We are looking at US high schools for our kids in the event that we come back to the US (Phoenix, AZ) for their high school years. There is a great STEM public charter school in Phoenix and there is also a private college prep school, PCDS (Phoenix Country Day School). PCDS has small class sizes, a large, beautiful campus, and a resource-rich learning environment where they foster a love of learning and develop proud confident independent thinkers who are ready to succeed in university and in life. Pretty much everything you would want in an institution entrusted with the education of your children.
When we toured the school i noticed in one of the English classrooms a poster with a quote about poetry by John Yeats, about how poetry can “lift the thoughts of man.” It’s a nice quote and a nice sentiment about poetry. And it made me think about how they are educating their high school students to be well-rounded human beings, the future leaders of society, and how part of that training involves an appreciation of poetry as a way to express one’s self, as an expression of the trials and tribulations of humankind, of the human condition, and how poetry can become part of a healthy coping mechanism for dealing with some of life’s more daunting challenges.
“Delight it; for it feeds upon the burrs, And thorns of life; forgetting the great end Of poesy, that it should be a friend To sooth the cares, and lift the thoughts of man.” The entire poem (its quite long) can be found here.
Then I thought of how some of the prayers I’ve been saying this high holiday season have served that purpose for me. How reading some of the Psalms have been used through the ages to allow our people to “cope” with all that has befallen us through the ages. How some of the poetry written by rabbis of the middle ages have been turned into modern day songs by modern Israeli rock musicians, which can help lift our spirits today. And then I thought how odd it is that all that would be barred from being taught at PCDS because of the American separation of church and state. How the poetry taught to the students would necessarily be restricted to “secular” poetry.
Clearly that’s the way it is supposed to work in the US. If a parent wants their kid to learn “religion” it is their responsibility to teach it to them at home. This obviously applies to religious practice but also to religious texts and thought. This is so obvious that it almost seems strange to even articulate it. Were it not for my having come from an experience with the Israeli school system I might not have even noticed it.
But when the religious poetry is relegated to the home and the secular poetry is taught in school, the subliminal message is that the secular poetry is “real,” is what’s important, is what matters, and the religious stuff is at best harmless so long as you keep it out of the public sphere. The two are just separate worlds. If you find reading religious texts to be a helpful way of coping with the travails of your secular life, that’s great, but we’re not going to teach that to you here. You’ll have to work that out for yourself.
For Jewishly educated and committed American parents, that is certainly possible to achieve for themselves and for their children. But for the mass of American Jews it seems a tall order. Most Jewish kids (and even Christian kids for that matter) will end up with a fine secular education, scant religious education, and no understanding of the rich tradition of poetry, prose, legalistic debates, etc, that our own religious culture has to offer – to “lift the thoughts of man,” as it were.
Since in my own personal life i find both to be intimately intertwined and useful, the notion of arbitrarily barring half my poetic or linguistic identity from being taught in school just seemed a bit jarring. And its not that I have a better idea. I realize that there is perhaps no other option for America – that in order to prevent one religious group from monopolizing the civic landscape over another, there simply has to be a compete separation between the two spheres. And yet, it seems strangely unnatural. People are innately tribal and want to feel connected to something bigger than themselves.
And then I had this nauseating feeling as I wondered whether the epidemic loneliness and alienation and depression and even possibly the epidemic levels of violence, school shootings, etc, could be somehow a terrible unintended side effect of the intentional divorcing of our children’s education from any religious tradition – if the lack of grounding in any historically and religiously rooted culture ends up making for a subconsciously alienated populace less able to cope with the human condition. We give our children license to use secular literature but effectively deny them access to religious literature. It’s as if Russell Crowe in The Gladiator were denied half his weapons before a fight. How could he be expected to win? (yeah, we just saw that on netflix, sorry if the reference seems a bit obscure…)
Maybe I’m overstating the case. Maybe things just look different from over here in Israel after having been away for over a year. I’ve certainly never questioned the separation of church and state before. But realistically, everything has tradeoffs; there is no free lunch. Is it possible that we’ve just gotten so used to the way things are that we’ve lost our ability to even conceive of anything different?
I suppose in the past the separation of church and state presupposed a more lively “church” in the private sphere. In other words, it was just what it said, a separation between two equally important realms, rather than what is has become for many today; the preeminence of state over church, or simply state without church. It is perhaps a difficult discussion to have in America, especially for Jews, and I’m not naively pining away for a revival of redneck bible thumping racist-tinged Christian religiosity. Its just that with everyone in the junior high and high school years so involved in the college rat-race, there is little time for anything else. The secular education you get is top-notch and the religious side is neglected because everyone is so busy getting their college resumes in order. And by the time you figure out what’s happened, your formative years are over. And then – poof – you’ve turned into a parent yourself, trying to figure out how to give something balanced to your own kids….
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Psalm 130 – Read each day between Rosh HaShana and Yom Kippur:
שִׁ֥יר הַֽמַּעֲל֑וֹת מִמַּעֲמַקִּ֖ים קְרָאתִ֣יךָ יְהוָֽה׃
A song of ascents. Out of the depths I call You, O LORD.
אֲדֹנָי֮ שִׁמְעָ֪ה בְק֫וֹלִ֥י תִּהְיֶ֣ינָה אָ֭זְנֶיךָ קַשֻּׁב֑וֹת לְ֝ק֗וֹל תַּחֲנוּנָֽי׃
O Lord, listen to my cry; let Your ears be attentive to my plea for mercy.
אִם־עֲוֺנ֥וֹת תִּשְׁמָר־יָ֑הּ אֲ֝דֹנָ֗י מִ֣י יַעֲמֹֽד׃
If You keep account of sins, O LORD, Lord, who will survive?
כִּֽי־עִמְּךָ֥ הַסְּלִיחָ֑ה לְ֝מַ֗עַן תִּוָּרֵֽא׃
Yours is the power to forgive so that You may be held in awe.
קִוִּ֣יתִי יְ֭הוָה קִוְּתָ֣ה נַפְשִׁ֑י וְֽלִדְבָר֥וֹ הוֹחָֽלְתִּי׃
I look to the LORD; I look to Him; I await His word.
נַפְשִׁ֥י לַֽאדֹנָ֑י מִשֹּׁמְרִ֥ים לַ֝בֹּ֗קֶר שֹׁמְרִ֥ים לַבֹּֽקֶר׃
I am more eager for the Lord than watchmen for the morning, watchmen for the morning.
יַחֵ֥ל יִשְׂרָאֵ֗ל אֶל־יְה֫וָה כִּֽי־עִם־יְהוָ֥ה הַחֶ֑סֶד וְהַרְבֵּ֖ה עִמּ֣וֹ פְדֽוּת׃
O Israel, wait for the LORD; for with the LORD is steadfast love and great power to redeem.
וְ֭הוּא יִפְדֶּ֣ה אֶת־יִשְׂרָאֵ֑ל מִ֝כֹּ֗ל עֲוֺנֹתָֽיו׃
It is He who will redeem Israel from all their iniquities.
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כָּתַב סְתָיו בִּדְיוֹ מְטָרָיו וּבִרְבִיבָיו
Winter wrote with the ink of its rains and its showers,
וּבְעֵט בְּרָקָיו הַמְּאִירִים וְכַף עָבָיו
With the pen of its brilliant lightning, with the hand of its clouds,
מִכְתָּב עֲלֵי גַן מִתְּכֵלֶת וְאַרְגָּמָן,
A letter on the garden in blue and in purple —
לֹא נִתְכְּנוּ כָהֵם לְחֹשֵב בְּמַחְשָׁבָיו.
Their like was never devised by the thoughts of a thinker
לָכֵן בְּעֵת חָמְדָה אֲדָמָה פְּנֵי שַׁחַק,
So when the earth grew to covet the face of the sky
רָקְמָה עֲלֵי בַדֵּי עֲרוּגוֹת כְּכוֹכָבָיו
Upon the garden beds’ fabric it wove its own stars
This is a poem written in the eleventh century by Shlomo Ibn Gabirol. It was set to music and performed by Israeli artist and rock musician Berry Sakharof: