There were clouds in the sky this morning when I got up — actual clouds! I had to smile when David Bernstein ,the Dean of Pardes, used clouds as an illustration of how differently many things may look from an Israeli perspective than from that of other countries (particularly the U.S.). As he noted, we say, “There are clouds on the horizon,” to mean something ominous is looming (perhaps a giant hurricane — or the second presidency of Lord Voldemort). But here in Israel, clouds are a delight — I can’t tell you how happy I was to see them. Of course they went away after an hour, not having dropped a single drip of rain — but they brought moisture, and shade, and that was good!
So these auspicious cloud brought me a good first day of school. It felt weird — and somewhat overwhelming — to be in the olive groves of Jewish academe again. The gestalt at Pardes is very reminiscent of the gestalt at Hebrew College where I got my MJEd and my smicha (ordination) as a cantor. It’s an institution that welcomes Jews of all backgrounds and “denominations”, English speaking Jews from all over the world. It’s small — from all the various programs combined there were perhaps 60 or 70 students there this morning, plus faculty and administrators. Still, introducing ourselves took forever — there are always those who have to say a little bit more than asked, and since that little bit more is often interesting and entertaining, who can complain?
Today was a time to introduce ourselves, and then we had the first part of our orientation — I’ll share some the Dean’s words in moment. Then they fed us lunch. The food was good, the racket in the khadar okhel (dining room) close to deafening. After that we had meetings with teachers in order to make a final assessment of which level we belong in. I am something of an anomaly, it seems — I am in good shape to go into the intermediate level for Khumash (Torah and Haftarah), but less qualified for intermediate Mishna and Gemara. (Each week we read a section of Torah, the Five Books of Moses, and a corresponding Haftarah, a reading from the Prophets. Mishna and Gemara make up the books known as Talmud — from the root lamed mem dalet, which has to do with learning and teaching. The way I’ve lately been explaining Talmud is that just as Christians have their “New Testament” which mediates and builds on the Hebrew Bible, so Jews have Talmud, which mediates and builds on and explicates the Hebrew Bible — as well as telling stories, setting rules of behavior, and several other things. Jews are not minimalists — the Talmud is a long shelf of books!)
The question of what level classes I should take should sort itself out over the coming weeks. In the meantime, rather than more reportage, I thought I would share with you some of the words from Dean Bernstein that struck me this morning. I’m sure he’s said them a million times — they had a polished air — and yet they were powerful and moving to me, enough so that I copied them down verbatim.
Dean Bernstein said (or, as the Talmud would say, R. Bernstein omer): All the books that you see around you [in the Beit Midrash, the study hall] belong to you; they belong to you in the way that Shakespeare belongs to the English-speaking world, that Moliere belongs to the French-speaking world, that Dante belongs to the Italian-speaking world… We hope that when you leave here you will be more literate, more passionate, more open to other views, more moral… We believe that Torah will have an impact on your lives, but we don’t necessarily presume to assume how it will have an impact… There was much more, but you get the idea. He also noted that Pardes was the first Beit Midrash to open its doors to women , in 1972. Which doesn’t sound like a big deal, but actually is pretty huge…
Getting back to those clouds…did you know that one reason we build sukkot (huts, tabernacles) at Sukkot is to help us remember the heavenly protection of the clouds when we traveled in the midbar (desert or wilderness)? I wonder — is there also connection with God’s pillar of cloud which led us through the desert? I’ll be looking for clouds, and looking differently at clouds — as Rabbah Mitchell said, “I really don’t know clouds at all.”
Nine months in Israel 