Amassing Religious Capital

In this constructed debate, Abraham and Sarah reflect an important, yet false, dichotomy that mirrors the anxieties of contemporary Jewish life. There are those, like Abraham, who say we need to create educational experiences that elicit strong positive feelings, or a strong sense of Jewish identity. And there are those, like
Sarah, who believe that education ought to encourage people to do, to act.

But, there is a crucial element missing in both of these approaches: Jewish education for the sake of gaining Jewish knowledge. Neither actions nor feelings are truly sustainable or meaningful without understanding.

To make a comparison to other areas of our lives where knowledge plays a critical role, let’s think about our relationships with other people and, in particular, with falling in love. When we first meet another person—while the relationship is still superficial—we have a general sense of liking the other and wanting to spend time with him/her. But, the only way for that relationship to become truly sustainable and long-term is to really develop a deep knowledge of the other.

It is very hard for us to imagine any intervention in Jewish life creating a lifelong connection if it doesn’t also include an intimate and detailed knowledge and understanding of where the ideas and practices come from. Feeling connected to other Jews, for example, or lighting Shabbat candles—or any combination of feelings and actions—cannot possibly be enough without a significant level of knowledge and understanding to go with them.

Michael Rosenak, the late educational philosopher, took the importance of Jewish knowledge one step further. In his article “Educated Jews: Common Elements,” Rosenak explained that in order to sustain and enable the creation of general culture, rich language is needed. The same is true for Jewish culture. He explained that the language of the Jews is the Torah and related texts, and in order to sustain and develop Jewish life, Jews need to have deep Jewish knowledge of this language. This shared language of Jewish texts has, for generations, continued to support the creation of a rich, new Jewish culture.

In his words from Roads to the Palace:

The concepts of language and literature are helpful in describing what we should like to see happen in education: namely, to initiate the young into the language of a culture by way of its most cherished literatures, including and perhaps particularly those formative literatures called “sacred” or “classic.” When it succeeds, education provides learners with the tools to select literature for use by abundantly exposing them to the forms and substance of diverse literatures. Optimally, education also prepares them to take part in the enterprise of making new literature.

We need to educate people in a way that ensures that Jewish ideas, texts, and traditions are so much a part of our lingua franca that we begin to create a rich new Jewish culture. Similar to the development of every language, it is shaped and changed by its ongoing usage. We develop new slang, write new songs, create new movies. By educating toward a deeper grasp of Jewish ideas and texts, we will help raise a generation that can renew our culture in a way that will strengthen Jewish life beyond our wildest imaginations.

Can we imagine Sarah and Abraham debating, not whether to measure identity or actions, but rather to debate what knowledge we ought to be teaching, what texts ought to be on the tips of our tongue, what ideas should be core to us as Jews?

I see Jews of varied backgrounds, with a diversity of Jewish practices, with different understandings of what it means to be Jewish, but who all speak the same language, who share a vocabulary that is laden with Jewish resonances and meaning. And these same Jews will use their shared language to create inspiring new Jewish experiences and expressions.

To implement this vision, Jewish communal organizations and individuals must commit to gaining a fluency in the language of Torah and Jewish ideas. We need to commit to measuring not identity or practice, but what people know and understand.

At Hillel International, we’ve been using the term “Jewish fluency” to capture this idea, but we try to take Rosenak’s idea even further. We view Jewish fluency as the magical combination of knowing specific Jewish content, having the ability to do Jewish actions (or rituals), and having a personal emotional attachment to Jewish experience.

In academic terms, the idea of integrating knowledge and practice with more general emotional attachment is called “religious capital.” According to Roger Finke and Kevin D. Dougherty, in an article about the training of Christian clergy:

Religious capital consists of the degree of mastery of and attachment to a particular religious culture. The mastery of the religious culture refers to learning the knowledge, skills, and rituals of a specific religion. Yet, religious capital includes more than a learned mastery of religion, it also includes an emotional attachment to a particular religious culture.

Imagine if we created ways of educating toward amassing religious capital? We could begin to think not in terms of practice or identity, but rather in terms of practice, identity, and knowledge. We can achieve our goal as Jewish educators to ultimately capture the hands, hearts, and minds of our students, which in turn will enable the ongoing development and vibrancy of new Jewish cultures.

Abi Dauber Sterne is vice president for Jewish education at Hillel International. She is developing the Center for Jewish and Israel Education of HillelU, which will provide training and continuing education to all 1,000 Hillel professionals to enhance their Jewish fluency and educational skills.