By Michael Stiefel Alperin
We had the opportunity to hear from Rav Shaul Feldman who is the Executive Director of Bnei Akiva. He began by saying that he doesn’t like it when the flight attendants say, “Sit back and enjoy your flights,” and that’s not the way to go about life. He juxtaposed that by saying that we need to feel that we were taken out of Egypt to teach about it.
Rav Shaul then told us about how Rabbi Akivah went from 24,000 scholars to 5 scholars. Those 24,000 scholars didn’t truly understand what he was teaching so he went down to just 5 scholars. He also brought to our attention, to think about how the experience was different from Rabbi Akivah from speaking to 24,000 scholars to just 5 and the dynamic differences. Rav Shaul concluded by asking us where am we today as Jews?
What I took away from Rav Shaul is that you need to put a little of your own self in what you’re doing no matter how big or small your impact will be and that we can’t just sit back and relax and wait for somebody else to do it. As a Jewish educator at camp I took this to heart that I have to put energy into what I am teaching and not sit back and wait for my co-staff to do all the work. That to teach the best I possibly can I need to feel as if I lived through the Jewish history I am teaching, no matter if I am in front of the entire camp or just my cabin.
