SCIENCE AND TORAH
The typical gap year yeshiva program involves intense study of the Torah and Talmud, trips throughout the country, unique chesed opportunities, and strengthening the relationship with Israel. Our unique educational philosophy expands the experience, introducing new and challenging topics to its curriculum.
One area of focus, in the spirit of Maimonides and other great Torah giants, is the study of science and physics as essential reflections of God’s wisdom and the Torah. To help enhance this overall study, we brought our students on an unprecedented trip to CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research) in Geneva to study the Large Hadron Collider, as well as Bern, the birthplace of Einstein’s revolutionary theory of relativity.
Students, rabbeim and a few select guests were joined by Dr. Gerald Schroeder, world renowned physicist, modern orthodox Jew and author of Genesis and the Big Bang as well as other well-known books.
To many, the study of physics would seem extraneous, certainly outside the confines of a curriculum rooted in classical texts and sources. We on the other hand consider it essential to the basic philosophy of Judaism. Its study provides a greater understanding and appreciation of God’s world and through that, the recognition of the wisdom of the system that defines our existence in that world.
The basic tenets of the Torah, the Talmud, and of the entirety of Jewish law, requires a fundamental understanding of how the world works and how we, as humans, fit into the larger system. What better place to investigate that than where our understanding of reality was so greatly altered and where the most significant studies into the nature of the universe are happening today?
