Pirkei Avot, “Ethics of the Fathers,” states in chapter 6:6: “The Torah is acquired in 48 ways.” This week: Way #46, “Making one’s teacher wiser.”
The relationship of Torah student to Torah teacher is profound, and tricky.
The profundity is the obligation to transmit, and receive, the tradition precisely. A space probe to Mars that, at launch, is one-thousandth of a degree off will eventually veer millions of miles off target. The responsibility to teach Torah accurately is heavy; the slightest imprecision will have immense, negative consequences.
So much for the profundity in the relationship.
The trickiness lies in the obviously superior knowledge of the teacher. Yet, each teacher is, or was, also a student. That student, his inferior knowledge notwithstanding, became a teacher because he completed his own teacher’s knowledge in some way. To guarantee accuracy in the transmission of the Torah, every student must make his teacher wiser.
Otherwise, mistakes creep in and widen from generation to generation.
Transmission is two-way pedagogy. This the trickiness.
Most Jews at the Western Wall feel the long arc of tradition, connected to the generations that came before. When students acquire the Torah, that same profoundity is felt. In part, it derives from the student enlightening the teacher.
The 46th way to acquire the Torah: Making One’s Teacher Wise.
- Way #1, Study
- Way #2, Listen
- Way #3, Articulate Speech
- Way #4, Understanding of the Heart
- Way #5, An Intelligent Heart
- Way #6, Awe
- Way #7, Fear
- Way #8, Humility
- Way #9a, Joy
- Way #9b, Purity
- Way #10, Serving the Sages
- Way #11, Interaction with colleagues
- Way #12, Exchanges with students
- Way #13, Deliberation
- Way #14, Scripture
- Way #15a, Mishnah
- Way #15b, Limited Business Activity
- Way #16a, Limited Marital Relations
- Way #16b, Portion Control
- Way #17, Limited Pleasure
- Way #18, All nighters
- Way #19, Limited Conversation
- Way #20, Limited Entertainment
- Way #21, Slowness to anger
- Way #22, A good heart
- Way #23, Faith in the sages
- Way #24, Acceptance of suffering
- Way #25, Knowing one’s place
- Way #26, Happiness with one’s lot
- Way #27, Have a filter
- Way #28, Claim no credit
- Way #29, Being beloved
- Way #30, Loving the Omnipresent
- Way #31, Loving G-d’s creatures
- Way #31b, Loving acts of charity
- Way #32, Loving reproof
- Way #33, Loving integrity
- Way #34, Shunning honors
- Way #35, Loving integrity
- Way #36, Taking no joy from issuing halachic rulings
- Way #37, Sharing another person’s burden
- Way #38, Judging others favorably
- Way #39, Setting someone straight via the truth
- Way #40, Guiding a person to peace
- Way #41, Being at peace in one’s Torah study
- Way #42, Asking and answering
- Way #43, Listening and adding
- Way #44, Studying In Order To Teach
- Way #45, Studying In Order to Act