There was still a small and sweet kol Torah emanating from the benches below

Photo: AE GEDOLIM PHOTOS

Living Higher

ON a sweltering summer day in Bnei Brak, photographer Avraham Elbaz climbed the steps inside the Slabodka Yeshivah, intent on capturing a bird's-eye view of the beis medrash packed with hundreds of talmidim as they passionately engaged in Torah learning. But the yeshivah’s first seder had already concluded, and only a handful of talmidim remained in the beis medrash. As his lens surveyed the large room, he noticed that while it may have been a bit emptier than what he was hoping for, there was still a small and sweet kol Torah emanating from the benches below. There, two Bnei Brak bochurim were huddled over large Gemaras alongside their chavrusas — two kippah serugah-clad youngsters — engaging together in the sweetest of songs.

Overheard

Photo: MAD STRATEGIES INC

“This notion that parents feel their children have to think their parents are hakol yachol…. I don’t know how many parents have the same worry when it comes to learning — if your child asks for a vort on the parshah, do you feel you have to become more learned? I think it’s projection — we feel bad because we’re not millionaires, and we assume our child is looking at us the same way we look at ourselves. As parents, we have to know: Are we seeing ourselves, or are we seeing our child?”

— Rabbi Menachem M. Karmel, menahel of Montreal’s Yeshiva Gedolah elementary school at a panel discussion held last week. The specific question he was responding to was what the appropriate response is when a child requests something out of the parent’s budget.

Reaching the Peak

For an end-of-the-school-year trip, the fourth-grade class at the Clifton Cheder and their rebbi, Rabbi Elimelech Silber, headed to upstate New York, where the group hiked up Rockland County’s Kakiat Mountain. As the boys reached the peak, the rebbi passed around paperback Mishnayos, and with the breathtaking views of the mountainous ranges surrounding them, the boys completed yet another journey they had been hiking along all year — that of Maseches Megillah.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1017)