Israel – Teachers at Orot College in Elkanah wish to alleviate Israel’s math problems by imparting algorithms and pedagogical techniques developed by Jewish Sages over the generations.
Subscribe to our Daily Roundup Email
The reason for the new course is to help improve Israeli students’ dwindling math achievements and motivate new Torah-oriented math teachers.
Dr. David Zeitun, head of Orot’s Mathematics Department, says that Israel’s low math scores in international terms stem from the use of faulty teaching methods, which are suited neither to Israel’s population nor to the knowledge being transmitted. In addition, the Central Bureau of Statistics reports that Israel faces a growing shortage of trained math and science teachers. The lack is expected to reach into the hundreds in the coming years, and the Education Ministry says it is having trouble finding math teachers even now.
Dr. Zeitun, who came from France, told Israel National News of the three topics he plans to feature in the new course: “Traditional Jewish teaching methods, various scholarly books written by Jewish Sages on math calculations and the like, and many Talmudic passages having to do with math.”
He said he “cannot understand why the Education Ministry is bringing in new methods of teaching math from Singapore, when many of the elements therein have been the bread-and-butter of rabbis and Jewish teachers for generations.”
These include repetition of verses and Mishnayot (which can be applied to multiplication tables), the extraction of the ‘bottom line’ law from amidst complex argumentation (and avoiding the long and confusing explanations that are often found in new math books), the use of stories, and more.
The Orot College is “dedicated to education and representing academia in the spirit of Torah,” its website says, and wishes to train new math teachers among the religious public.
Dr. Zeitun noted that many Jewish scholars, such as Maimonides (Rambam), Gersonides (Ralbag), the Maharal, and others, wrote scholarly treatises on math topics, and these should be recognized today. In addition, the Talmud is replete with math calculations such as figuring out the area of a round Sukkah, the circumference of Jerusalem, astronomical calculations that predict with pinpoint accuracy when the new moon will appear hundreds of years in advance, and more.
It was noted that the great German mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss has been credited with discovering, when he was a boy over 200 years ago, a quick way of summing up numbers in an arithmetic series – which has become the accepted method for doing so. In fact, however, the method appeared hundreds of years earlier in a popular Talmudic commentary by the Tosafists in Tractate Sukkah. Dr. Zeitun noted that the famous French number theorist Fermat studied under Gersonides.
Having recently merged with Moreshet Yaakov College, Orot is now the largest and most diversified of all religious academic teaching colleges in Israel. A total of some 1,500 students are registered this year for full-time undergraduate studies, with another 150 M.A. students.
A nice try, but ultimately this article is nonsense.
2000 year old pre-scientific superstition is no substitute for modern mathematics.
Fermat lived a couple of hundred years after the Ralbag (Gersonides).
If you do a little research on game theory, you will see that it traces its origins to a misnah in yevamos. Game theory is so complex that a number of nobel prizes have been awarded based on advancement of its study, international economics and accordinding to some, the strategy behind the MAD protocols relating to the nuclear programs were also based on game theory.
The Baal Ha Turim used remez in a way that closely resembles Lie Algebra and Group theory in modern math.
Does anyone know where the Tosafos in Succah the article refers to regarding summing arithmetic series is?
People don’t realize that the Chachmei Hatalmud believed that the Moon had its own light, as opposed to being a reflection of the sun.
That’s why the Talmud could entertain the notion, that at night the sun is passing right above us over the sky which is non-transparent, an yet the moon, underneath the sky, can shine.
The Chachmei Hatalmud also believed that there is no such a thing as different time zones. When it becomes day, it became day for all over, and also for Hashem for Him to keep Shaabos, or for the Malochim for them to say Shira.
astronomers nowdays have all agreed after endless calculations that the true length of each month is as stated in the Talmud, 29 days 12 hours 793 chalokim
hafoch bo v’hafoch bo. keep on going over and over all and u will see its ALL in there.
I agree with comment # 9. On this subject, I just finished reading a recently released Hashkafah book, Search Judaism: Judaism’s Answers to a Changing World by Rav Yitzchok Fingerer. It was so fascinating because it proves in great detail (with methodical scientific research) the validity of the Torah and how the Torah and Talmud knew empirical science, math, and psychology (including mathematics) eons before recent discoveries. It’s an amazing read and is available from Targum/Feldheim. It’s the type of book that makes you so proud to be part of Am Yisroel and is refreshing both intelectually and emotionally. I