Ethics of the Mothers & Fathers on How to be a Mensch (Winter 2021)

Pirkey Avot, the lessons of the first generations of rabbis (200 BCE-200 CE), is the most popular and oft-quoted rabbinic book. Its practical proverbs in uncomplicated language made it user-friendly to many more people than scholars.

This class will focus on Pirkey Avot’s most general advice on how to be a mensch, a “stand-up” person, and sometimes a hero. A quarter of the book is devoted to these kinds of sayings, meaningful to Jews as well as people of all faiths and traditions.

Texts will be from Rabbi Cartun’s illustrated translation and commentary, called Family Stories: Pirkey Avot v’Immahot (“lessons of our fathers and mothers”). Having taught Pirkey Avot for many years, he noticed that available translations & commentaries were formal, often preachy, and exclusively male-oriented. So he made his own version for youth and adult education: in modern gender-inclusive plain English, with illustrations showing people in all of our human diversity. Its commentary is based on questions and explanations, not sermons.