Portion of the Portion

Sacrifices for Jewish Education

Sacrifices for Jewish Education

If you were planning the curriculum for a Jewish school for young children the logical place to begin learning Chumash would be from Bereshit. But in most boys CHEDERS they start to learn from this week’s portion, from the book of Vayikra. Did you ever wonder why little boys in Cheder start learning the Torah from Vayikra the middle of the Torah and not from the beginning? Vayikra is so complicated and not necessarily relevant to the world of today’s children who grow up with CDs and electronic toys. Some children may never have even come in contact with a live sheep or goat let alone be able to think of slaughtering one for a sacrifice? There must be some reason for this educational decision.
A well known explanation is that the same way that the KORBANOT are TAHOR - young children are also pure so it is a natural connection for the pure hearted children to busy themselves learning verses that are related to purity. This answer is sweet but there still might be more parts of the Torah that we would think are more related to purity that could be learned with young children that would be more relevant.
The ALEF of the word VAYIKRa is small. ALEF - means to teach - so there is a hint here that Vayikra is related to teaching.
An answer I saw from the ANEI EZEL relates to the parents more than to the children. Anyone who has tried to educate their children for a life of Torah and Mitzvot knows that there are sacrifices involved. Whether one is paying tuition in the thousands of dollars to a Jewish day school in America or a couple thousand shekels in Israel, there is some financial sacrifice. Some people have made sacrifices of their career for the benefit of their children’s Jewish education as well. They might not have taken a “good job” in a different location since there wasn’t a good Jewish school there.
And in Israel parents sometimes have to conform to certain norms and behaviors in order to “get their kids into” a certain school.
For that reason children begin learning from the book of VAYIKRA, from the chapters dealing with the animal sacrifices to teach the parents that if they want their children to continue in the path of Torah they will have to make sacrifices.
Rav Meir of Lublin said for this reason the Rabbis taught us, “Pay attention to the offspring of the poor because these parents constantly forgo pleasures in order to provide for the education of their children. A child who sees what his parents are willing to do in order that he will be able to learn Torah must certainly learn the value of Torah and will want to keep it.
Speaking of children… here is a cake recipe with gumdrops that most kids like.

Children’s Gumdrop Fruitcake
1.5 lb. gumdrops (don’t use licorice)
1 cup butter or margarine
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
4 cups sifted flour
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. soda
1 tsp. cloves
pinch nutmeg
1 tsp. cinnamon
1.5 cups chopped nuts
3 cups golden raisins
1.5 cups applesauce

Cut gumdrops in small pieces. Cream butter or margarine and sugar; add eggs and beat well. Sift together the flour, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, soda and salt. Sprinkle 1 cup dry ingredients over gumdrops, raisins, and nuts. Add remaining dry ingredients alternately with applesauce to creamed mixture; mix well. Pour into tube pan. Bake in moderate oven (350F-180C) 1 hours or until done. Place a pan of water under cake in oven while baking to keep it moist and to keep it from burning. Cool thoroughly. Brush cake with wine 2 or 3 times after cake is cool.
Remove from pan and wrap in foil.

• Other Portion of the Portion
• The Hide & Seek of Purim
• SHOV'VIM TAT
• The Women in Sh'mot