ABSTRACT Title of dissertation: TEACHING THE SACRED: A PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY OF SYNAGOGUE- SCHOOL TEACHERS Louis Alan Nagel, Doctor of Philosophy, 2009 Dissertation directed by: Professor Francine Hultgren Department of Education Policy Studies This dissertation is a hermeneutic phenomenological study of synagogue-school teachers of Jewish sacred text. The phenomenological question that orients this study asks, What is the lived experience of teaching sacred text in a Conservative synagogue- school? This study takes place in the Maryland suburbs of Washington, DC. The writings of Martin Heidegger, Hans-Georg Gadamer, Max van Manen, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Emmanuel Levinas, among others, orient the study philosophically and methodologically. This investigation of the challenge of making relevant to 21st century American youth an ancient tradition is grounded in sacred texts as well as the author’s life experiences, and is metaphorically explored in the encounter with natural landscapes. Eight third through seventh grade synagogue-school teachers of Torah and Hebrew prayer are engaged in individual and group conversations to explore the personal meaning they make of their engagement in this service to the Jewish community. The review of recorded conversations, verbatim transcripts, essays, and notes taken during classroom observations reveal existential philosophic themes that are brought forward in the writings of Heidegger, Sartre, and Levinas. In particular, the existentials of being present, relationship, discourse, and the Other, emerge as powerful openings of the phenomenon in question. The narrative of this lived experience is the exercise of Buber’s I-Thou relationship, one of profound moments of encounter with the sacredness of the text and of the student; time and timelessness; and boundaries to be respected, tested, and breached. At essence the synagogue-school teacher is seen as taking on the responsibility of perpetuating connection to a sacred community, acting in the role of both the prophet as teacher, best represented by Moses, and in maintaining connections that link to Biblical accounts of encounter with God and with divine messengers. Synagogue-school teachers are seen to demonstrate independence, genius, responsibility, and deep spirituality in a unique educational landscape. These teachers reveal the nature of the synagogue-school as an island of Jewish time, a period rich in engagement with community and sacred text, set in the synagogue environment. A challenge is for the learnings that take place in the synagogue-school to be extended to Being beyond the boundaries of that sacred space. TEACHING THE SACRED: A PHENOMENOLOGICAL STUDY OF SYNAGOGUE-SCHOOL TEACHERS by Louis Alan Nagel Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2009 Advisory Committee: Professor Francine Hultgren, Chair and Advisor Associate Professor Bernard Cooperman Rabbi Steven Glazer Professor Arthur Popper Professor Steven Selden © Copyright by Louis A Nagel 2009 DEDICATION To Faina, my infinitely patient Eshet Hayil, who kept my life in balance between College Park, Bethesda, and Fulton. To my daughters, Margo and Jamie, for the joy and beauty they bring into my life. To my colleagues and friends who shared my enthusiasm for phenomenology and Jewish education and kept me from getting lost while on this voyage. To Mom and Dad who taught me to love a quotable line, follow my muse, enjoy the journey, delight in the woods, live in the moment, and pursue my oddball career path. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS In this document I make reference to Mount Sinai, where according to the Torah’s narrative the Jewish people received the Ten Commandments and according to midrash were given all of the Torah. We are told to connect to that moment in our history as if we were there, present for the revelation. Forty years later in that narrative, Moses went to the top of another mountain, Nebo, and according to rabbinic texts looked out and saw all of Jewish history play out before his eyes. Over the course of this research I have had my Mount Sinai moments and my Mt. Nebo moments. The Mt. Nebo moments are ones of looking out at the people who brought me to this shehecheyanu moment, Shehecheyanu has become one of my favorite prayers in Jewish liturgy, a blessing for marking a unique point in time. It is chanted when celebrating a holiday, when doing something for the first time, and when getting something new. Now is a moment to give pause and, like Moses standing at Mt. Nebo, looking out over all of the future of Jewish history, I look out on the many people who contributed to bringing me to this passage. Jewish tradition has the legend of the lamed vavniks, the 36 righteous individuals without whom all the world would descend into chaos. I will leave it up to someone else to declare these people lamed vavniks, because the true lamed vavniks disappear and are replaced if discovered. Of the individuals who have brought me to this moment, Dr. Francine Hultgren, has had the most profound influence on me and my work. She opened my eyes to new ways of relating to the world, to teaching, and to the quest for meaning. I am an infinitely better educator than I would have ever been had I not been blessed with the opportunity to be her student. A responsibility Judaism puts on teachers is to raise many disciples. I am honored to count myself among her many disciples. My dissertation committee is made up of individuals who have also greatly influenced me. Dr. Steven Selden brought me into the department of Education Policy and Administration, brought me to a whole new understanding of curriculum, and elevated my sense of the school as a measure of social justice. Dr. Art Popper was on the committee that hired me at Congregation Beth El almost 20 years ago. He has been unstinting in his support and encouragement every step of the way. He wrote one of my recommendations to the University and offered to serve on my dissertation committee before I took my first course. Dr. Bernard Cooperman hooked me when in 1992 as a guest speaker at a principal’s meeting, was asked if Christopher Columbus may have been Jewish. His answer, politely put, was that that matter was beside the point. Thus, I was launched on an interpretive path to understanding Jewish history, challenging assumptions of the significance of people, places and events, which began my shift from an epistemological view of teaching toward an ontological one. iii Rabbi Steven Glazer is among that short list of rabbis that I would want to call “My rabbi.” It is my good fortune to have been given honors before friends and family in his congregation. He combines the scholarly rigor of Shammai with the humanity of Hillel. Dr. Robert O. Freedman has guided and inspired my career path since I was a teenager and still thought I could be the next Sandy Koufax. He saw a different future for me and offered the opportunity to enroll in the Masters program at Baltimore Hebrew College. I have spent the decades since graduation privately thanking him for his faith in me, and striving to live up to his confidence and ideals. Finally, I want to acknowledge the teachers, students, parents, secretaries, rabbis, and educators who have been a part of my life in education. We form a true kehila kedosha, a holy community, writing a text no less sacred than the one that brings us together. I also acknowledge the permission to reprint the following “Benedictio,” from Earth apples by E. Abbey (D. Peterson, Ed.), Copyright 1994 by New York: St. Martin’s Press. Reprinted by permission of David Peterson. “I dwell in possibility,” from The poems of Emily Dickinson, Copyright 1983 by Boston: Little, Brown, and Company. Reprinted by permission of the publishers and Trustees of Amherst College, Cambridge, MA. “Jewish and Goyish,” from The essential Lenny Bruce by J. Cohen (Ed.), Copyright 1970 by New York: Bell. Reprinted by permission of Douglas Music Corporation (BMI) c/o Don Williams Music Group, Encino, CA. “Love is finished again,” from The selected poetry of Yehuda Amichai (C. Bloch & S. Mitchell, Eds. & Trans.), Copyright 1996 by Berkeley: University of California Press. Reprinted by permission of University of California Press, Berkeley. “Love of Jerusalem,” from Yehuda Amichai: A life of poetry (B. Harshav & B. Harshav, Trans.), Copyright 1995 by New York: HarperPerrennial. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins, New York. “Passover,” by Primo Levi from Collected works (R. Feldman & B. Swann, Trans.), Copyright 1988 by Boston: Faber and Faber. Reprinted by permission of Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, New York. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER ONE: TURNING TO THE PHENOMENON OF TEACHING THE SACRED 1 Bringing 3,000 Years of History and Tradition to Bear on a 21st Century Moment 1 Bar and Bat Mitzvah 4 Ritual Objects 7 From Kiddush Cup to Am Kadosh 10 Moshe Rabbeinu 13 The Sacred Teacher 14 Into The Wilderness 21 Climbing Mountains 23 Déjà vu 25 HaMakom: Sacred – Place 26 Jerusalem 26 Exile 27 Sacred Time 28 Who Shall Stand in this Holy Place? 29 Torah to Morah 30 Makom Kadosh: Sacred Space 31 The Place of the Principal 32 Kedushat Hashem 36 Teaching The Sacred and Phenomenological Inquiry 39 My Itinerary 44 CHAPTER TWO: MOVING CLOSER TO THE PHENOMENON OF TEACHING SACRED LITERATURE 47 Just Who Is This Person Teaching My Child? 50 Lech Lecha – Go Forth 51 Baruchim HaBaim – Welcome to my Classroom 53 Well,