Fast-paced is an understatement as a description of contemporary living. Increased production may or may not be an advantage of the racing rhythm of our days, but we can’t ignore the fact that attendant fallout is inevitable. One of the areas in which this finds acute expression, at least what I notice in my own life, is childrearing. Chinuch concerns lie at the beating heart of our hopes, yearnings, and aspirations. Countless articles and shiurim are consistently generated on this topic because of the overarching importance that it carries for us. It seems that most (if not all) chinuch experts agree that one of the most crucial components for successful child-raising is the cultivation of a close, warm relationship with our children. This awareness is something that often leaves me very ill-at-ease.
Perhaps there are some singularly unique individuals in the world whose force of character is so powerful that they can achieve this formidable feat through the medium of but a few minutes a day. Perhaps they are able to make up for lack of quantity through a richness of quality that saturates the souls of their young, impressionable charges with all the love and warmth that they need. (Obviously, I am talking about fathers. I don’t think anyone would even attempt to suggest such a thing as far as mothers are concerned).
Maybe. Or maybe not.
But for the rest of us common folk, the theoretical discussion if such people actually exist is painfully irrelevant. The thought, “Face it: If you don’t invest the time, it will never happen,” is something that gnaws at my conscience on a regular basis. In earlier years, I had a personal custom that is was at least a very good step in the right direction.
Although in our small Ramat Beit Shemesh community kids generally attend schools that are within a few minutes walking distance – and they therefore usually make the trek on their own once they reach a certain age – I used to accompany my kids on these walks as much as possible. I only considered those walks successful, though, if I managed to engage them in enjoyable conversation. My success rate in that regard wasn’t so bad. I could for sure have gotten a C+. Maybe even a B- (for a regular man, that’s pretty good, I think).
The point of this article, though, is actually not to talk about the need for cultivating strong bonds with our progeny, as important as that is – and certainly not my own relative success or lack thereof in that regard, whether past or present – but to share an observation that arose one morning on one of those constitutionals. But first, one more word of background. The school that my older son attended in those years was up the hill from where we live. It’s a steep hill, so I would often offer to carry his backpack for him. He was quite the little guy at the time and his backpack appeared to me to have had almost as much volume as he. I felt that it was an appropriate gesture on my part (especially when we were in a rush).
Anyway, one morning, I was in the midst of an animated discussion with my son when we arrived at his school, so I walked him all the way to his classroom. When we entered, one of his little friends called out to my son in a very loud voice, “What, you’re not strong enough to carry your backpack by yourself?!”
Ouch.
Of course, I immediately came to my son’s defense. I didn’t berate the boy. I just stated the truth; that I wanted to do a chesed. “Is a father not allowed,” I rhetorically asked, “to do a chesed for his son?”
Then I told that boy (and the other boys who were present at the time) a short story about a Rosh Yeshiva who once saw two bachurim bringing chairs to a shiur. “For whom,” the Rosh Yeshiva asked them, “are you boys bringing those chairs?” They responded what they thought should have been obvious. Each one was bringing a chair for himself. “What a shame!” the Rosh Yeshiva exclaimed. “Had each one of you,” he continued, “brought a chair for the other, you would be baalei chesed. But as is, you are both just schleppers!”
With that, I made my exit, hoping that the message sufficed to soothe the smarting sting my son must have suffered from his friend’s loud, thoughtless comment, and that the latter would cease his taunting.
Now, an observation.
The particular boy who made that comment happened to be in the middle of doing a mitzvah. An altruistic one at that. He was taking out all of the siddurim from the closet and placing each boy’s siddur on his desk in preparation for davening. Beyond that, I always considered that particular boy to be friendly, personable, and good-spirited.
So how does it come about that such a good boy could callously transgress the very serious prohibition of embarrassing someone in public? Let’s not forget that malbin pnei chaveiro ba’rabim is one of the sins for which one could lose his entire Olam Ha’Ba ! Of course, one could pooh-pooh away this question in one of two ways. The first is the age-old expression, “Boys will be boys. When they grow up they won’t behave that way.” The second is the almost as oft-used, “What are you getting all worked up about over a good-natured jibe?” A third explanation is also eminently possible. The boy was genuinely curious as to why his friend was not carrying his own backpack, and lacking the social graces that come with age, simply blurted out his musings.
I cannot deny that there is validity in any of those explanations. However, the reality is that a) there are many adults who never grow out of their childish bantering behavior at the expense of others, and b) those at the butt of such jokes may project jovial immunity, but are often hurting on the inside, irrespective of whether the one who uttered them was blindly blurting out befuddlement or willfully wafting a wisecrack (just think about some of the times when you have been on the receiving end of such “good-natured fun” or tactless comments!).
Of course, the rough-and-tumble of school life is probably not something that we can completely cure, but it may be worth our while to ask ourselves if we really are doing what we can (and should) to transmit the critically-central values of middos tovos to our children and students.
Unfortunately, it sometimes seems that middos tovos are often treated like a secondary topic. Not part and parcel of the rigor and thoroughness of school curricula, but somewhat of an “extra” for which we “generously” allot a bit of time here and there. In the hierarchy of the school system’s academic enterprise, it would seem that middos tovos – as a subject of intensive study – would often be fortunate to be deemed a second-class citizen.
I once read an article about the topic of teaching tznius to our daughters. The main thrust was the assertion that, if you want this crucial message to get through, you simply cannot lean on a dress code and occasional speeches and critiques. If the sum-total of girls’ exposure to learning about this decisive facet of their Jewish identity takes the form of dry regulations and occasional “mussar injections”, watch out, because the results may not match the intended goal.
Interestingly enough, a good friend of mine – whose wife is a Beis Yaakov teacher of many years – shared with me something that he heard from his wife (although she was not one of the protagonists of the story). At a wedding, a teacher saw a former student who was dressed in a way that was not at all in line with what one would expect of a Beis Yaakov graduate. Rightly or wrongly, the teacher brought this unhappy state of affairs to the attention of her erstwhile charge. “Teacher,” the young lady replied in a somewhat irreverent tone, “you don’t seem to understand. I am not in school anymore!”
That’s definitely not what we want.
Not when it comes to girls’ absorption of tznius values, and not when it comes to boys’ development of middos tovos (or vice versa, for that matter).
So what can be done?
Well, coming back to that aforementioned article (unfortunately, I don’t remember the author’s name), it was emphasized – in the hopes that others would follow suit – that there is a school that developed a proper syllabus for teaching the topic of tznius. With no less methodology or rigor than any of the other major subjects that comprise school curriculum. So perhaps we could apply the same concept to middos tovos. A good child is just that. Good. But even good children (and adults for that matter) need to study a topic thoroughly to be able to know and apply it. From the perspective of a Torah Jew, it does not suffice to simply be a “good person”. One has to know precisely what it means to be good.
And that takes time, effort… and comprehensive study.