Reflections on Shavuot: The Torah Of Social Media

Right before Pesah, I created an Instagram account. I made the conscious decision to develop a Social Media presence to share who I am and what I do as a parent and rabbi who is raising the next generation in our changing Jewish community. This has been quite the step up from my casual sharing on my personal Facebook page.

I am setting aside time to build substantive and relevant posts with the ultimate goal of interacting with young people about Judaism and what it has to contribute to one’s life. With the conclusion the holiday of Shavuot which celebrates the giving of Torah that defines the relationship between God and the Jewish people, I reflect upon the Torah I have received from my recent immersion into Social Media.

Just like the invention of the printing press some 500 years ago revolutionized the way we studied and taught Torah, Social Media provides a radically different way to engage in the sacred activities of seeking meaning, sharing insights into life’s big questions, and contributing to a dynamic community. Social Media provides a lasting platform to define one’s digital Jewish or spiritual journey and interact within the public square. I would like to highlight a few Social Media Torah journeys that have inspired me during my short time on Instagram.

• Two young women, Sam and Rena, in rabbinical school at Hebrew Union College (one was just ordained) using the Instagram account @ModernRitual, to share aspects of Jewish tradition to encourage personal engagement and spiritual development of their followers in an accessible, interactive, and supportive manner.

• Aviva Brown, an author who shares her family’s experience of being biracial and Jewish on her account @Aviva.author.slpub reflects the diverse experience of being Jewish in America.

• Rabbi Yael Levy using her account @Awayinorg to count the Omer in a kabbalistic/Mussar manner that increases Jewish mindfulness. This is consistent with her teachings which offer deep reflections on Judaism and life coupled with beautiful pictures which point to the possibility of personal transformation.

This medium allows everyone the absolute and equal ability to share and respond. The form itself creates the potential to animate and shape one’s vision, not realizing what image may go viral or what idea may rally a robust conversation. Even the daily ritual of checking who responded to a post or a comment is a type of “personalized revelation” from the collective community of those in engaged in Torah on Social Media.

The eternal digital footprint stands against the transitory nature of our society, communities, and lives. The four walls of the classroom have been taken down. The teacher, who can be any one of us, defines, creates and documents the learning process and content for their students who can also be redefined as any interested person who chooses to engage. One of my Bar Mitzvah students has some 10,000 followers on his YouTube channel which he uses to teach how to master certain video games.

Over the past two months of engaging on Social Media, I am more conscious about the ways I use this platform to leverage my educational and rabbinic work. This is becoming a type of personal practice that increases my voice, encourages creative reflection, and increases the reach of people with whom I interact.

I am left wondering about how future generations will view what we are producing today. Will people read blogs like books and journals and research Social Media channels like rabbinic commentaries? In the meantime, I am delving into the mysterious ways Social Media is shaping the present.

-Rabbi Barkan

A Prayer From Tucson City Hall

As a Rabbi and Jewish educator, I offer these prayers for our children and their education. I gave my social media community the opportunity to share their prayers on this crucial subject and will incorporate their prayers as part of this invocation. 

“The world only exists on account of the breath of children at the school-house.”

This statement was made by Resh Lakish in the name of Rabbi Yehuda the Magistrate around 2000 years ago recorded in the Talmud on page 119b of Shabbat. 

The issue of education perennially remains the central way to shape our society, to make the ultimate investment in our future. The breath of our children engaged in learning ensures that our civilization will persist. That order will prevail over chaos. That future generations will preserve, build, and create. 

On that same page in Talmud Rabbi Hamnuna suggests that the inverse is true too: that Jerusalem was destroyed because children stopped attending the school-house.

We know this violent reality in our society all too intimately. I share with you a prayer by Dan Alexander, the Chief Administrative Officer at Great Lakes Academy Charter School in Chicago. 

He offers this prayer in the wake of a drive-by shooting late at night last week outside the school where a young man and woman were badly injured: “I pray for God to help us construct schools, economy, law, and religion to cause our young people to have the inner strength to reject gangs and the violence they bring.”

How do we teach our children this basic tenet of choosing life?

One of my main mentors, my mother-in-law, addresses this fundamental question with the prayer she shares:

“A Prayer on Learning for a Child I Love”

By Sally Weber

What do I want you to learn?

To speak, to read, to write of course.

And to excel.

But to excel in learning from all around you.

The people who love you, the people who don’t;

The people you agree with, the people you don’t;

Those who speak loudly, those who speak softly.

I want you to learn that you have a moral base.

I want you to excel in discerning how to share that with the world.

I want you to learn to say ‘yes’ and also how to say ‘no’

And to understand why you’re making those choices.

I want you to learn from the love that’s offered that you have love to give.

I want you to learn that you will always be loved.

Her prayer challenges us to ensure that the basic skills we prioritize in our schools don’t replace basic human values that we must teach our children so that they understand that they matter in an absolute way.

The family is the primary place where we teach our children these lessons of being loved. Yet transformative teaching in the classroom at every age emanates from relationships between teacher and student, and student and student. 

One of my former students who lives in Jerusalem, Dafna Guttman shares her prayer that recognizes how this profound encounter must be the basis of how we educate our children. 

May we be guided and successful in (educating) providing a space for our children to express their needs and desires to us freely and without shame. For them to know that they are seen, cared for, and supported. After which, they will go on to do wonderful things in this world.

I add my own humble prayer to these prayers: 

May we educate our children to appreciate the beauty of nature and mystery of existence; to simply learn how to be kind; to have hope.

I am grateful for how these public forums -- City Council and Social Media – can be used as a powerful and positive force for change in our society. May God establish the work of the hands of educators, public-policy makers, Religious leaders, parents and the hands of our children as we shape our world.

Here is the official video of me reciting your prayers. It’s the first two minutes, enjoy!

-Rabbi Barkan