ignorant we are of our tradition. In that moment we are newly-declared adult learner in our communities. Are we incredibly vulnerable-on the verge of being able to tuned in to it? Remembering where Adam and Eve’s receive wisdom or so frightened and overwhelmed by our “moment occurs, have we created environments safe and inadequacies that we might deny them. We may all be attractive enough to enable and “tempt” .others to take inclined to mask or deny our vulnerability, but the similar risks? When they do take the risk and admit their admission is a magnificent moment of self-awareness that vulnerability, how do we greet that admission-with holds the potential for our adult Jewish liberation. We disinterest, amusement, kindness, h&tility or encourage- can stay as we are, unknowing, complacent, naked and ment? Appreciating that we possess so many of the tools stuck (remaining unclothed in the garden in a state of for the liberation of authentic Jewish learning, how ignorance) or we can take responsibility for our defi- prepared are we to share them? What range of programs ciency, plunge into the world of Jewish learning, begin to and settings do we offer? How well do we understand the clothe ourselves and co grow (leaving the garden in processes and challenges of adult learning? What kinds of pursuit of appropriate challenges for our adult minds and curricula have we developed to address the specific spirits). cognitive and psychological sensibilities of the adult Equally significant is what happens when we admit learner? How many teachers are truly competent in adult our deficiency and our need to others. Certainly God . teaching? Do we have better wardrobe options than the punishes Adam and Eve for their disobedience, but God first thing the adult learner is most likely to grab-his does a remarkable thing before sending them out of the inadequate childhood clothing which has the sole advan- garden. God gives them better clothing. God acknowl- .tage of familiarity and easy access? edges their fear, vulnerability and real need. In an act of It is no accident that the rabbis refer to Torah as the lovingkindness that our sages cite as the foundational act Tree of Life. When we forfeited immortality in favor of for the Jewish category sf gemikut hasadim (acts of consciousness, wisdom and the desire to learn, we chose lovingkindness), God gives them something more substan- another source of vitality for the continuing well-being of tial than they are able to create for themselves. humankid-knowledge. If the source of all knowledge is Torah, then we chose Torah over immortality. Torah is On The Werge what makes our lives worth living. Holding fast to it allows us to achieve the only form of immortality avail- The story contains some extraordinary lessons. First, the able to us-the lasting impact of our deeds and the legacy human appetite for knowledge appears to be innate. Its of children who share our commitments. In Torah we can satisfaction is meant to appeal to us in a variety of ways. find everything we need to live a rewarding life. Bereishit Second, the acquisition of knowledge is a dangerous enjoins us to discover new ways to share those rich business and has moral implications for which we must rewp-ds with the emerging adult learners among us and be responsible. Third, self-consciousness is essential to to acknowledge that the way in which we receive those the receipt of wisdom. We cannot discover what we need learners indicates everydung about the kind of holy world to know until we acknowledge all that we do not know. we intend to create together. + (We do not realize we need clothing until we understand that we are naked). Fourth, the moment of acknowledg- ment is fraught with psychological and physical ten- sion-as human beings we cannot tolerate our vulnerabil- ity for long: we are compelled to do something about it. Fifth, whatever we have at hand is what we are inclined to use to fEst protect ourselves. Sixth, someone else is bound to have something better, and, scary as it may be, if we are willing to disclose our need to them they may MoonligMing daf yomi student share it with us. Seventh, acquiring knowledge and as a growing up is a risky enterprise that will most certainly contain moments of pain, fear and alienation. Eighth, One of the happiest events of last fall for me was the awareness of our own mortality is the ultimate expression ’shas celebrated in September at Madison of consciousness. Ha Square Garden. This event celebrates the completion of The story seen in this way should challenge all who deal with new adult learners. We must ask ourselves how ALFRED 1. NEUGUT is Assoclate Professor of Cllnlcal Medicine and Public seriously we take that moment of acknowledgment for the Health at Columbia Unlverslty In Mew York, and Medical Director of Camp Seneca Lake in Honesdale PA.

Sh’ma 281550 3 a cycle approximately seven and a half years in duration, able to grasp and appreciate the structure and substance among participants who have undertaken and carried out of the entire . a commitment to learn one folio page of the Babylonian In my wildest dreams as a boy, I never dreamed that Talmud every day. The last siyum, in 1990, partially I would finish the entire Talmud. One time, I tried to filled Madison Square Garden; the 1997 siyum completely read the entire History of the World by Will and Ariel filled both Madison Square Garden and the Nassau Durant, but of course, I quit halfway through the first Coliseum. Similar celebrations were held in several other volume. Somehow I manage to keep going with Daf locations in the U.S. and around the world. Being one of Yomi, and I have learned mesechtot with names such as 25,000 praying together and then learning the last , Shevuot and Yevamot (I’ve discovered that daf together, was wonderful. mesechtot Shevuot has nothing to do with the holiday!). Who’s bright idea was this anyway? In 1923, a Polish Past learning rabbi by the name of Meir Schapira initiated the first cycle in order to encourage daily learning and to ensure How did I involved in Daf (a page a day)? It’s Yomi that obscure mesechtot were covered. The first cycle not if I have nothing else to do or always loved as ended 1931. Talmud study. a child, I attended modem Orthodox in As The real growth, however, has come in the past five elementary and high school in Brooklyn. My class began years, and what has really stimulated this phenomenon is its formal study of the Talmud (a well-edited blend of the availability. Years ago, the only way to learn Mishnuh and Gemma) sometime around fourth grade. A was to open one and learn it yourself or with a who memorable aspect of our approach to the Talmud was its could explicate the text and mefarshim to you. The slow pace. It wasn’t unusual to spend a two-hour Talmud was basically inaccessible to the common man. (lecture) on or seven lines of Talmud. six Starting with the Steinsaltz Twud in the late 197Os, The average daf or folio page (two sides of the page) all sorts of new texts and technological changes have of Talmud has about 75 lines. Study of the six lines made the Talmud available to Anyman. A good English involved an in-depth analysis of , Tosefot and other translation of the Talmud, software with explications, mefarshim (commentators), usually with allusions to other audio tapes that can play in the car (my favorite way), volumes of the Talmud and discussions of recent halakhic have made this learning available even to the weak- sources to elucidate current application(s) of the talmudic willed. principles being explored. It was not unusual to look up two weeks later and discover that you were still on the Personal Learning same daf. The second most notable feature of my yeshivah I learned of Daf Yomi in an ad I saw in the paper for a Talmud study was that it focused on only a few tractates. telephone shiur (lesson) and so in late 1992, I began listening Most yeshivah students end up learning Baba Metzia, one hour a day to the speakerphone. It required, though, that Baba Kamma, Sanhedrin, Shabbas, , Gib, or I have an hour each day (no longer necessary with newer some few others, essentially selecting from four of the six phone technology) or I would miss that day’s @. major orders or segments (sedarim) of the Talmud. I switched to audio tapes which can be bought or rented (Torah Tapes: 718-438-3904) which I carry all Current learning day in my Walkman. To make the portability complete, I photocopy the dapim I’m up to (double-sided of course) Now look at me! I’m doing a daf a day. I don’t know and carry them all day in my briefcase. No more bore- what impact that is having on the doctor, but it’s sure dom waiting for the elevator or walking from my car to keeping the yetzer hara (evil inclination) away. In the office or when there’s nothing on the car radio! I’m yeshivah, we were lucky if we finished 40 dapim in a doing my daf a few minutes at a time. year; the major tractates usually comprise more than 80 I must confess that I’ve fallen behind. But with the dapim. Now I am doing a whole tractate every two to tapes or the English Talmud or other methods, you can four months. And studying at this pace, all of a sudden I fall behind, catch up, or stay ahead. You can do it at can see the interrelationships of sugyot (topics), and the your own pace. Alternatively learning in a group or in relationship between the beginning and the end of a chavruta, sharing it with some friend regularly, adds to tractate. Covering all the mesechtot (tractates) in a given the pleasure. seder permits me to understand and interrelate the One of the constant unexpected benefits of Daf Yomi mesechtot to each other. I’m five and a half years into it is that all around the world, thousands of people are now and I have reason to hope that in two years I will be

4 Sh’ma 28/550 learning exactly the same daf of Gemm each day (all gender. So what did those attempts reflect to a young right, I’m a little behind!). 60 three blocks from my girl? No separate seating in the , certainly. house at 530 a.m. and you will see cars arriving at the Boys and girls studying together, no question. Could I local synagogue to begin the day with the daily &..in the have a bat mitzvah? Not even a doubt, and at age half hour before the sun rises. Enter a midtown law firm 13-just like the boys. at lunch time and you will find a small group doing their daily daf. You can e-mail a fellow Daf Yom*iteand ask The Early Years him how he interprets a certain sugya. There’s a biweekly But the gender message was subtly confusing. newsletter that gives a brief uort on the day’s Bat daf mitzvah for a girl in my synagogue took place on a (Al-Hadaf, 9 14-356-9 114). Friday night. Each bat Pnitzuah girl was allowed to But imagine what it really takes to learn like this! Day in, day out, day in, day out, no time off for holidays, no choose a hafluruh, and chant it along with the brachot in front of the congregation. We prepared and delivered a time off for Shubbos, no time off for illness, no time off small chosen text after which we were duly for wedding or birth or funeral, day in, day out, the talk on our blessed by the rabbi and presented with the requisite day’s daf must be done! gifts. But all took place in the middle of a Kizballat It’s sensational! It’s addictive, like my morning coffee this (Friday night) service where there was no or The York Post (all right, so I’m not a real intel- New possibility of a Torah being involved! It -took‘me some lectual); the day doesn’t fieel right if I don’t get my daily years to fully appreciate the fundamentally different dose of Genuzra. Rava said, “The reward of listening and experience of my younger brothers-which, of course, learning is the struggle to understand” (Berachot 6b). The included aliyot, reading from the Torah, chanting hafdarot day doesn’t feel quite right if I haven’t had my work- and leading parts of the t@Zlah. out-my intellectual struggle with an ancient rabbi. For boys and girls alike, messages about study and learning were also mixed. Though a devoted three-day a Future Yearning week Hebrew school student and a fairly consistent Since I started, I’ve had the plan that when I complete Shabbat morning attendee, my basic knowledge never my cycle, two years from now, I’ll hang up my Thud seemed to rise beyond the level of ”Bible Stories for and tape recorder and devote myself to learning Karate. Children. Junior congregation and youth group provided As I start to approach the end, I’m already realizing two opportunities to become familiar with leading prayers and things: how much I will miss it, and how little I remem- exploring many aspects of our Jewish identities, but did ber from the fust go-around. I’ve learned that many little to build learning skills for text study. completers just go around again, cycle after cycle. But As I grew older, the study of Hebrew and visits to maybe it’s not that extraordinary. Boy, that Rabbi Israel became very important to me. And as I began to Schapira really knew what he was doing. + raise a family, ritual and celebration became central to my Jewish life. My Jewish identity and my involvement in the community were strong, but somewhere, something fundamental was missing. I found myself searching for a deeper spiritual connection to , but did not know where to look.

Eneount e r in g Text Several years ago I was given an opportunity to explore 8mie Keesler this empty space when my sons’ day school teacher, Rabbi Dov Lerea, began offering a chumash class for I grew up a child of the OS, part of the generation who parents. Being a new, progressive, “non-denominational” defined “politically correct” long before it was a term school, our tiny group of learners reflected the Jewish coined in the media. Jewishly, my second-generation rainbow-all ages, both genders, and certainly many American, northeastern Ohio upbringing was deeply different levels of religious education and practice. rooted in the Conservative movement, which was making Initially, it was thrilling to be leaving children behind in an effort to address many issues, one of them being ...... order to study chumash with other adults. And secretly I ...... hoped that the class would help me stay one jump ahead SUSIE KESSLER Is the Dlrector of Education of the Natlonal Center for Jewlsh Heallng, based In NYC.

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