Torah section of Toldot: The secret of success in educating children

In the talk he gave in Manhattan, Rabbi Yoshiyahu Pinto referred to the Torah section of the week, explaining that you can learn from it how to be successful in educating children.

On the verse "And the children were struggling inside of her... and she went to inquire from God", our sages say that when Rebekah would pass by a pagan house of worship, Esau would struggle to leave. When Rebekah saw this, she went to Shem and Eber's study hall to inquire of God why this was happening.

Rabbi Pinto quoted Gemara Shabbat 23: "Rava said ‘Whoever shows mercy to and helps Torah scholars will merit to have sons who are Torah scholars. And if he respects Torah scholars, he will have sons-in-law who are Torah scholars.” When Rebekah saw that she had a son who became excited when she passed by houses of idolatry, she decided to go help the Torah scholars, Shem and Eber. She hoped that the son in her womb who wanted to go to sinful places, would become righteous in the merit of her helping these Torah scholars.

Rabbi Pinto explained in his talk that there is an important principle here. When a person is merciful to Torah scholars and puts forth effort for them - he merits that his sons will follow the path of God and become Torah scholars themselves. He should also do his best to show respect for Torah scholars in order to merit sons-in-law who are Torah scholars.

Rabbi Pinto advised: during these days, with the evil inclination as strong as ever, it is very difficult to educate children. So if a person wants to have scholarly sons, he should try with all his might to be merciful to Torah scholars. And if he wants to be worthy of having scholarly sons-in-law, he should also show respect to Torah scholars.

This article was written in cooperation with Shuva Israel