Emuna’s Role in Educating Children
A confidant child is free to learn. A child that's worried if he or she will have a roof or a meal to come home to can't concentrate on what the teacher is saying...
Once, I was walking late at night in my neighborhood, one of the Chassidic bastions of Ashdod, and I circumvented a playground, where there were two Chassidim with black hats and long coats playing on the swings and the sliding board. They thought that nobody saw them; I imagined that they weren’t allowed to play as kids, so they’re trying to compensate now. But, at 26 and 27 or so with a wife and two or three babies at home, they should be doing other things…
When we rob a child of what he or she needs, the deficiency will show up later – that’s why it’s so important to let children develop naturally. Hashem created them as children, and not as 30 year-olds.
A major mistake that parents make is by loading emotional weights and pressures on a child, which the child’s tender soul can’t handle. One of the prime examples is when parents discuss financial problems and worries within earshot of the children; that’s tantamount to taking five 50—pound sacks of potatoes and piling them on the back of a 50-pound child. The child can’t stand such a weight, for it will crush him, G-d forbid. He needs to know that everything at home is fine and there’s nothing to worry about. If not, then children end up paying the price of their parents’ lack of faith and trust.In school, a confidant child is free to learn. A child that’s worried if he or she will have a roof or a meal to come home to can’t concentrate on what the teacher is saying.
A second devastating mistake that buries children under burdens of worry and insecurity is when the parents air their differences in front of a child. A mother, a father, and a solid home are a child’s fortress, which parents have no right to destroy. Hey Mom and Dad, have a minimum of compassion! Only insensitive and self-centered parents use kids as pawns in their war against each other.
A child’s soul is like a tender seedling that needs to remain in the greenhouse or nursery, for like the seedling, the child’s soul needs warmth and light. If you cast a child in a stormy and cold environment, he or she will wither.
Parents that have problems should work on their emuna – no matter what their problem is, they need to maintain the healthy environment that their children need. Again, self-centered and selfish parents always fail to realize what their children need, unless of course the children serve the parents’ own vested interest. Spiritually unsightly parents are out for themselves…
My beloved rabbi, teacher, and spiritual guide Rav Shalom Arush shlit’a stresses that child education is parental giving, not parental getting. Sure, kids must have responsibilities, but they’re not slaves or full-time domestic help and/or gardeners.
Remember, a child is Hashem’s safe-deposit of an exquisite and pure soul in your safekeeping. Rav Shalom says time and again that a child that grows up in a home of love and warmth won’t ever need Ritalin. People don’t like hearing this, but I’ve seen this phenomenon time and time again in family counseling.
Another thing that’s critical to remember – mistakes in child education are fatal. One must not err – this isn’t money, it’s life and death. In Jewish law, when handling lives, one judge isn’t enough – if a parent doesn’t know what to do, it’s better to do nothing until he or she has a chance to ask an expert.
Most problems in child education stem from deficiency in warmth love and understanding – in subsequent years, substance problems for example, can almost always be traced to deficiencies in warmth, love, personal attention, and understanding. Kids that lack warmth, attention, love and understanding grow with low self images and no self confidence; they don’t have the power to cope, so they look for cheap escapes.
It’s up to us as parents to avoid causing a deficiency in warmth, attention, love and understanding in our kids. How do we do that? Raising voices, anger, belittling kids should be considered treif in a Jewish household. Hitting children is really destroying a child. Don’t forget that a threatening father appears to a child like a 9-foot tall giant standing over him with a knife at his throat. Chill out, Dad – think about what are you doing? Scaring a child is a Torah transgression.
Like every other challenge in life, successful parenting boils down to strengthening our emuna. With emuna, we rid our lives of anger and arrogance. We start asking ourselves what Hashem wants from us, not the opposite. Hashem wants us to make every single effort to be wonderful parents. With His loving help, we will be, amen!
7/21/2019
Thank You Lazer, for what you wrote. It's very helpfull for me as a father. Yeverechecha, shalom