Making it Real ARJE Torah Lishma #9

Teachers for children should be appointed in each and every land, in each and every regiion, and in each and every village. If a town is without a school for its childrem, its inhabitants are placed under a ban of ostracism [from the rest of the Jewish community] until they employ teachers...If they do not employ teachers, the village is/deserves to be destroyed, since the world exists only by virtue of the breath coming from the mouths of children.

Rabbi Yishmael [his son] would say: One who studies Torah in order to teach will be given the opportunity to both study and to teach. One who studies in order to practice will be given the opportunity to study, to teach, to observe, and to practice. Rabbi Tzadok used to say: Do not make the Torah into a crown with which to aggrandize yourself, and don't use it as a spade with which to dig into them.

Elisha ben Abuya says: One who learns as a child is compared to what? To ink written on new parchment. And one who learns as an elder is compared to what? To ink written on scraped parchment. Rabbi Yose bar Yehuda from the town of the Babylonian says: One who learns from young ones is compared to what? To one who eats unripe grapes and drinks wine from its press. And one who learns from elders is compared to what? To one who eats ripe grapes and drinks aged wine. Rabbi says: Do not look at the jug but rather at what is in it. For there are new jugs full of old, and old which don't even have new within them.

And Rava said: If there are two teachers of children, one who teaches a lot of material but is not precise in his statements, and one who is precise but does not teach a lot of material, one hires the one who teaches a lot of material but is not precise. Why is this? Errors will be corrected by themselves, and no lasting harm will be caused. By contrast, Rav Dimi of Neharde’a said: One hires the instructor who is precise and does not teach a lot of material, as once an error is taught, it is taught, and cannot be easily corrected.

How do we teach? The teacher should sit at the head, and everybody should sit around him so that they will all be able to see him and hear his words. The teacher shouldn't sit on a chair while his students sit on the ground; either they all sit on the ground or they all sit on chairs. Originally, the teacher would sit and the students stand, but since before the destruction of the second Temple everyone followed the practice of teaching while both they and the students were seated.

Rav happened to come to a certain place where he decreed a fast but rain did not come. The prayer leader descended to lead the service before him and recited: The One Who makes the wind blow, and the wind blew. He continued and said: And Who makes the rain fall, and the rain came.

Rav said to him: What are your good deeds? He said to him: I am a teacher of children, and I teach the Bible to the children of the poor as to the children of the rich, and if there is anyone who cannot pay, I do not take anything from him. And I have a fishpond, and any child who neglects his studies, I bribe him with the fish and calm him, and soothe him until he comes and reads.

The Gemara asks: But is one’s father’s father obligated to teach him Torah? But isn’t it taught in a baraita, that the verse: “And you shall teach them to your sons” (Deuteronomy 11:19), indicates: But not your sons’ sons? And how do I realize, i.e., understand, the meaning of the verse: “But make them known to your sons and to your sons’ sons” (Deuteronomy 4:9)? This serves to say to you that whoever teaches his son Torah, the verse ascribes him credit as though he taught him, and his son, and his son’s son, until the end of all generations.