“Avimelech, king of the Philistines looked out the window”
The Hebrew word for “looked out” is Vayashkef (וַיַּשְׁקֵף). This word’s root has come to designate one’s conceptual scheme or world-view, in Modern Hebrew: Hashkafah (הַשְׁקָפָה). When and where does a child actually develop his or her Hashkafah?
The well-known mishnah states,
At five years old [one is fit] for Scripture, at ten years for Mishnah. At thirteen for the commandments. At fifteen for the Talmud. At eighteen for marriage. At twenty for pursuit [of one’s livelihood]....
The mishnah begins with 3 divisions of 5 years, each for a different area of Torah study: five years of Scripture, five years of Mishnah, and five years of Talmud. But in the middle of the five years of Mishnah, the child celebrates his Bar Mitzvah, and within the five years of Talmud marriage seems to interrupt. Actually, these are not interruptions. Rather, just as in order graduate from the study of Mishnah to Talmud one needs the “thirteen for the commandments,” the Bar Mitzvah in the middle, so too, in order to continue the momentum of Talmud study, up to age 20, one needs the “eighteen for marriage” in the middle. So, the Bar Mitzvah and marriage are accelerators. However, the study of Scripture does not need an accelerator.
Scripture Builds Faith
Since this is a program of development of the individual, we want to contemplate what the purpose of each five-year stage of study is. What is it that Scripture gives the child that learns it for five years—from “In the beginning God created” to the end of the Tanach? Scripture is meant to provide the child with the foundations of his faith. All the verses that you know by heart, from the years you studied Scripture from the age of five, are an engraving in the soul of the foundations of the faith of the Jewish people. It is written in Tanya that Scripture also awakens the power in the soul to call out to God; Scripture opens the direct link between the soul and God. This is the essence of faith.
Mishnah Accumulates Knowledge
What does the Mishnah add? In one word: knowledge. By studying Mishnah between the ages of ten and fifteen, the young person accumulates his main stock of knowledge. There are many types of knowledge, or information. Every Mishnah is some point of Divine knowledge one needs to know.
Bar Mitzvah: Turning Knowledge into Obligation
Why is there suddenly a Bar Mitzvah in the middle, during the years of accumulating Torah knowledge? Because knowledge should create obligation. If you know something you should act upon it. Before his Bar Mitzvah, the Rebbe Rashab learned all of Shulchan Aruch Orach Chaim so well that it penetrated into his bones, into his body, until the body itself fulfilled everything automatically (naturally). This is already beyond obligation because the actions become second nature, something that we call “natural consciousness.” But this is a high level not suitable for everyone. After three years of accumulating knowledge, the young person should feel obligated to fulfill what he or she knows.
Talmud Builds Hashkafah
After a 15-year-old has foundations of faith and has accumulated much knowledge in his head, what happens? It is around this age that the teenager needs to choose which Yeshivah to go to, what social group to belong to. Talmud is about figuring out the rationale. You need to know the text, the Mishnah (and the Braita) but Talmud is about figuring out the reasoning.
If we want to translate it into something more general, we can say that reasoning builds your own patterns of thought. All the time that you accumulated knowledge—before Bar Mitzvah and after Bar Mitzvah until the age of fifteen—you are not required to have your own, deep thought patterns. When you learn Talmud, you are not only learning the reasoning of the Talmudic sages—what Rava thinks and what Abaye thinks—but you also need to develop your own reasoning. Your reasoning is your patterns of thought. From all the reasoning that you learn from everyone, you build patterns of thought. In a word, the purpose of Talmud is to develop your Hashkafah, your world-view, or conceptual scheme.
Marriage at Eighteen Applies Your Hashkafah
Just as the Bar Mitzvah turns knowledge into obligation and commitment, so marriage validates one’s hashkafah, one’s worldview. To get married you need to find someone who shares your view of life. The most important thing to discuss when meeting a potential spouse is your views of life, your hashkafah.
To galvanize your hashkafah, you need to get married. A young person might say: “I think the government should do this and that, that's what I think.” But maybe it’s up to you? Perhaps you should “put your money where your mouth is,” get up and start doing something to make it happen? Marriage brings with it obligation. To completely manifest your hashkafah in your life, you must be a complete person, you need to get married. We need men and women to build the Jewish people and the Land of Israel and to bring Redemption to the world.
These three spiritual resources—faith (אֱמוּנָה), knowledge (יָדַע), and world-view (הַשְׁקָפָה)— are also related mathematically. Their sum is 676, the square of 26, the all-important value of God’s essential Name, Havayah. They possess 13 letters, or half of Havayah, which means that the average value of each letter is 52, the value of “son” (בֵּן). Possessing all three— faith, knowledge, and hashkafah—is a segulah (a charm) for having at least 13 sons.
