How to Raise Healthy & Secure Jewish Children

In this week’s Parsha, Vayechi, our forefather Jacob is reaching the end of his life and blesses each of his Children. Jacob also blesses Joseph’s two sons, Ephraim and Menashe, elevating them to the status of his own sons as founders and leaders of the Tribes within Israel.

Tradition dictates that every Friday night, we bless our daughters to be like the four matriarchs “Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah” at the Shabbat meal. However, when we bless our sons, we say that they should be like Ephraim and Menashe.

Why don’t we invoke our forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob for these blessings, and instead reference their fifth generation Egypt-born descendants? Why are they a more apt choice for these blessings than the original patriarchs?

It is precisely because Ephraim and Menashe are born outside of the Jewish community that they became the source of blessings for future generations. Joseph raised his two sons to be G-d fearing and righteous even while living in a pagan culture, and this was perhaps even a greater miracle than his saving the world from starvation during the famine. His two sons held tight to their faith and heritage, even in a foreign land.

This is a lesson for us today. In the modern world where we live in a predominantly non Jewish society, people still practice and keep our Torah traditions alive.

I am humbled to belong to the Chabad movement, where thousands of rabbis and rebbetzins devote their lives to being Torah ambassadors for their fellow Jews, in even the most remote and isolated locations in the world.

What motivates me and my colleagues to take on this monumental task? I believe there are many parallels between our role and that of the Biblical Joseph in our mission to raise the next generation to practice Judaism when none of their peers do so.

Here is a short excerpt from the book “The Rebbe’s Army” by Sue Fishkoff, which gives a behind the scenes peek into the life and work of the Chabad emissaries around the world:

Rabbi Yosef Greenberg is a Chabad emissary in Anchorage, Alaska. (Yes, there’s Chabad even where the moose roam). When he moved to town, he made it his mission to get to know every Jewish family in town. One of his methods was visiting various local institutions, for the stated purpose of teaching about Judaism. It was in this fashion that he arrived one day at a public school, there to broaden the children’s horizons by educating them about a religion and culture they had never seen before. Of course, he could also get a feel if anyone in the school was themselves Jewish.

Rabbi Greenberg walked into one classroom. The children gathered around this friendly looking figure who looked like he came straight out of the Bible, and he asked them, “Has anyone here ever met a Jewish person?” Sure enough, one young student got up and exclaimed, “Yes, my mother is Jewish!”

The rabbi knew he had an opportunity to make an impression upon this young girl.  “Listen my dear child,” he told her. “Every Friday afternoon, Jewish women and girls all over the world light Shabbat candles, bringing light and peace into their homes and into the world. I want you to light a Shabbat candle, too. Because Alaska is the westernmost place in the world with a Jewish population, and the last place that the Shabbat begins. I want you to light a candle for Shabbat every week, and know that all the Jewish women and girls around the world will wait every week for your little precious candle—because your candle will complete the circle of light that illuminates the entire world.

When our precious children realize that the world needs each and everyone of them to be proud and committed Jews— they feel the joy and privilege of representing our people, even in Cairo, under the shade of a pyramid or in a warm and welcoming igloo in Alaska.

Have a great Shabbos,

Rabbi Areyah