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The following is a chapter from Turn It, Turn It: The Many Faces of Torah
Students
Much Torah have I learned from my teachers, and from my colleagues more than from them, and from my students more than from all of them. – Rabbi Yehuda haNasi, Talmud Makkot 10a
Students are to Torah as wetness is to water. Anyone who has come into contact with Torah has been transformed into a student, even if just for a moment. Even teachers are transformed into students—nay, especially teachers. Arguably, teaching our children is the primary commandment concerning Torah:
These words that I am commanding you today are to be upon your hearts. And you shall teach them diligently to your children and speak of them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. (Deuteronomy 6:6-7)
These words are so central to Jewish tradition that they are part of the prayer (the Shema) we put in the mezuzot we hang in our doorways. Always remember to teach Torah. Whether you are home or on vacation, teach, teach, teach your children! Of course children doesn't only mean young people. We are all children of the Jewish people as well as of our actual parents no matter how old we have grown. And even if we become the wisest elder in the village with the most incredible library of leather-bound books and an adage or story for every occasion, even then we are still students. In his book, With Heart in Mind: Mussar Teachings to Transform Your Life, Alan Morinis writes that a learned person is simply referred to as a great student:
The Jewish term for a learned person is not a chacham, a wise one, but a talmid chacham, which literally translates to “a wise student.” The truly wise individual is not one who has achieved wisdom but rather one who is constantly seeking learning, ever studying more. (Alan Morinis, With Heart In Mind: Mussar Teachings To Transform Your Life (Trumpeter Books; Boston, MA; 2014), 20.)
When it comes to Torah, all people are students, all the time. However, there is also a specific category of people who are more precisely students in a given classroom or tutoring context, in relation to a specific teacher. Jewish tradition has a lot to say about how to treat these kinds of students, but perhaps the best verse to start with is one of the simplest from Pirkei Avot:
Rabbi Elazar ben Shammua said: Let the honor of your student be as dear to you as your own honor. (Pirkei Avot 4:12)
Let’s start with the possessive statement, your student. There is something so transcendent about gathering students and knowing they are yours. There's love there—and a huge responsibility. My students. I catch myself saying my students a lot. Maybe this is just a proxy for my parental instincts kicking into gear. When my students walk into class (or run, as the kindergarteners do, or drag themselves pathetically, as the teens do), I always ask how they are doing—did they sleep enough last night? Why not? What’s Minecraft® again? I don’t know what it is, but there is no sight I love more than some mildly grumpy middle schoolers sitting in a circle, convinced they are going to have the worst hour of their life as we study Torah. There is so much potential! Nowhere to go but up! They are all mine!
Loving what you are reading? What are you waiting for?
And what is the honor of a student? We might translate this as integrity or respect. All students are to be treated with respect—as are teachers (which includes self-respect). Their learning boundaries should be challenged for the sake of their growth, but not broken against their will. Students are not widgets you program with new, interesting information. They are organic beings that are learning about themselves as they assimilate new information and hone skills. They are discovering their own needs and preferences and figuring out how to implement or advocate for themselves. Also, they are constantly negotiating the social dimension of being in a class—who among their peers isn’t paying attention to them? Who will hang out with them at the next break? If they say the thing they’re thinking, will it sound weird or cool or smart or dumb? Honoring our students means honoring them as fully alive and wonderfully singular people. As our tradition teaches:
The House of Hillel says, ‘Every person recites [the Shema] according to their way.’ (Mishnah Berakhot 1:3)
According to their way. Students are learning not just how to recite the Shema, but how they recite the Shema. This is like the ancient version of what we might call intelligence types or even IEPs. Even when we teach classrooms of students at a time, each individual is an entire world unto themselves! We honor our students when we honor this ahead of time and plan on the fact that our students are uniquely molded from the dust of this earth, not uniformly mass-produced like Pringles®. Students are not Pringles®.
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There is a great story told in the Talmud about the power of opening doors to students. Here is a streamlined version of that text:
On that day that they removed Rabban Gamliel from his position and appointed Rabbi Elazar ben Azarya in his place, there was also a fundamental change in the general approach of the study hall as they dismissed the guard at the door and permission was granted to the students to enter. Instead of Rabban Gamliel’s selective approach that asserted that the students must be screened before accepting them into the study hall, the new approach asserted that anyone who seeks to study should be given the opportunity to do so.
On that day several benches were added to the study hall to accommodate the numerous students. Rabbi Yoḥanan said: Abba Yosef ben Dostai and the Rabbis disputed this matter. One said: Four hundred benches were added to the study hall. And one said: Seven hundred benches were added to the study hall. When he saw the tremendous growth in the number of students, Rabban Gamliel was disheartened.
There is a tradition that tractate Eduyyot was taught that day. And everywhere in the Mishna or in a baraita that they say: On that day, it is referring to that day. There was no halakha whose ruling was pending in the study hall that they did not explain and arrive at a practical halakhic conclusion. And even Rabban Gamliel did not avoid the study hall for even one moment, as he held no grudge against those who removed him from office and he participated in the halakhic discourse in the study hall as one of the Sages. (Talmud Berakhot 28a)
Only after welcoming in more students were the most difficult legal problems solved.
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At the risk of ending on a nauseatingly wholesome note, the truth is that I am incredibly indebted to my students. When I teach them Torah, I learn Torah—a symbiotic relationship. My students challenge me to really know what I’m talking about, and also to humbly declare when I have no idea what I’m talking about (which is fairly often). They are my fact-checkers, editors, critics, and collaborators all rolled into one. My students force me to constantly ask and answer, Why does this matter? or What does it mean to be a Jew?
If you are or were a student of mine and reading this, thank you (Yes, even you!). May you one day be blessed with students of your own. Students who test you in your beliefs, stretch you in logical reasoning, and hold you to high standards of justice. Students who, as soon as you are getting into the depth of a discussion on a topic of grave significance, raise their hand and say with utter nonchalance, When is this class over?
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