In the last book of the Torah, the Book of Deuteronomy,  the Jewish people are standing on the other side of the Jordan River, about to enter the Land of Israel.   Moshe (Moses) is reminding them of the last 40 years, the total amount of time they were in the desert, and giving them encouragement for their future in Israel. Now, the trick question…who exactly is standing there?  It’s actually all the people who were children during this 40 year period.  They’ve now grown up.  So they’ve taken all this time to be learn how to be a Jewish community, something they need for their new home- in Israel.  

Each year, our students learn a little more, another little piece of the puzzle of what it means to be Jewish and like the Jewish people back then, all these pieces  come together to help keep our Jewish community strong.  When does this Jewish learning end?  Well, I would like to think that it never ends, and that even 40 years is not enough.  Recently, when I was attending the Shabbat morning learning at the temple, I looked at a word in the story of Joseph as  if seeing it for the first time, in spite of my reading the text almost every year.  As time goes by and we experience new things, we bring new ideas to our understanding of the biblical text, enriching the story even further.

I hope our young students will desire to continue learning after their bar and bat mitzvah years.  We become strengthened in our ideals and more able to stand up for what is right when we wrestle with the values of our tradition and keep them foremost in our minds.

– Hana