HASHEM spoke to Moshe, saying: “Take the staff and assemble the congregation, you and your brother Aaron, and speak to the rock in their presence so that it will give forth its water. (Bamidbar 20:7-8)
It’s not so easy to pinpoint the mistake that caused Moshe and Aaron not to enter the Holy Land. It seems purposely obscured. Was it that Moshe hit the rock rather than speaking to it? Was it that he hit it twice? Was it that he spoke disparagingly about the congregation? Was it a loss of patience? In any case, why was Moshe told to take a stick if he was to speak to the rock? Is that not a mixed signal and a cause for confusion? Is he to speak to the rock or to hit it? What was the purpose of telling Moshe to take the stick if the intention was for him to speak?
A friend of mine shared with me an educational point. It helps to speak to the rock when you have a stick in your hand! Even if you don’t use the stick, having that giant symbol of authority, helps pry open the ears of the listener. It’s no mystery that a policeman gets a little more respect because of the billy club he swings or the fire power he carries on his hip. It’s like Teddy Roosevelt had famously uttered, “Speak softly and carry a big stick!” This is a good thing for everybody if properly understood!
Someone told me that a young man came to visit the previous Skverer Rebbe and he sat down in a very casual manner, bordering on disrespect. The Rebbe was noticing his posture when the young man declared confidently, “I am only afraid of HASHEM!” The Rebbe responded, “Do you know how many “Yiras” –“Layers of fear”- that you have to go through to come to Yiras HASHEM!?”
The impressive part about speaking while holding a stick is that the authority figure is choosing to speak even though he has a license to employ a stick. Rabbi Kalish told our teachers at an in-service session, “Let’s say a young high school boy in my Yeshiva misses Davening in the morning. I have enough clout and leverage to guarantee that he will come to Davening the next day.
However, I want him to come to Davening 30 years from now.” He went on to explain the famous verse from Mishlei 22:6, “Chanoch L’Naar Al Pi Darcho, Gam Ki Yazkin, Lo Yasir Mimena” – “Raise the child according to his way, so that when he grows old, he will not depart from it”. He said that everybody emphasizes the first part of that verse but too many lose sight of the second part. Whatever methodologies we employ when educating, we should have the long game in mind. We can win a single battle by using force but lose the war or we can lose many battles and still win the war. There is a world of difference between Chinuch – Education and Control.
I read in a book entitled, “Spare the Child”, multiple cases of parents, who with noble intentions, by exercising control, turned what would otherwise have been pleasant and holy experiences, into something so supercharged with negative neuro-associations that their child can no longer enter a Shul or open a Siddur, and the parent insists, “I emphasized Davening!” It was not Chinuch though!
The Prophet Zacharia (4:7) writes, “Not with force and not with power, but by My spirit, says HASHEM the G-d of Hosts”. The Piascenzo Rebbe writes in the introduction to Chovos HaTalmidim that Chinuch, education is a process of mining out from inside the child rather than piling on from without.
I have become proficient at starting fireplace fires in recent years. There is a lot to be learned from this exercise. You start a fire with small stuff, not big logs. They are the last to catch on! Once the little branches and twigs are burning long enough, then the big logs start to catch on and the fire is a success.
Our job as parents and teachers is to provide gentle encouragement, long enough, until the young adult has developed a fire of their own. The big stick is like a match to catalyze, but the real fire is the inspiration that has been awakened within. This is what can happen when we speak softly even though we are carrying a big stick!
Image Credit: Fred Barkhouse via CC BY-NC-SA 2.0, Flickr