Jewish Education: Some Recent Research (L’Eylah)

Much has been written, and many more words spoken, about the need for Jewish education to ensure Jewish commitment and survival. The cause goes to the heart of the Jewish experience. No faith, surely has valued study higher or invested more of its energies into the activities of learning and teaching.

The messages that emerge from recent research and from the Jewish historical experience are that education is the most potent guarantor of Jewish continuity, that Jewish education works best in closely orchestrated harmony with the other key institutions of Jewish life - the home and the synagogue - and that there is no short-cut to its proper resourcing. The question marks hanging over Diaspora Jewish survival are sufficiently strong to make a coherent, collective, community wide educational strategy our most immediate priority.