Imagine the following:  the Torah commentaries of Moshe Seinfeld, Avraham ibn Tuxedo, Hannah Maccabiah and Charlie Lev Mazon appear on a page of newly discovered “mikraot gedolot” edition and they are addressing the first perek (chapter) of bamidbar.  Each has unique torah to offer.

We sit together and study the page.  Like any community of avid Jewish learners, we could talk for hours about the teachings.

Now imagine the following:  you learn that Moshe Seinfeld was a great Hasidic rebbe, you learn that Avraham ibn Tuxedo lived during the Golden Age in Spain and that he was educated in the context of Muslim intellectualism; you learn that Hannah Maccabiah was the only female scribe known to us from the period of the Qumran scrolls; and you learn that Charlie Lev Mazon was Tevye’s father from Fiddler on the Roof.

Now we go back and read the same page of text.  Will we learn the same things as our first go around with the text?  How will our understanding of each commentator’s words of torah be different than the first go around?

RRC’s text-oriented curriculum is based on the premise that in order to move into deep relationship with earlier commentators and texts, you first need to know with whom or what you are in sacred relationship.  A hallmark of text study at RRC is that we expect our students to know who is sitting around the table of text study (and who were their teachers, what else influenced their thinking, how did their environment shape their value system, and what were the literary conventions of their time).

At RRC students begin by learning Torah (Bible), then move on to rabbinic literature (midrash, Talmud), then on to parshanut hamikra and legal codes, then to hasidut and contemporary Jewish literature. Once students have gained the skills to read a sugya of Talmud, they move on to more advanced Talmud study. Once students have immersed in the study of the Talmud, they can better appreciate what later commentators are doing when they quote a text.  We don't want students to take our text course: “Who is a Jew?” without first learning how to access and interpret the many traditional sources in which this important question is discussed.   We don’t want students quoting text without at least knowing for themselves the story behind the text.

Each rabbinical school is driven by a particular philosophy about how to cultivate Jewish minds and how to train rabbis.  Our philosophy is that each generation of Jewish teachings has been informed by what preceded it AND is very much influenced by the needs/aspirations/challenges of its own generation. We honor our tradition by getting to know our predecessors as fully as we can.  We believe that this is a solid method for cultivating sacred relationships with texts that utilize both the mind and the heart.

We have considered reorganizing the program around particular themes each year or a specific slice of our “canon,” but each time we move in this direction, we find ourselves privileging certain texts or themes over others.  We want students to create their own “100 greatest texts” lists.

Last year, we sent out a survey to our alumni regarding a variety of curricular matters.  As we would expect of any such survey, nobody agreed on how much modern Hebrew rabbis need or whether CPE should be mandatory or not.  The only consistent response was about our approach to Jewish learning and text study.  Over 90% of our graduates affirmed the effectiveness of our model for Jewish learning and its importance in rabbinic leadership.  One of the meta lessons that our graduates take is that each and every rabbi (and each Jew) not only has permission, but an obligation to reinterpret texts for the needs of the present generation.

A last comment for today, our new curriculum (to be implemented in fall 2013 {I hope!!}) will continue to embrace this model but we will condense the introduction to each period of Jewish life into two years.  These two foundational years will provide students with the broad contours of our people’s traditions and stories, will attune students to engaging with the text with intellectual integrity and with the heart, and will provide basic skills in text analysis.

In year three to five, students will have significant freedom in choosing their areas of continued study.  Those who love Talmud can continue to study Talmud every semester.  Those who love Hasidic literature can continue to immerse themselves in these texts.  Students who prefer learning more about Jewish law and customs can do so.  And Yehuda Amichai lovers can study his poetry as Jewish text.

Students will also be able to choose among an offering of topical text courses that will explore our teachings regarding poverty, the environment, leadership, pursuing peace, sexuality, and so on.  These courses will be coordinated with other courses that apply these teachings to the demands of rabbinic leadership in the present.

y. Hag 1:7:  “So should it be that you would forsake me, but would keep my Torah.”  I understand this to mean that our primary obligation is to engage in the fluid, ongoing, ever-changing world of torah interpretation over a commitment to any static belief system that is out of our reach.