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Religious Education through Literature

Author: Published on: Published in: Religion, Arts & Culture

(Author: Azila Reisenberger, Vol. 64, #1, Pesach 2009)

 

Abstract

Religious education in South Africa is at a turning point. No longer may  religious instruction in a particular tradition be accepted as a matric (final year) subject. Instead, religious education takes the form of general religious studies.

This paper proposes that instead of seeing the new policy as a crisis, one should see it as an opportunity to reconstruct the format of Religious Education in South Africa and update it for modern needs. Furthermore, as teaching a particular religious tradition is prohibited, the paper proposes that instead of abandoning it, one can teach religious education through literature. Since the background study for the paper has been done in the Jewish Community, examples from Jewish education and the Jewish community in South Africa are used, but the theory and the proposals made in the paper could be seen as a model for all religious traditions, and in particular traditions and denominations that are not in the mainstream.

Worldview

From the minute babies are born their senses take note of the world around them. As we grow and develop our emotional and intellectual capacity, we keep assimilating the information we receive of the world and accommodating our perceptions of ourselves and our place in the world around us in line with the new information. This perpetual process depends on the impact the world has on us, and the impact we make upon our surroundings. At the same time, it affects the overall model we have of the world and ourselves. In turn this model is the ‘spectacles’ through which we continue to view all of the above. David Chidester describes this process as a negotiation of our “worldview”, describing worldview as “…an open set of discursive, practical, and social strategies for negotiating person and place in a world” (1992:4).

In keeping with Joachim Wach’s definition of religion, Chidester goes further and suggests that our worldview corresponds to our religious view. The essence of this argument is that our multi-dimensional understanding of the world is, in fact, one and the same as what we usually call ‘religious beliefs’ comprising the theoretical, practical and social dimensions (Wach as in Chidester 1992:176).1 I maintain that philosophical understanding of religion may deal with the essence of religion but it does not deal with the pragmatics of organised religions, each of which has its own history, perception of the Deity as well as a particular code of worship and of expected behaviour.

Each organised religion likes to teach its followers its own uniqueness in order to shape them to what it deems to be better members of the particular tradition. Such religious instruction can be carried out at adult level, but many religious traditions prefer to start it at the young, school-going age. In South Africa we know of many churches2 that provide after-hours, or weekend religious tuition, such as Catechism, Sunday School, Madrasa, Cheder etc.

There are many reasons for starting religious instruction at a tender age. Better informed children can relate to, and feel part of, the church from a young age. They can also be better indoctrinated at a young age, which ensures that a) they are dissociated from other religions or denominations, thus cutting out any ‘wrong choices’ that they may make in attempting to join them – a strong reason for the dogmatic character of many organised religions and b) it ensures that they do not question authority.

From an educational point of view, teaching people from a young age is an effective way of implanting in them a particular worldview as a blueprint for whatever they subsequently learn – the information is embedded in their consciousness before they reach the rebellious age when they question everything and tend to rebel against whatever the older generations present to them.

In the Twentieth Century, when parents and communities delegated the education of their children to the schools, most schools in South Africa3 offered religious instruction in line with Christian thought, Christianity being then seen as the dominant religion. Children of other religious traditions could be excused from class, and these traditions were allowed to send their own instructors to teach such children. In addition, further religious instruction of minority groups was outside of school hours or at special schools that were established and run by particular communities, for example the Islamia College, or the Herzlia schools in Cape Town – for Muslim and Jewish children respectively.

Religious instructors

The validity of religious instruction – as well as the method of optimising it – is a subject of fierce debate. On one side are the religious leaders who put forward faith-based indoctrination when they construct their curricula and employ teaching methods, and on the other are the philosophers of education who put emphasis on teaching methodologies, wide-ranging information, critical thinking, and interpretation.4 For many years the latter, i.e. educationalists, have stressed that indoctrination is not a sound way to impart knowledge, including knowledge that deals with religious matters. “Like the nascent fields of psychology and sociology, religion as a phenomenon, like the human mind or human society, has to be seen not as a given, but as an object of …[investigation]” (Thistlethwaite 2003: 390), and this means that religious instruction must also fit into the greater world context and no longer be taught in restrictive isolation.

If one follows the proposition of many scholars that ‘[r]eligion, like science and history, is an expression of the human attempt to understand and respond to what is really the case’ (Newbigin 1982: 105), then to instruct religion along narrow and dogmatic lines would be counterproductive.

Furthermore, recognising that religious beliefs or worldviews are not crystallized entities but involve a process of modification and transformation, lends emphasis to the aspect of evolution and growth. This applies not only of curricula but also to the role of the educators involved in religious education – who need to adjust their methodology and their attitude in accordance with their time and place. Attitudes and methodology that worked in the Middle Ages are not necessarily effective in the 21st Century; what is suitable for 10 year-olds is different from what is suitable for 18 year-olds; and what is applicable in Jerusalem is not necessarily effective in South Africa.

Having said this, it must be clear that while methods of teaching are changing, the core of the material changes very little since the core scriptures of most religions have not changed significantly throughout the ages, and the mode of worship has been evolving very slowly. What is malleable and changing is the way the adherents interpret these scriptures, and how they negotiate between their life experience and the demands of the scripture, i.e. what they choose to emphasise and practice, and what they try to play down and even disregard.

Religious leaders’ conservative approach and general dismissive attitude towards change can impact on the way they teach, and this paper suggests that it hinders their efficacy and success, especially when teaching young adults who are themselves going through a major process of personal change and development. This becomes clear when we note that within the process of negotiation of worldview, two fundamental factors exert particular power and authority on issues that come under scrutiny, namely relevance of the issue to our own existence and our own ability to relate to it and to the mediator (i.e. the instructor).

Relevance and ability to relate to instructors influence both the learners’ wish to learn as well as their willingness to accommodate and assimilate the material which is presented to them. And as far as religious instruction is concerned, these factors impact on the learner’s decision whether to keep and uphold particular religious practices, customs, beliefs, or to discard them – in line with their worldview.

Jewish religious education in South Africa

As this paper deals with religious education in South Africa, one needs to illustrate how the above applies to the practices there; and as the initial study concentrated on Jewish Education, Judaism will be used as the model for other religious traditions.

Having said that all worldviews are constantly negotiated, it is important to note that in 2007 religious education in South Africa is not part of a constant ongoing evolution but rather at an abrupt turning point. In 2005 the South African Minister of Education announced that religious instruction in a particular tradition cannot be accepted as a matric (final year) subject. From 2008, religious education at this level has instead taken a form of general “religious studies”. Within this topic the students must learn the history of religions and religious concepts, the way religions organise themselves, ethical principles and the social issues that most religions struggle with, etc. This should be seen as a move in the right direction towards reconciliation and unity, but the leaders of the various religious traditions – especially leaders who represent minority groups, amongst them Jewish community leaders – have expressed their grievous concern.

As has been mentioned above, the community fears that if children are not introduced to their religious traditions while they are young, not only may they miss years of instruction, but more importantly, religious educationists may miss the opportunity to reach children before they arrive at the critical, rebellious and antagonistic phases of their lives, thereby escalating their resistance to what seems to them conservative and old fashioned. 5 Rabbis and community leaders may know instinctively that worldview and religious beliefs are negotiated throughout our lives, and they want to reach the young Jewish children while they still take for granted, as “God’s word from Sinai”, everything that the parents and teachers tell them. This unquestioned foundation of our worldview, what we imbibe with our “mother’s milk”, is identified by the sages as Girsa de’Yankutah6, and in most cases it is so entrenched in our worldview that it forms an unquestionable axiom and becomes a non-negotiable foundation of our worldview.

The education ministry does not, in fact, prohibit schools from teaching about a particular religious tradition in the primary schools,7 but rather has stopped a detailed study thereof at a matriculation level. Alas, this prohibition signals to parents and learners that this subject is not to be taken seriously. The paper suggests that the Education Minister’s decree be seen as an opportunity to bring Jewish and other minority religion’s education in South Africa up to date through some radical changes, rather than becoming alarmed and hostile on the one hand or giving up on religious instruction altogether on the other. It advocates a paradigm shift, i.e. teaching the religion by means of teaching literature. This will require a change of teaching texts, for example, from the traditional Scriptures to Modern Hebrew literature written in South Africa, and replacing religious leaders as instructors with modern teachers of literature. If one proposes that the raison d’être of teaching this particular material is to highlight its Jewish aspects, then one has to ensure that instructors have a solid knowledge of Jewish tradition in addition to their training in literature.

Learners’ responses

Currently Jewish religious instruction in South Africa is carried out mainly in two ways. About three-quarters of Jewish children of school-going age in South Africa go into the Jewish day school system where the Hebrew language and Jewish religious instruction are included as part of the curricula; the remainder have religious instruction to varying degrees –  from none at all to extensive teaching within the local communities.

At the communal institutions, i.e. local synagogues, the instructors are the Rabbis, their assistants, or their wives, and as the time for instruction is restricted the syllabi are limited and aim mainly at preparation for Bar- or Batmitzvah.

At the Jewish Day School, on the other hand, the ‘Jewish’ syllabi include Jewish history, introduction to custom and tradition, learning to use the prayer book, familiarity with the Jewish calendar, exercise of practices, etc. The historical aspects can be, and mostly are, taught by history teachers, but all other aspects that deal more with traditional practices, laws and customs, are taught by Rabbis. On occasions when this is not possible they are taught by men or women who are observant of the Halachah in the strictest form.

Many young adults in the Jewish day school system complain bitterly that they do not find the material relevant to their own lives and that they cannot relate to the Rabbis, who are the mediators of the learnt material. It seems, then, that Jewish religious instruction for them has not been very effective.8

The problems cited by learners interviewed in 2004 were the inability to relate to the Rabbis or the very observant men and women – who are, in the main, visibly different from the students in their clothes, their religious apparel, men’s beards, head covers and Tzitzit, women’s wigs etc. Furthermore, the teaching methods employed were mostly not up-to-date teaching methods. The Rabbis tended to exercise the learners on what they themselves had learnt in their religious academies, called Yeshivas, which concentrate on the study of religion with no secular topics whatsoever. The material that they chose to pass on to the learners did not, in the main, feel relevant to their young, mostly secular charges. In other words, Jewish instruction in South Africa to date is seen by many learners as irrelevant, and they cannot relate to it or to the instructors.

A suggestion9

I suggest that the term ‘Jewish’ or ‘Jewish identity’ be seen as an inclusive term incorporating: religious practice side by side with issues of ethnicity and community, Hebrew language, history with attention to the ‘in-group’, attachment to Israel and, last but not least, a study of South African Jewry as a particular minority group in South Africa. This paper proposes that all the above can be reached through teaching Jewish Literature, or even better: Hebrew Literature that has been written in South Africa.

It is safe to say that Hebrew literature written in South Africa was directed at the ‘in-group’ only. The topics and themes it covers reflect the lives of the learners and their families. Teaching this particular literature will incorporate the teaching of Hebrew (which is also needed for prayer) with themes that the learners will be able to relate to while at the same time identifying with the South African context of the story. Moreover, since the material reflects a reality similar to their own, it will hopefully draw them closer to their families, many of whom may be reflected in the stories. All these aspects make it more relevant to the learners; and, above all, they will be able to relate to the educators, who are modern people trained as teachers with modern methodologies.

Furthermore, even when the teachers deal with Jewish customs and rituals they will not be seen as judgmental – as the Rabbis seemed to be – since they seem to be ‘like us’. This will allow for more open discussion, for freedom to ask questions without fear of being called am ha’aretz, which is the derogatory term that the Rabbis employ to describe ‘ignorant’ religious people.

Problems of relating to the texts

To date the material taught in Jewish Instruction classes is chapters from the Bible, the Talmud, or limited paragraphs from traditional books that state the Halachah. Unfortunately these texts, on the whole, seem to lack relevance to the learners’ lives. Scriptural debates regarding whether you are or are not allowed to do certain work on the Sabbath are not relevant to learners whose parents go to work or do shopping on that day. Furthermore, paragraphs stating which foodstuffs are Kosher or not, are not seen as relevant to learners who live in a home which does not adhere to the laws of Kashrut. So many of the texts studied in class to date were perceived as foreign and not relevant to the learners.

Problems of relating to the teachers

Most scholars agree that one of the most important aspects affecting the efficacy of teaching is the differing levels of student involvement. “Teacher behaviours do cause students to be either active or passive, and thus largely determine both overt and covert involvement” by students (Hough 1967: 376, 377).

Cogan methodically proves that there is a direct link between students’ perception of their teachers and student behaviour and change (1967: 70). This perception is shaped by the behaviours and actions of the teachers and the general interaction between student and teacher. If the teaching methods and behaviours of the teacher are inclusive and integrative (including traits such as motivating students, relating to students, being self-effacing, being responsive), there is a positive increase in required and also self-initiated work (1967: 87). However, if a teacher creates a learning environment where students do not feel comfortable about expressing their personal opinions (“preclusive behaviour”)10 and there is strong “dominative contact”11 by the teacher over the student, there will be a direct negative effect on the production of required and self-initiated work (1967: 82), and students “will be more easily distracted from their schoolwork as well as rejecting of teacher domination”. (Flanders 1967: 105). Cogan reiterates the Deweyan Philosophy of Education, and suggests that “there is an intimate and necessary relation between the processes of actual experience and education” (Cogan 1967: 72).

Successful teachers, therefore, have to create the environment for students to feel comfortable in assimilating the knowledge into their own understanding; encourage  inclusive and integrative behaviour in both themselves and students; and use teaching methods that promote personal experience which can transform random knowledge into understood meaning for each student.

All these educational qualities are rarely displayed by Rabbis, who are not trained as educators, but rather as the upholders of the religion which requires them to be more dogmatic. Thus a situation is created where the visible differences between students and religious instructor, compounded by the lack of methodological skills, together with the visible difference in degree of religious observance, catapults the Religious Instruction classes into an artificial space, into a vacuum.

Studying religious education in a vacuum and without personal affiliation creates fundamentalism and “inhibits future development of religious thinking”, while at the same time engendering the situation of “hypocritical conformity” where both students and teachers “are invited to pretend to believe what they do not in fact believe to be true” (May 1968: 52).

I agree with Edwin Cox who suggests that all the aims for religious teaching should be justifiable on educational grounds too “so as to contribute to the growth of the pupils’ understanding and ability to think about and deal with the secular pluralistic settings of their greater lives.” (Cox 1982: 56). Understanding of one’s religion within a greater and more open context allows for an understanding of one’s religion’s contributions to culture, music and other disciplines. It also allows for further acceptance of other people’s beliefs (desirous to South Africa and imperative in our expanding global community) and provides an opportunity for students to create their own individual belief that is sincere and hence stronger under scrutiny (Cox 1982: 56).

I suggest that through studying literature together learners can properly engage in understanding the characters, and, if they have religious inclinations, learners can incorporate their insights into their own worldviews – through the process of thinking rather than through dogmatic instruction. P. May, who has made a similar proposition, terms the use of literary tools for religious education the “poetic approach” (1968: 65).

Teaching through discussing literary characters allows personal understanding through individual identification and cognitive evaluation. Through discussion and debate, concepts cease to be alien or threatening and can be fitted into our familiar schemes and assimilated into our lives (Robinson, 1982: 88).

I maintain that religious education via literature is the best way of creating a teaching medium that promotes wider thought, individual identification and assimilation, and personal understanding of a subject that is usually difficult to grasp as abstract and theoretical. Once we have properly understood a concept for our own individual selves, it can be mentally linked to other concepts we already understand and “this kind of learning permeates the being” (Sotto 1994: 59) and has lasting effect on our worldview. Newbigin suggests that instruction should be made via a medium that allows students to see a concept as a truth (via understanding) and yet be open to further evidence which might enable them to amend this belief – students will accept because they understand on a personal level (1982: 104). This can be done when discussing narratives that depict South African reality, rather than learning texts two millennia old.12

A case study

Through my research on Hebrew literature written in South Africa, I have become familiar with the writing of Zalman Aaron Lison. His stories were prominent in the Barkai, the Hebrew journal published in South Africa from 1933 to 1970. Lison’s Hebrew was good and his stories flowed and were engaging – his aesthetic skills and the stories’ literary merit were beyond doubt.

After his death his family published a selection of his stories in book form. I chose two of these stories and, with their permission, introduced them into the syllabi of senior grade students in South Africa.13 This in turn required some preliminary work by way of printing the stories and preparing accompanying material, such as literary analysis of the stories for teachers and more experienced students who are able to read it in Hebrew, as well as background articles on the historical context and the Jewish customs that are depicted in the texts. These latter articles are written in English for the students to read by themselves. All this was done, and was published together in the form of a book entitled Pride in Tradition through Acceptance: Jewish Identity in South Africa as reflected in the stories of Zalman A. Lison (Reisenberger 2005).

One of the stories, Darga Basulam, describes the relationship between a Jewish smous and the people of the land, i.e. the African folk and a Boer farmer. The unravelling narrative portrays the torturous lives of the immigrants as well as the relationship between the Jewish immigrants and the locals. From a Jewish point of view, the story highlights (amongst others) the following themes:

  1. the importance of Jewish names,
  2. specific beliefs and traditions related to death,
  3. mixed marriages, and
  4.  the importance of the community.

As the story describes many Jewish customs and rituals, it is an excellent way to teach these customs to students who, to date, have been alienated by the overpowering religious teachers teaching these topics in their Jewish daily schools. These customs can be taught while discussing the protagonists in the narrative rather than by Rabbis ‘prescribing’ them and pressurizing the student to ‘adhere or else’. Learning customs through discussing a third person rather than the ‘self’ allows for freedom to question, protest, prove ignorance, negate, etc. Furthermore, as the teacher is a trained teacher and well versed in educational methodologies, she or he is more likely to be more open-minded, encourage debate, and be less judgemental on topics of tradition.

The story also illustrates the importance of a Hebrew/Jewish name. This may encourage the students to familiarise themselves with their own given names or, in their absence, to choose a name, and be proud of it.

During interviews with two Heads of Department from Herzlia, the Hebrew day school in Cape Town, one of the teachers expressed the following reservations concerning the teaching of this particular story (which may apply to other locally written Hebrew literature):

  • Some learners don’t have, don’t know or don’t care about, Hebrew names.
  • Some learners suffer as a result of a mixed marriage, and dealing with it as a literary theme may upset them.
  • Ten years after the dismantling of the Apartheid political system, fond depiction of the Boer farmers may not be politically correct.

These points support my proposal, as when these issues are raised and discussed in a non-threatening environment by instructors whom the students can relate to, then the students are more likely to absorb the knowledge and incorporate it into their lives.

 Conclusion

The paper has suggested that, instead of seeing the new policy as a crisis for Jewish, or any other particular Religious Education, we should see it as an opportunity to reconstruct and update our methods in line with modern needs. The old style of teaching specific religious texts by religious leaders could be replaced with teaching literature written in South Africa by teachers of literature. The students can relate easily to modern teachers of literature, and the texts will raise issues pertaining to various aspects of their traditions in the country they know. The projection of the issues onto protagonists in a narrative rather than onto the students themselves will enable more open debate and rigorous inquiry since the discussion is transferred from first person to a third person

I believe that this will increase learners’ desire, as well as their ability, to practice their religious tradition.

References

Awotua-Efebo, E.B. Effective teaching. (Port Harcourt: Paragraphics). 1999.

Chidester, David. Shots in the Streets, Violence and Religion in South Africa. (Cape Town: Oxford University Press). 1992.

Cogan, M.L. ‘Theory and design of a study of teacher-pupil interaction’. In Flanders, N. (ed), Interaction analysis: theory, research and application. (Massachusetts: Addison-Wesley Publishing). 1967.

Cox, E. ‘Educational religious education’. In Hull, J. (ed) New directions in religious education. (Basingstoke: Taylor and Francis Printers). 1982. Flanders, N. ‘Teacher influence in the classroom’, In Flanders, N. (ed)? Interaction analysis: theory, research and application. (Massachusetts: Addison Wesley Publishing). 1967

Francis, L. ‘Measurement reapplied: Research into the child’ attitude towards religion’, In Hull, J. (ed), New directions in religious education.

(Basingstoke: Taylor and Francis Printers). 1982 Good, Thomas et al Teachers make a difference. (USA: Holt, Rinehart, Winston). 1975.

Hough, J. ‘Classroom interactions and the facilitation of learning the source of instructional theory in Flanders’, N. Interaction analysis: theory, research and application. (Massachusetts: Addison Wesley Publishing). 1967.

Jackson, R. Religious Education, an Interpretive

approach (London: Hodder and Stoughton), 1997. May, P. and Johnston, O. Religion in our schools (London: Hodder and Stoughton). 1968.

Newbigin, L. ‘Teaching religion in a secular plural society’. In Hull, J. (ed) New directions in religious education. (Basingstoke: Taylor and Francis Printers). 1982.

Reisenberger, A. Pride in Tradition through Acceptance: Jewish Identity in South Africa as reflected in the stories of Zalman A. Lison.  (Cape Town: Green Sea Publishers). 2005.

Robinson, E.A. ‘Religious education: A shocking business’. In Hull, J. (ed), New directions in religious education. (Basingstoke: Taylor and Francis Printers). 1982.

Sotto, E. When teaching becomes learning: A theory and practice of teaching. (London: Cassell). 1994.

Thistlethwaite, S. ‘Counterpoint: Settled issues and neglected questions: How is religion to be studied’. In Olson C. (ed)? Theory and method in the study of religion. (USA: Wadsworth). 2003.

Wach, Joachim. Sociology of Religion. (Chicago: University of Chicago press). 17-34. 1994.

 

Dr Azila Talit Reisenberger is a Senior Lecturer in Hebrew and Jewish Studies in the School of Languages and Literature, University of Cape Town. Her poetry and short stories have been widely published in South Africa, Israel, the USA, UK and Germany.

 

NOTES

  1. In line with the malleability and negotiated character of what constitutes our worldview, Chidester terms these discursive,practical and social aspects ‘strategies’ rather than beliefs, yet he deals with these strategies (worldview) when he discusses religious beliefs. I follow his argument when I deal with religious studies.
  2. The term ‘church’ is used here to denote a religious community body, thus it can also represent synagogue, mosque, temple etc
  3. I do not discuss here the Bantu Education system, as it raises many problematic issues, none of which are relevant to the core issue of the paper.
  4. For a study of Religious Education with particular emphasis on an interpretive approach, see Robert Jackson, 1997.
  5. Leslie Francis states that there is a constant and persistent deterioration in a child’s attitude towards religion as their age increases. The rejection of religion is also founded in early education and gets compounded as school years progress(Francis 1982: 26, 27).
  6. Which literally means: the way you learn initially (as a baby). Used often by the 11th century Biblical and Talmudic commentator Rashi.
  7. And indeed the subject is a part of Life Orientation.
  8. By interview of a random sample of 20 past learners from Herzlia, the Hebrew day school in Cape Town, who had matriculated in 2003.
  9. I propose that minority groups, such as Muslims or Hindus in SA, use the module to investigate the religious education in their own community.
  10. Cogan 1967: 80
  11. see Flanders’ concept of when teachers have strong dominating control over their students (Flanders 1967: 104)
  12. Indeed, at younger ages, when learners have fewer skills to debate and struggle with abstract concepts, one may still have to maintain religious teaching alongside particular scriptures in order not to deviate too much from the core religious principles and lose the essence of all the discussion in the first place. See May 1968: 69.
  13. “Senior grade” here denotes students at matric level and undergraduate students at university.

 

 

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