Michael Laitman, on The Times of Israel: “What Are Some Noteworthy Quotes About Education?”

“Teach a child according to the child’s way.” – Proverbs 22:6.

There is also a noteworthy quote by Swiss teacher and publicist Adolphe Ferrière that explains how we fail to follow this principle, i.e.

“And they created the school as the devil commanded.

The child loves nature, so he was locked in four walls.

He can not sit without moving, so he was forced into immobility.

He likes to work with his hands, and he began to teach theories and ideas.

He likes to talk – he was told to remain silent.

He seeks to understand – he was commanded to learn by heart.

He would like to explore and search for knowledge himself, but he was given them in ready form.

And then the children learned what they would never have learned in other conditions. They learned to lie and pretend.”

This quote dates back to the beginning of the previous century, but it is just as accurate today. It shows how children have natures to be like free birds, but we place them into cages.

Why? It is simply easier and clearer for us to coercively make children stay within our four corners. And by doing so, we rob them of their soul’s, mind’s and heart’s free development, and even disrupt their bodily development.

The principle “teach a child according to the child’s way” means that children should be raised in ways that let them freely develop. In practice, it means that they should listen to adults, but adults should adjust themselves to be as interesting and as relevant as possible to the children. Also, children need a lot of time outdoors with their friends, and to be simultaneously with their friends and their teachers. That is, they should engage in several activities that involve creating, inventing and fixing things together, as well as in ongoing discussions with their peers and with adults where they need to debate certain topics and reach conclusions.

Such an approach develops children in the natural course of their activities. It liberates them and gives them the freedom to think and to develop new ideas. We have yet to see an educational system that develops children to their fullest potential in such a way. Instead, we pack them into cubes that constrain their thinking and optimal development.

In order to upgrade education to “teach a child according to the child’s way,” we need different teachers, or more specifically, teachers themselves need to initially undergo a different course of education over several years, and only then will they accordingly become ready to cater to children. We will then start seeing completely different results to the current ones.

I think that the move to this kind of education will come when we become completely disillusioned with the ways we currently raise children, when we see that our current systems serve to create a world of increasing depression, anxiety, stress, loneliness, and other problematic phenomena across the board on personal, social, economic and ecological scales.

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Question: An elderly couple that lived together for more than fifty years was asked how they managed to live together for so long? They answered that it must be because they were born and raised in the times when you fixed what was broken and did not throw them away.

Basically we are throwing away broken things today. Replacements come—no problem. If the relationship is completely broken, how can you fix it? People write to you all the time, and you insist on holding on to the end. But how do you hold on when everything has been broken and there is nothing left?

Answer: Have you lived together? Do you have children? Have your children given birth to grandchildren?

So you have to stay glued together somehow. For the sake of the children and grandchildren because they are your descendants, your consequence. Therefore, you must stay together for their sake. If only officially; it doesn’t matter how.

It means that you can live officially together. For them, you are together. You create this theater for grandchildren and children.

Question: And what does it give? Why are you so insistent on this?

Answer: This is called “family.”

Question: So family is grandchildren, children, and their parents? Is this a family?

Answer: Yes. All those alive and united with each other after all.

Question: Is there a root to this?

Answer: We have to keep this structure. It doesn’t matter whether you like it or not.

Comment: So this remains, even if it breaks me; if everything is already broken and I cannot tolerate the other…

Answer: Don’t pay attention. What’s the difference? What does “breaks” mean? You go on with your life, your wife goes on with her life, the children have their lives, the grandchildren have their lives, and so on. But you’re not breaking anything.

Question: So in a bad relationship, your advice is to act?

Answer: In any condition. You don’t even have to act; just don’t separate officially, don’t get divorced.

Comment: You are now obliging a person: “This is how you must live.”

Answer: If you are aimed at the family existing and at your descendants living within this framework, then you can uphold it. I think we must maintain this connection.

Question: What do you base this on? That this is a bad example for children and grandchildren? Now we are talking about elderly couples. Suddenly they decide to divorce, or suddenly they are in a bad relationship. Should they stick to it because it’s a bad example for children and grandchildren, and it may continue on?

Answer: That too. People should know that if they get married and have children, they should live, in a way, for the sake of the children.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 3/23/23

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Comment: In some countries governments officially take control of the Internet and block sites that promote, for example, pedophilia, etc.

My Response: Of course. If you have a family and small children, would you let them watch obscene programs on television or on the Internet? No. So we need to find some kind of regulator. The problem is how to find it.

Humanity is not inclined to look for something in common; it comes to something involuntarily, for example, an agreement on flights, on corridors for aircraft, and so on.

But in general, this is a big problem, especially with issues related to business. Some kind of moral basis is needed for this, and humanity does not have it.

Today’s parents, in principle, have other things to worry about. Our egoism has grown so much that the Internet does not correspond to what happens in schools. Therefore, I am in favor of reaching an international agreement, an international restriction.

Man is an animal, and the most terrible, ugly, and egoistic one on top of that! If we allow everything, it is not freedom, but a perversion that turns our life into such a swamp from which we would not get out! We would drown there. Therefore, we need to restrict ourselves so that we are at least in such a state from which we could initially go further, think of something, and choose some kind of middle line.

Our egoistic nature crushes us and pulls us to the very bottom. The popularity of porn sites is above everything else. This shows who we are!

I am not going to enforce anything, but it should be very limited and properly considered. I am not a hypocrite, but it must not be like that.

We will have to do something anyway. I am in favor of creating an international organization to control the Internet in which there would be representatives of all countries. This is the correct approach.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Control Over the World Internet” 11/3/12

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Question: Is it possible to say that the Creator plunged Himself into a state in which He perceives Himself as a creation?

Answer: No. All creations, in fact, are in one single, absolute, perfect state. In order for the creation to attain the Creator, it goes through all kinds of phases, which are called “exile,” so that they can attain from these phases of concealment, exile, and darkness the state they actually are in.

This can be compared to the way I deliberately make faces for my child as if I am angry, happy, suffering, or passionate about something in order to evoke all kinds of reactions in him, and he will begin to understand me better and develop.

Look at how many toys we invent, how many methods, not for the bodily development of children, but for their intellectual development. After all, if we did not do this, they would remain at the animate level as if they had been abandoned in a forest. How much humanity invests in kindergartens, schools, and education; this is a huge world!

All this is only in order to pull up a child who is born like a piece of meat, like an animal, and give him development. In just a few years, he goes through amazing revolutions inside himself and becomes a person who understands not what we understand, but more than that!

Can you imagine what is inherent in us from the very beginning?! What potential! All this is only thanks to the correct attitude to children.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Who is the Creator?” 10/27/12

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Question: Why do all children like to draw? What are these qualities and properties?

Answer: Drawing is an expression of one’s perception of the surrounding world because verbal means of attainment are not enough. Drawing is necessary for a person, it is the most ancient art. Since ancient times, people left cave carvings. After that, writing emerged. This is all about expressing yourself.

For example, there are many things within me that I cannot express other than through drawings. During lectures and lessons, I made thousands of drawings because they express much more than words. Drawing is the world.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Why Does a Person Draw?” 11/29/12

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Comment: In our world a person is judged by his achievements in society, to what status he reaches.

My Response: To what status? Sometimes I watch the news on TV channels and that’s it. All other programs talk about all kinds of frauds, murders, punishments, about the army—everything is forceful. The triumph of power is promoted: here we are him, and he is us, who will crush whom, and so on.

Is it really possible to educate the population about this?! Not even just to educate, but somehow to nurture a new generation.

What kind of person do you end up with? We have no idea what we are doing with society at the same time! Or is this the state program? Maybe it’s called freedom: Do what you want?! This is terrible!

And the Internet is not a free field either. They are led by serious forces; the state should think about what is happening in the field of the Internet. There are laws for its development, switching, and management. Or does the state think it’s OK to have so many porn sites there? It is an unreasonable approach! This also affects a person!

Of course, things like violence and murder, should be mentioned but in a very limited way so that we can see that there are such things. People need to be educated! Man is an animal. Once he climbed down from a tree, but today he is worse than in those days.

So where is this government policy?! Any parliament in the world deals only with internal bruising and nothing else. Look at the structure of the world, what selfishness has brought us to!

I’m not against crime films. But these should be isolated cases from which you can learn something, and not shown on all channels. By watching all this, negative examples are deposited in our brain, and we are already acting on these patterns: This is how I saw it in this film. These pictures pop up in a person, and he realizes them. This is the current upbringing.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. A Man Is Judged by His Deeds.” 6/16/12

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Question: Nadezhda writes: “The question is very painful for us. I could not get pregnant for a long time, and we decided to adopt a child from an orphanage. This was a lengthy procedure that took us five years. This is how Ilya appeared in our house.

And then I managed to give birth to a child. Today we have two sons Ilya and Denis. Ilya is 8 years old, and Denis is 6.

I am writing to you with the consent of my husband. We do not know what to do. Denis, our biological son, feels that he is less loved. He became irritable. He does not hide that he is jealous of his brother and shouts at him. He does not know that his brother is adopted, but we do know.

We have watched a lot of your talks on the topic of education. We have seen the one in which you say that adopted children become closer than biological ones. But we love them both equally. We do not single out anyone, and still, something is wrong.

We want them to be real brothers. We are suffering so much! How can we change the situation?

Answer: It is because you are constantly proving to yourself that you love your adopted son like your biological one. You cannot help but distinguish between them.

Question: It sits in them, and therefore the adopted son stands out, and the biological one, as it were, appeared naturally, he is ours, right?

Answer: Yes. Imagine that every time, in any turn, in any appeal, you still feel that you owe him as an adopted son. And the other one is yours.

Question: He will remain mine, and I must prove to the adopted son all the time that he is mine, right?

Answer: Yes. They will grow up, they will go their own way, and each will have his own family, and everything else. But for now, yes.

Question: Will it be like this for now? That is, our biological son feels at the inner level.

Answer: He is at the adopted child level. And the adopted child is at the level of the biological one. Because that is the way things are in our world.

Question: Can you give some advice, please? How can parents at least bring their children to a state in which they are still like brothers?

Answer: It depends on the parents. The kids probably do not know (the truth).

Question: They do not know. Can parents change internally like that?

Answer: No. It sits in them internally so deep. They wanted a child too much, and therefore, due to their strong aspiration, they accepted the adopted child in such a way that he became dearer to them than their own.

Question: Then tell me, what is love for these two children, the adopted and the biological one?

Answer: Love is earned. You must pay for it, sacrifice yourself, and then to that extent you love. They wanted a child so much that the adopted child is more precious to them than their own.

Question: But will this not lead to any distortions or tragedies?

Answer: Children will grow up and then they will figure it out. They will figure it out anyway. It will take time.

Question: Time heals here. So do you tell the parents to calm down? To keep living as they are living now? Obviously, they love both.

Answer: Yes, but still there is a difference.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 1/5/23

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Question: Can a person force his child to study Kabbalah?

Answer: Of course not! In no way! He just has to give him an opportunity, and the child himself chooses yes or no.

But, in principle, when a child is still small, you give him a certain amount of knowledge. You pass to him what you consider important. That is how the world works.

If you consider Kabbalistic knowledge important, then you instill it in him. If other knowledge is important to you, you will pass it on. This is natural for parents.

That is, what is natural in nature and thus recorded in our life has the right to exist.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. How to Find the Purpose of Your Child” 6/27/12

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Question: How should a person behave in order not to take away the freewill of someone else?

Answer: Love, but love can also be different, like a mother who smothers a child with her love. To love is to put the other’s desire and his way above your own.

Question: Let’s say parents build a child’s life according to their understanding of what is right and what is not. How can one determine the right path?

Answer: It is from the fact that you take the desires of the child and work with them, not with your own. That is why the Bible says to educate a child according to his way.

Question: How did you give such a foundation to your children?

Answer: I tried to ensure that they were more or less in a society in which they would not catch any viruses. Only this, nothing else.

They were brought up in normal conditions within the framework of a conservative education. I believe that this is how it should be with children; otherwise, you still fall under other currents that today have no direction, but just follow wherever the current takes them.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. How to Find the Purpose of Your Child” 6/27/12

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Question: Do you think that in the process of education it is better not to put pressure on the child, not to impose your views on him?

Answer: What do you mean by not to put pressure on? As a father, am I obligated to raise him? Of course I am.

I have to give him a certain amount of knowledge, skills, foundations, and examples, and some of them will develop into habits with the help of which he will behave in a certain way all his life. There is no escape from this!

You are the result of the education you received no matter what it was, but you are the product of your environment in childhood and in youth.

We cannot get rid of it. The upper governance created such a system around us in this way. Everyone is born in a certain circle, in a certain environment and surroundings. It is foolish to object to this if everything is arranged so by nature.

Comment: Information received from parents remains for life: “Dad said,” “Mom said.”

My Response: You cannot do anything about this. This is how everything is arranged in the world. Therefore, first of all, it is desirable to educate parents so that they properly educate their children. That is all. After all, the problem of education is the only problem in the world.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. How to Find the Purpose of Your Child” 6/27/12

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