The Visions of Jewish Education

Edited by Seymour Fox, Israel Scheffler and Daniel Marom

Visions of Jewish Education is designed to promote the philosophical consideration of Jewish existence in our time as reflected in Jewish education, its alternative visions, its purposes and instrumentalities, the values it should serve, and the personal and social character it ought to foster.


Prevalent conceptions and practices of Jewish education are neither sufficiently reflective nor thoroughgoing enough to meet the multiple challenges that the world now poses to Jewish existence and continuity. New efforts are needed to develop an education of the future that will both honor the riches of the Jewish past and grasp the opportunities for fruitful interaction with the general culture of the present.


To promote such efforts, six leading scholars formulate their variant visions of an ideal Jewish education for the contemporary world. This groundbreaking book also illustrates the translation of educational ideals into practice and reports on sustained efforts to articulate such ideas as embodied in a particular school's ongoing activities.


Intended to stimulate others to engage in a philosophical re-envisioning of Jewish life and learning, Visions of Jewish Education should also provide a new approach to reform efforts in general education as well as in the education systems of various religious and ethnic communities.