Introduction

Question: Why did you decide to do the 'Ten Paths to God’ curriculum?

Rabbi Sacks’ answer: The reason I'm doing this is because there’s nothing I care about more passionately than the Jewish future. And I think that as Jews we overachieve, but as Judaism, we underachieve. I think our faith and way of life and way of thinking is so powerful. It is so directly aimed at some of the challenges of the 21st century. It is so meaningful in potential to young Jews who are going to face an age of uncertainty, where this incredible resource, tried and tested over every kind of environment, over the better part of 4000 years, this exciting, powerful mode of identity is what I most passionately care about communicating to young Jews. And really that's what's driving me with this project.

Question: Why are teachers and educators so important to the Jewish future?

Rabbi Sacks’ answer: I've always said that Judaism is a religion whose heroes are teachers, whose citadels are schools, whose passion is education and the life of the mind. But very often, I find that teachers feel quite unsupported. They’re almost not properly valued in the community. They’re not always given the best resources, the resources that speak to the young people of now, not of 10 or 20 years ago.

So, teachers really are our heroes. And when I hear from them that they need some more materials, some direct help, I felt these are my most important people. So, I hope these materials will help them. I hope, in addition, that they will allow us to strike up a connection with specific schools who are piloting this material, because I want to make myself available, as part of the teachers’ resources, for a direct one-to-one relationship with some of the classrooms that are using this material. We’ll see if we can use this new technology to allow kids who have been learning these units to pose their questions directly to me. So, we’re all singing from the same song sheet. We’re all part of the same team.

Question: What is the structure of the ‘Ten Paths to God’ curriculum?

Rabbi Sacks’ answer: What I’ve tried to do in this first curriculum is to look at ten dimensions of being Jewish. Number one, Identity; then Prayer; and Learning; and Mitzvot. And then key Jewish values of Tzedakah; and Chessed; and Faith as loyalty. And then the ways that we express it in Israel; in Kiddush Hashem; and in Jewish Responsibility.

So those are kind of the ten rungs, I think, of the Jewish ladder, or the ten elements of Jewish identity and existence. And I hope we’ve gotten material that really is thought-provoking, and that opens things up for the students so that they can bring something of themselves to the material.

Each one of the ten units in this curriculum comes with a trigger video that initiates reflection on the topic. It then comes at two levels of course units; for the introductory and the more advanced. And each one of those units has two forms of material, one for the students, and the other as guides for the teachers.

Question: Who is this material aimed at?

Rabbi Sacks’ answer: This is very open-ended material so that it allows the teachers to use it in whichever way they think is best for their class, and will allow the class itself to reflect very actively and really contribute to each of the units. So I hope it’s teacher-friendly, and I hope it’s pupil-friendly.

It’s very non-prescriptive and very open. This material, I think is, strong enough and sophisticated enough to be used in all sorts of contexts. Whether it’s in student groups on campus. Or, it’s study groups within synagogue life. Or it’s just groups who come together to reflect on Jewish values. And that could be, all sorts of Jewish activities. So I think it’s thoughtful enough and demanding enough and mature enough to be used in a lot of different contexts. I hope Rabbis will find it good for their own educational programmes. And I just have a strong feeling that because it’s very open-ended, different venues and different organizations will find that they can slant it to their specific needs.

Question: When will the 'Ten Paths to God’ curriculum be available?

Rabbi Sacks’ answer: We’ll be releasing this material over the next few months. And for each of you who wants to be kept in touch with that material, please subscribe to the specific dedicated mailing list that you can connect with, at RabbiSacks.org/TenPaths, and you’ll be on our mailing list, and, you'll get the material as it appears.

The development of this curriculum is not entirely unrelated to the fact that I'm just about to celebrate my 70th birthday, and there’s a big rule about 70th birthdays, which is, when you celebrate them start getting young again, which is what I feel, doing this material, and I hope you will feel, using it.

At some point in life, every reflective human being will ask three fundamental questions: Who am I? Why am I here? How then shall I live?

Whether we believe, or don’t believe, these are religious questions. Science can tell us how life began, but it can never tell us what life is for. Anthropology can tell us the many ways in which people have lived, but it can never tell us how we should live. Economics and business studies can tell us how to generate wealth, but they cannot tell us what to do with the wealth we have made.

The various sciences, natural, social or human, can tell us how, but not why. The ‘why’ questions ask us to lift up our eyes beyond the immediate, in search of the ultimate. The name we give to the ultimate ultimate is God. The search for meaning at its heart is a religious quest.

God is always close to us, but we are not always close to God. How then do we come close to Him? By living Jewishly. ‘We will do, then we will understand’, said our ancestors at Mount Sinai. So it is in all matters of the soul. We learn to love music by listening to music. We learn to be generous by performing acts of generosity. ‘The heart follows the deed’. Don’t expect to have faith or find God by waiting for Him to find us. We have to begin the journey. Then God meets us halfway.

There are many ways of finding God, many paths to the Divine presence. For this series of videos and accompanying curriculum, I have chosen ten of the most important. The first is identity. We are born into a family that has a history. Who are we? To which story do we belong?

The second is prayer, the most focused way in which we reach out to God. Third is study, the highest of all Jewish acts, which the Sages said was more holy even than prayer. Fourth is mitzvot, the way of the commands. In prayer we find God by speaking; in study we find God in listening; in mitzvot we find God by doing.

Then come the three great attributes of the Jewish personality: tzedakah, love as justice; chessed, love as compassion; and faith, love as loyalty. Judaism is a religion of love, not the mystical, otherworldly love that hovers above the world, leaving its imperfections intact, but the love that engages with the world, trying – one act at a time, one day at a time, one life at a time – to make it a little less cruel, a little more human and humane.

Then, lastly, come the three great expressions of Jewish life: Israel, the one place on earth where Jews have the chance to do what every other nation takes for granted, namely the right to rule ourselves and create a society in accordance with our beliefs; Kiddush Hashem, sanctifying God’s name in the world by acting as God’s ambassadors; and lastly responsibility, the idea that we are God’s partners in the work of creation, and there is work for each of us to do in this tense and troubled age.

Any of these units may be the starting point of a personal meditation, framed by such questions as: How does this apply to me? How can I act on it to become a better person? How can this help me to lead a more meaningful and fulfilled life? Some may not speak to you, others will. For there are as many ways to the Divine presence as there are Jews, said Rav Nachman of Bratslav. Or as I put it: Where what we want to do meets what needs to be done, that is where God wants us to be.

There are many ways to God. Where we begin doesn’t matter, so long as we begin. Jewish life is the circumference of a circle at whose centre is God. That is where we meet, whatever our starting point.

However long we live, life is short, too short. Every day matters. Every day in which we do not do some good deed, take some step toward God, make some difference to the world, is a day lost – and our days on earth are too few to waste even one.