Professor Levine raises a problem with contemporary day school education - the observation that many graduates of Modern Orthodox schools are not committed to Torah and mitzvot when they reach adulthood - and a suggested solution - to include more of Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch's teachings in the curriculum.
Specifically, Professor Levine asks two questions:
"What are the day schools doing with the 12 years of chinuch?" and
"What are the schools in EY doing with the year or two spent studying there?"
These questions are patently unfair when dealing with the Modern Orthodox community, whose students come from homes whose level of personal commitment varies greatly. Anecdotally I can tell of a wonderful student who was in my class in a one-year Israel program after 12 years of day school education who explained to me that her parents - both physicians - oftentimes came home on Friday afternoons well after Shabbat began. She related that in response to her arguments that based on what she learned in school they were violating the Shabbat, they told her that when she was older she would understand that not all Jewish laws could be kept in the "real world." My guess is that that student today is keeping the traditions of her parents rather than those that she was taught in school.
I question whether a strong dose of Hirschian thought is the solution to these ills. One thing that Rav Hirsch believed strongly was the concept of hanokh la-na'ar al pi darko - that every student must be approached according to his unique situation (his description of the differences between Ya'akov and Eisav, and their need for distinctive educational programs - see [
www.lookstein.org] - is a good example of this). Surely Rav Hirsch would be the first to agree that his writings of over a century ago are not the best model for the challenges of contemporary reality.
The modern Orthodox community has made its decision about interaction with the modern world, and, at great sacrifice, has invested significant resources in a day school system that is educating its children. Professor Levine's diatribe notwithstanding, the teachers and administrators of this system - both in North America and in Israel - can be proud of their accomplishments with these students. At the same time, it behooves us to redouble our efforts to inspire the families who are sending their sons and daughters to our schools to greater commitment to the values of Torah that we teach.
Sasson
