All education – whether formal or informal, Jewish or secular, pre-school or graduate school – is iterative and builds new understandings in the context of prior knowledge. In some cases, it simply adds knowledge; in other situations, it is transformative and provides new and more complex understanding of existing knowledge. The extent to which attaining new knowledge or more nuanced understanding of what is already known affects the self, however, depends on the way knowledge is developed. Does it promote an aspect of the self that is particularly valued by the learner? Does it confirm the learner’s most deeply-held values, attitudes, and beliefs? Does it evoke meaning? The challenge of Israel education, to borrow Einstein’s phrase, is to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge and channel that joy into ahavat Yisrael– both the country and the Jewish people.
Perhaps the challenge is easy to meet for Jews living in Israel, but the majority of contemporary Jews live in the Diaspora. How can Israel, and the study of Israel, help to develop the Jewish identity of those living in Diasporic communities? Pedagogy aside, insights from sociology and social psychology suggest the specific mechanisms by which exposure to Israel can affect Jewish identity, and they tell us that the Israel experience is a powerful tool to turn Judaism from an abstract collection of values into a concrete, salient identity.
Responses
When Eliezer Ben Yehuda coined the Hebrew word for 'identity' he chose zehut. Rooted in the word zeh (this), zehut means "thisness". Zehut Yehudit therefore refers to that which makes a Jew a Jew, the particular knowledge and experience that result in the unique combination of a Jewish self, a Jewish life. An Israel experience provides an invaluable "value-added" aspect of Jewish identity, the kind of knowledge (yeda in Hebrew) that comes with intimate, first-hand contact. The Israel experience not only concretizes prior abstract understanding; it also makes intimate that which was remote, passionate that which was dispassionate and subjective that which was objective.
Saxe suggests the fundamental challenge of Israel Education today is to “awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge and channel that joy into Ahavat Yisrael – both the country and the Jewish people.” This suggestion represents a clear goal for Israel Education and a necessary guiding principle that we ought not ignore.
Saxe, like Pomson and Chazan, places heavy emphasis on the importance and primacy of place when it comes to Israel Education. It’s one thing to learn about Israel and what it represents historically, biblically and in a contemporary Jewish context, but there is no substitution for a significant piece of that Israel Education that takes place in Israel. Why we do Israel Education, how we do it and where...