Engaging our children in the parsha

The following are some suggestions of ideas for conversations with our children by the Shabbos meals. The key here is to get the children involved through debate and stimulation.

The Meraglim – imagine spying

Start telling the children about imaging being a spy. What is involved. Usually, the children (especially the boys) will start telling you about it. If there are several children, they might all start talking at once. In such a case, tell them you are going around the table letting each one tell you one thing about spying. Once you have got them talking and imagining what goes behind spying you now turn to the parsha. You then tell them to now compare it with what happened with the meraglim, spies. Where the Nesiyim, leaders, the right one’s for the job? Why the need for twelve spies and not only one or two? Why did they all travel together while spies usually split up? (We find that when Yosef’s brothers came to Mitzrayim looking for him they split up going through different entrances into the country.) Did they have any training? Would it not look suspicious carrying the enormous fruits everyone with them and make them look conspicuous? You then go into some details of what helped their espionage in that Hashem made unnatural things happen. They manage to travel all of Eretz Yisroel, Israel, by foot in just forty days! Wherever they went the people starting dying to distract attention from noticing the spies. Try and get them to note the differences that can lead them to ask questions.

The Mikoishesh Eitzim – wood gatherer

Very often we can imbue our children with emuna and a Torah perspective on things when seeing it through the parsha. Let us turn to the episode of the Mikoishesh Eitzim – wood gatherer. Imagine walking done the street on Shabbos and seeing a Jew taking an axe about to cut down a tree. You quickly scream at him not to do it since it is a forbidden melacha to do on Shabbos. He replies that he doesn’t care and proceeds to cut it. There has been a warning and witnesses. The Torah says that he must be stoned. What does it mean to be stoned? Is this a quick death? Why would someone ignore the warning that he would be sentenced to death? Why did this man not listen? When the children get involved, asked them how would they react had they been in this position? What about some people nowadays in Eretz Yisroel, Israel, who throw stones on the cars that drive on Shabbos? Are they right to do it? There is so much that can be linked in to this conversation that it should certainly get the children involved.

Wearing Tzitzis

Tell the children to imagine being dropped on a desert island where the inhabitants have never seen a Jew. They approach and start pointing at your tzitzis and laughing. What is that all about? What would be your response? We wear tzitzis because that is how we are brought up. But what do the tzitzis represent? Should they be seen or tucked in when going out amongst goyim? Again here is an everyday situation that children can relate to and once asked this basic question are hungry for the right answers.

A reference to some answers

See my page on Parshas Shelach where some of these questions are asked and answered. However, a whole lot have not been answered and require parents to find out before entering these conversations to be confident to give answers that will satisfy the children. Even when prepared there is always the odd question that you do not know the answer to. Under these circumstances, the best answer is to be honest and say that you will need to look into it. Sometimes praise the child and say that it is such a good question you will need to ask the Rov or he/she should asked their teacher.