that the school should not be involved with English - but that the families should take care of it themselves?
Also, in CH they have started an after school English program for kids who only learn Limudei Kodesh in Yeshiva.
i thought it was taboo to out somebody!
Dear Ce and kurtz, you ascribe in this case to a dogma of disaster based on personal feelings about chareidi educational failure without actually describing a problem....Let us please elucidate and substantiate aspects of a percieved problem because then we could constructively blog about its merits. rather, the posts are global, cataclysimic, without a coherant premise and provide no real evidence of support......for example kurtz says that chareidim are taught not to think and that there are no thinkers...thats a thesis based on feelings...i urge k to start getting to know more chareidim and he'll see quite an intellectual bunch.......ce says 15 pages of rules for my child"...what are the problematic rules?...why is it a forgone conclusion that abundance of rules is problematic...maybe the focus here is that golus is problematic...and that because we live in the real world the yeshiva needs to confront our gulus situation with rules, but i'm jumping the gun...what are the problematic rules?
"Also, if you ask around you will find that the Rebbe's position on this topic is not so clear..."
I think that the thread on chabadtalk.com about secular education and the Rebbe opinion is clear.. i beleive that you must look at the bulk of the eveidence and weigh it agaisnt the detracting evidence and settle at the weightier position
"This leaves me unsure of what the Rebbe really wanted in my situation" everyone's personal situation requires persoanl advice from a mashpia type...
"even Oholei Torah expected kids to have English tutors"
how do you know?
"Also, in CH they have started an after school English program for kids who only learn Limudei Kodesh in Yeshiva".
who is they?
Kurenitzer,
I respectfully disagree with your analysis. This is all about zeitgeist, not heimishe schools. The world today - Jews & Non-Jews alike - have different wants needs & desires, than those of old. Today's non-Jews revels in the counter culture, anti-establishmentism, and fulfillment of their most base animalistic desires. The days of "enlightenment" are a thing of a past - in those days people wanted to be intellectuals, today the pendulum has swung and the converse is true.
That is the explanation for the current sate.
History will one day show that the downfall of most Chassidic groups started when they entered the field of Jewish elementary education.
Post high school education is a completely different matter.
In east Europe not 1 chasidic group had their own Chedorim or talmud Tore. Ger a huge Chassiduth did not run chedorim in Warsaw, Lodz, bendin or Plotzk. Belz had no Talmud Tore schools in Cracow or Lemberg. All chasidic kids learned and studied together . This encouraged a sense of klal rather than sectarian feelings and loyalty.
Schools were run by groups like the Aguda, Mizrachi or baale batim or concerned aprents not Chasidic courts.
More impotantly Chassidic rebebs did not have to cover the huge educational budgets of their movements.
A senior yeshiva is not the most expensive mossad to run. But we all know that primary and secondary school are very cost productive.
Thus today all rebbes are primarily CEO's of their movement or at best hold a position like a University president whose chief responsibility is fund raising.
Imagine a chassidus where the rebbe ran no schools except for a kibbutz for 18-19 year olds and a kibbutz for a dozen yungeleit.
The rebbes concentration would be on "inyone ruchniuth."
But alas since they are not poali Yeshuoth , they have to do something.
Peshvorsk in Belgium has no mosdos, except for the classic beth medrash, hekdesh and free kitchen.
Thus Reb Itchele did not get involved in chinuch. There are plenty of baale batim and melamdim who can run better schools than a chassidic movement.
Imagine a world where students of difft backgrounds studied together, Stoliner , Lubavitcher, Gerer, Breslover and Slonimer studying together , and learning to tolerate difft minhogim and viewpoints.
Meanwhile, back in reality...
I Eretz Yisroel a few people got together and made a "revolution" in Chinuch, namely "Zichru Toras Moshe", where kids are taught Torah Al HaSeder, from Chumash thru Mishnayos. They learn every subject thoroughly, and the kids know their stuff.
So too, if someone would want to he'd do the same thing as far as a Cheder for all children.
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