WORDS OF WELCOME

Vivienne Anstey, Director

I would like to welcome everyone to this historical opening of the Florence Melton Adult Mini School, the first on the continent and the first city in South Africa. Cape Town often leads by example, with the rest of the country following our lead, and yet again we take the lead as the 63rd international city to introduce this programme, joining 20,000 graduates from around the world and 5,000 current students.

Most of you will have voted today for the local election and you have voted today with your commitment (and it’s a two year 30 week commitment) to a new process of adult Jewish education, a new paradigm of teaching and learning. 

Many of you have arrived, having taken a leap of faith, while others attended the “tasters” we provided around the city.  What Melton offers us is a unique and inclusive adult Jewish educational process that will give us the tools to build our knowledge, understand the assumptions of Judaism at its core and in the differences, enabling us to navigate our own growth and learning.  What is special is that the Melton curriculum is designed to accommodate every student at your own entry point and facilitate a movement forward towards your own objectives.  Our objective is to promote an environment of Jewish learning and discussion, attracting a wide range of audience to engage in the Jewish conversation that has been ongoing for the past 5000 years.

As you get to know each other over the next two years you will recognize the beauty of this programme in that you have been attracted to it as you come from all sectors of our Jewish community, left, right, centre and off course; people looking for opportunity to learn for the sake of Jewish learning, couples, singles, and ages across the spectrum. 

I have taken this opportunity to invite members of our Advisory  Board and Trustees to join us this evening to see the fruits of our joint efforts to get this programme off the ground and share in the our prayers for a stronger and more knowledgeable understanding of who we are as Jews. 

Torah Today by Pinchas Peli highlights the fact that readers of Torah are never bothered by the simpleton’s question:  of all the commentaries, which is the true or real one?  Keen students even of modern literature know, that what differentiates great literature  from its lesser counterparts is that the former can be interpreted on many levels, all equally true and real; this is certainly true of the word of G-d, embodied in Torah.  The rabbis liken it to a letter from a loved one who has gone on a long journey and in our longing for the absent beloved, we choose to read and re-read that letter, applying different meanings and interpretations to every word with every new reading.

We do this each Shabbat as we read the Torah portion, and each week provides us not only with a new text but also a new experience.  The Torah reading was never the sole province of scholars and rabbis; everyone has a share of it according to their own level. 

We hope that this is what the Melton programme offers each one of you, a share according to your own objectives and your own path and to develop new meaning and interpretation as each week unfolds.

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