LJ tags are spiffy but not as fully-featured as I'd like, and I probably haven't figured out the best way to use them yet. So this entry is something of a cross-reference; if you got here via one of the tags on this entry you might also be interested in some of the others. I'll try to update this entry over time, and eventually will create similar entries for other tag families.

Judaism: education is a catch-all bucket. Sometimes things start here and then spin off into their own tags.

Sh'liach K'hilah (LJ swallows the first apostrophe for some reason) is (was) the Reform movement's para-rabbinic program. I attended in 2004 and 2005.

Open Beit Midrash (obm) at Hebrew College. I attended in 2007. I also have a more-general Hebrew College tag that includes entries about a program called Ta Sh'ma that I attended in 2006. One of these days I might give those their own tag.

Melton = Florence Melton Program, an international two-year program of which I completed the first year in 2006-2007. (My class session got cancelled the following year. Someday I will probably return, if the scheduling works.)

Study with my rabbi is for entries related to my one-on-one study. Midrash overlaps that, covering my midrash study in particular.

NHC is a tag for the chavurah program I attended in August 2008.

Kallah is a tag for the ALEPH kallah that I'm attending in 2009.

Shalom Hartman is a tag for the Shalom Hartman Institute, a program I considered in 2008 and 2009. I'll get there some year, I expect...

This year, for the first time, AJL is offering a class in biblical (not siddur or conversational) Hebrew. Wow! Better late than never, I suppose. :-) It's being done in conjunction with a local synagogue (and being held there); I don't know the instructor but my rabbi has heard of her and didn't say anything bad. The class is 20 weeks and 1.5 hours a week, so that's substantial. At $150 (so $5/hour), that's also way better than I could ever achieve via tutoring. (No idea what class size will be like, of course.)

I already know a lot of the material, but there are reasons to take it anyway. First, the teaching approach is different, and complementary to, my favorite textbook; that should help. Second, this could develop into a second-year course. Third, I want to encourage classes in this space by helping to ensure critical mass. So I'm doing it; if you're local and interested and didn't get the AJL catalogue (web site is out of date), ask and I can pass on the registration info.

Speaking of critical mass, I got email from the coordinator of the Melton program today saying "you might have noticed I haven't cashed your check...". They did not make minimum registration for the Monday-evening class. :-( My choices are to take a too-early Sunday-morning class (without my favorite instructors) or wait and try again next year. I'll be doing the latter. On the bright side, this means I can sing with the Debatable Choir for the coming year.

Ok, here's why I asked my question a couple days ago: the account I think I know isn't what's written in torah, and this was true of everyone in class Monday night when we discussed it, and I was curious about how widespread that is. Pretty widespread, as it turned out. Thanks for taking the time to answer.

Mind, every year I read the relevant passages and have some reaction along the lines of "huh, that's odd", but that thought never seems to stick around long enough for me to actually do something about it. So I'm glad our teacher pointed it out.

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A thought snippet I want to hang onto (result of tonight's class)...

The liturgy for Rosh Hashana includes a powerful prayer called Unetanah Tokef, which includes the theme of God sitting in judgement and deciding who will live and who will die (etc) based on our past deeds. Lots of people (myself included) have trouble with this idea, because it seems to say that if someone dies it's because he did something wrong. (I choose to interpret it with a big dose of metaphor.)

Tonight when we were studying this prayer I found myself wondering about the intentions of the author, Rabbi Amnon of Mainz. According to tradition, he proclaimed this prayer one Rosh Hashana -- while dying from torture because he wouldn't convert to Christianity. So we have someone who was clearly dying for a holy cause uttering these words. Somehow I don't think he had in mind that death implies sinner and righteous implies life.

Hmm. I wonder what else (beyond the story itself) has been written about this. Must file away for later followup.

This morning a coworker sent mail saying she brought in home-baked cookies and put them next to the cookies that were already on the kitchen table. Then a few minutes later another coworker walked past me, kitchenward, with a box. Then this afternoon the landlord sent up cupcakes. Baked goods are normative for December, but the temporal distribution needs some work. :-) (That said, also this afternoon QA sent out a message announcing their second annual "bite me" spread for the whole company on Friday. At least it wasn't today.)

Unrelated short takes:

Class tonight was very good. The ranty student has dropped out (good) and so has his wife (ungood). The new instructor did an excellent job, as I suspected he would.

A friend's vet suggested to her that for an under-eating cat, a few drops of olive oil on the food would entice the cat, add a little weight, and do no harm. Erik has had a couple fussy moments lately, so I tried this out. He loved it. Who knew?

Pachelbel Rant (video), from ian_gunn.

Interesting developments in class tonight.

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Last night was class #10 (of 30 for the year), and evaluation night. They wanted the forms back that night, so I had to write comments quickly. I hope I was sufficiently diplomatic about the first course.

The second class last night involved a discussion of miracles. The rabbi started by asking us to list things we considered miracles, and we got some interesting personal stories that way. I, in typical fashion, said that it depends on how you define "miracle" -- which, I wasn't surprised to learn, was the point of the exercise. :-) (Collect input first, then look for trends, then bring sources to bear.) It was a good discussion.

One idea I want to capture before I lose it: we might think of the burning bush as a miracle about the bush (that it burned without being consumed). How long do you have to stare at a burning bush to realize it's not being consumed? Maybe the real miracle was that Moshe stopped to look and study it. (This tied into an idea I raised in the earlier discussion, not original to me, that God is always present, like a radio signal, but you have to be tuned to the right frequency for that to do any good.)

When the texts for the Melton program include classical sources (e.g. talmud), they include both the Hebrew (or Aramaic) and the English. This came as a pleasant surprise; I don't imagine that most of their target audience reads Hebrew. Last night, as we were looking at one talmudic passage (which I have studied with my rabbi), I said "that translation doesn't sound right" and looked at the Hebrew. One other student was about 10 seconds ahead of me in saying "that's not what that says". (Insert frustration with Melton over misleading translations.)

During the break I was talking with another student (from my congregation); she asked me if I'm fluent and I said no and I'm trying to learn but having to do it on my own. Doesn't AJL teach Hebrew? Modern conversational, I said, but not biblical/written; there's no one other than Pitt teaching that as far as I know, and I can't take time during the work day. That other Hebrew-reading student was nearby and he said "Kollel will teach you". That's news to me; I get their class lists every semester and haven't seen language classes. But what I actually said to the student is "for women?". You see, Kollel is an Orthodox institution and is generally gender-segregated; they mark a very few of their classes as "for women" and I'd been told that if it doesn't say that, it's for men. Most formal learning in the Orthodox community is done by men, so that isn't surprising. But it means I've never actually been in the Kollel, because their women's classes so far either haven't appealed or haven't been at times I could go.

Anyway, so this student said "I'm sure they'll teach you, and if they can't help you I will find you a chevruta (study partner)". Wow! So I'll send email to Kollel, and if they can't help me I'll ask this student for help.

This readiness to help a stranger (I don't know the guy outside of our shared class) is characteristic of the best of Orthodox Judaism. There are unhelpful people in that community to be sure, as there are in any community, and good people outside of it, but if I had to pick a Jewish community in which to seek help from an arbitrary stranger, the Orthodox community is where I'd look. They get this in a way that a lot of the rest of us don't. It makes me a little sad to think that if someone sought similar help from a member of my community, the odds are much higher that the answer would be "I don't know" or "you should ask so-and-so", not "I'll help you get an answer". I am guilty of this too, and it's something I'd like to improve.

The adult-ed program I'm in consists of two classes (in each year), both on the same night in successive hours. One of the classes is excellent (and tomorrow night I hope to write more about tonight's session). The other class... er, isn't. I wrote to the program director a few weeks ago and she said "give it a few more weeks". I wrote to her again yesterday, describing what I see as the problems with that class/instructor in more detail.

Tonight I went a few minutes early in case she wanted to talk with me. She said she had spoken with the instructor and that she'd be sitting in on part of tonight's class. Tonight's class was much better; I don't know how much of that is the temporary effect of directorial scrutiny and how much is a more permanent change. I participated normally in the class; one of the things I had worried about is that I might be the kind of student some classmates and instructors hate, the sort who asks real questions and digs into things. But I'm not willing to enroll in a discussion-oriented class and then not participate in the discussion. Tonight I asked some questions she wasn't prepared to answer and challenged her on a couple points -- politely, of course, in the manner that I've come to understand as typical in Jewish studies. I am careful to not monopolize.

After class she took me aside and asked "just where have you studied?". Really, my background isn't as special as one might think; I named my congregation and the Sh'liach K'hilah program, and said I'd done some study over the internet and that I read a lot. I don't have impressive schooling; what I have is an interest that I'm willing to do something about. (I didn't say that to her; I just answered her question.)

So if she continues the improved presentation (like tonight, unlike every prior week), I'll give the class another chance. Tonight we were talking about t'filah (prayer), and we'll do more of that next week; that lends itself to the kinds of conversations that go beyond simple mechanics and "Judaism 101". I still kind of fear that when we get to the holidays (in a few weeks, and continuing for a while at one week per) the class will become tedious again, but we'll see.

Later (ok, tomorrow) maybe I'll post more about the content of tonight's class.

Monday night's class was on sin. We had a lot of good discussion. This entry is part summary and part my own thoughts.

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Last week in class the rabbi distributed a poem by Yehudah Amichai that I like:
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I don't see the conflict with Kohelet (Ecclesiastes) that Amichai does. It says "a season for every purpose"; it doesn't say only one per, in either direction. (The rabbi chuckled when I pointed that out.)

I thought I would have more to say about this text, but I'm having trouble articulating it. Oh well; I still wanted to share (and record for myself) the poem.

One of the two classes I'm taking through the Melton program is a basic theology/text class with an excellent rabbi. Last week's topic was creation, and I wanted to jot down a few things that he taught about before I forget about them.

Two words are used in Hebrew to convey separation. One is "kadosh", which means to sanctify or set apart. Yisrael is set apart for a particular purpose; we set Shabbat apart from the rest of the week; when we marry we set our spouses apart from all other people (kidoshin); etc. The other word is "havdil", which I gather is a more "mundane" separation. This is the word used in the torah when God separates light from darkness on the first day. That makes sense; it's not like one of them is in any way elevated over the other. But, if that's the reasoning, then what of havdalah, the ceremony we do to mark the end of Shabbat where we say that God separates (havdil) Shabbat from the rest of the week? We elevate it but God doesn't so much? Must think more on this. (The rabbi only pointed out the use of "havdil" versus "kadosh"; the rest of this ramble is me. So don't hold him accountable if I'm off-base.)

The days of creation pair up as follows: day one light/dark and day four sun/moon; day two waters and day five water creatures; day three earth and vegetation and day six land animals and man. I never noticed that before.

(I, by the way, have no problem whatsoever with light on day one and the sun not showing up until day four. God can make light come from anything he wants, or nothing at all. He doesn't require a star to create it. I've met people who see a difficulty here.)

The word "hashamayim" (heaven(s)) contains "mayim", water. Day two talks about separating the "waters above" (heaven) and the "waters below" (sea). I don't really think of heaven as a place requiring a snorkel and fins to traverse; I wonder where the "water" association disappeared? (There is midrash about Moshe going up to heaven, so we can't just write it off as "God can live in any environment". The midrash doesn't talk about Moshe breathing in water while there.)

The rabbi asserts (I haven't confirmed) that the only time in B'reishit that God seems to talk about himself in the plural is when creating man (the first time), when he says "let us make man in our image". One could write off the "us" as referring to the heavenly court, but tradition teaches that man is made in God's image, not the image of God and his underlings, so the "our" is problematic. I read it as the royal "we" and don't worry about it, but I'm sure there are people out there who use this as a basis for polytheism. (I should mention that I've been taught that early Judaism was monolatrous; monotheism came later.)

The Melton program consists of four courses in two years. Courses are (academic-)year-long, so we have two each week (one night, back to back).

The second course in year one is very good so far; it's a theology class. It's calibrated low on raw content, but the teacher (mabfan, the one we've talked about) is excellent and the class discussions tend to be good.

The first class, on the other hand... is a practices course (practical applications), and they assume no prior background, nad I haven't learned anything yet, and a look at the syllabus doesn't give me great feelings about that changing. Last night's subject was "symbols", and we talked about t'fillin, tzitzit, and mezuzah -- source texts and how to do them. Next week is the first of two sessions on kashrut, followed by one on the siddur, one on b'rachot, and two on Shabbat. When they said "no prior background required" they really meant it; I think they'd be better off at least mandating "intro to Judaism" or its equivalent. (There's a city-wide intro course.)

A class on basic observances still has the potential to be interesting, given a good instructor. (There's always stuff to learn, after all.) It's not that there's anything wrong with this instructor, really, other than that I think she's used to teaching kids and I sometimes feel talked-down-to. But she's probably not the instructor to make this material come alive for me.

I'm considering finding out what the year-two students are doing in their first session and seeing if I can do that. Failing that, I'll have to decide whether the apparently-small potential to learn something is worth the cost of my time, or whether it would be inexcusably rude to bring a book to read during class. This isn't just a series of lectures, which complicates things -- each class coheres as a community over the two years, so I'd definitely be messing that up and probably coming across as snooty or something. Which isn't my intent.

Ok, here's why I asked (and why I didn't rewrite some of the bad options on the survey as it was given to me).

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A survey in the first session of the Melton (adult-ed) program produced some results that struck me as interesting. I have a theory, but the class wasn't large enough to provide a good sample. So I pose the question to you. :-)

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A few weeks ago I went to an open house for the Florence Melton school, a Jewish adult-education program. I've heard good things about the program and I enjoyed the (short) sample class that one of the rabbis gave, but I was also concerned that they say you don't need any background to attend.

I shared that concern with my rabbi and asked whether I'm past that already or whether I'd benefit from taking it. He said yes and yes -- that is, I am rather more advanced than that, but there is still significant value to be had. So between that and the fact that the person who will be teaching "my" section of Hebrew this semester is the teacher I don't like, I decided to go for it. First class is the week after next.

(Meanwhile, perhaps I will pursue private tutoring with the teacher I do like.)

One of the mini-classes tonight was well-done in terms of technique. (This is the rabbi I particularly liked, the one who just moved here.)

He said he was going to talk about Tisha b'Av, since it's timely, but first he wanted to talk a little about something else that's timely: the conflict in the middle east. After a minute or so he mentioned the custom of leaving notes (containing prayers) in the wall in Jerusalem, and then handed out paper and asked us to write whatever prayers felt appropriate as if we were there. (He said no one else would see them.) He collected the folded papers and set them aside.

After writing "Tisha b'Av" on the board in Hebrew and deconstructing it for those who don't know the language, he talked about all the bad things that have happened on that day throughout history -- the destruction of the temple (both times), and more recent events continuing into the 20th century. The latest thing he had was Iraq walking out of talks over Kuwait (IIRC); he asked if that spooked anyone else. A couple people nodded and he asked why, and someone said "makes you wonder what's going to happen on Thursday" (Tisha b'Av this year). Some in the room were thinking of that from a "theology" perspective (what does God have in store for us?); I found myself thinking that Jews aren't the only ones who know about Tisha b'Av and if I were a terrorist who wanted to wipe out Jews, I'd plan something impressive for that particular day. But I digress.

He showed a short (3-minute?) video depicting the destruction of the second temple (obviously this is a reconstruction), and asked how we think we would have felt if we were living through it. He got "depressed", "angry", and "scared" out of the class pretty easily, and also a comment about losing faith.

Then he gathered up those papers (remember the papers?), took one, and set it on fire. To drive the point home about how crushing this must have been.

So, in 15 minutes, we had lecture, video, discussion, a class activity, and a "non-traditional" way of making a point, and it all worked. I'd like to see more of what this rabbi has to offer.

Every summer I see ads for the Florence Melton Adult Mini-School, a two-year (one night a week, 30 weeks a year) program of adult Jewish education. Several people in my congregation have taken it and said good things about it. I've been deterred by two things: (1) many of those people did not start as advanced as I am now (so would the program teach me enough to be worthwhile?), and (2) the remarkable lack of detail about the curriculum. If I'm going to commit that kind of time (and pay tuition), I want more than one-paragraph blurbs about four courses. On the positive side, the people who've spoken well of it are smart people, and one of the rabbis at HUC also recommended it to me last year.

Last week I saw an ad for an informational meeting about the program -- first time I've seen such a thing. It was tonight, so I went to check it out. Two of the rabbis who teach in the program were there; one just moved to town and will be teaching for the first time, and the other is well-respected in the community and has been teaching in the program since the beginning. Each of them gave short (15-minute) samples -- lesson excerpts and an outline of how an entire class on that topic might go. I found that very helpful.

Both rabbis were friendly and articulate and seemed to be quite knowledgable. One had a more participatory style, which can be good or bad depending entirely on how well the teacher can keep things on track, and the other was more lecture-oriented. (Both did both and said the classes are balanced along that line, though.) I connected more with the new rabbi (whose teaching style I like), and if I sign up he'll be one of my teachers. (Two classes each year, so two teachers. I don't know who the other would be.)

The program doesn't mandate a particular level of learning coming in, and neither of the rabbis said much that I didn't already know. The lectures might fill in gaps here and there, but they're not going to be the strong draw, I don't think. However, the curriculum lists many topics that ought to produce stimulating discussions; this of course depends on the quality of the students and the ability of the rabbis to steer a conversation. We usually have this kind of discussion at the Shabbat-morning torah study, with my rabbi doing a good job of managing the conversation, and I enjoy that a lot. (I wonder how many students are typically in a class. I didn't ask.)

After the formal presentation I talked with both of the rabbis, saying I have a decent background already and I was trying to figure out if this would be a good fit. One of them suggested that it would be possible for me to come to the first couple sessions and then, if it's not working out, get a refund on tuition. I need to confirm that with the administrator of the program, but if that works, I'll probably give it a go.

One down-side is that the class meets on Monday nights. I've been thinking about returning to the SCA choir in the fall (there've been changes since I left), but it meets the same night. I suspect that the choir will have to wait.