Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Reason #214 To Make Aliya

An article (here) about a recently discovered First Temple-period seal noted:
  • From the very start of the excavations in this area the archaeologists decided that all of the soil removed from there would be meticulously sifted (including wet-sifting and thorough sorting of the material remnants left in the sieve). This scientific measure is being done in cooperation with thousands of pupils in the Tzurim Valley National Park. It was during the sieving process that the tiny seal was discovered.
There are just some experiences that even the best day school education in galus can't replicate.

3 comments:

Pragmatician said...

Nice point.But how often does such a thing happen?

Abba said...

PRAGMATICIAN:

how often does what happen? kids on a field trip participating in the discovery of bayis rishon seal with hebrew inscription? perhaps never before and never again. (in truth, it isn't even clear from the original article even how the kids were involved. was it a kid who actually found it, or were the kids just on site when someone else found it?)

but the fact that kids in israel can literally sift through (our) history or go on tiyyulim to biblical and historical sites goes a long way toward making our past come to life, as well as forging an organic connection with eretz yisrael. it's not just another story about a long time ago in a place far, far away. this is on an emotional/psychological level, but is true for an intellectual level as well. now most kids are going to explain how gideon's soldiers drank from the river with finges based on watching a bedoiun do so (just read this in daat mikra), but at the very least they can find chevron on a map. ask a haftr kid where jericho is and he's likely to tell you out on long island.

btw, yeshivat noam in teaneck does have some element in the curriculum whereby the classroom meets up with a teacher in israel to explore the land, or something like that.

Abba said...

"most kids are going to explain" should read "most kids are not going to explain"