After a year and a half of diligent weekly study, students of kitah bet made a siyum on all of Tanach! Every week since the beginning of kitah aleph, these students learned with Rabbi Zucker, twice a week, the narrative portions of Tanach, starting with Sefer Bereishit and ending with Nechemiah. The students took each of these lessons to heart—they cheered when King Shlomo built the Beit HaMikdash; they were sad when Bnei Yisrael went into exile. Rabbi Zucker will be going through the entire Tanach with these same students again, so that by the time they finish kitah gimmel, they will have gone through Tanach twice!

This project was the brainchild of Rabbi Hayyim Angel, BPY’s Tanach education scholar. The curriculum was planned carefully and comprehensively by Rabbi Angel, Rabbi Zucker and Dr. Hadar, with an eye toward giving students exposure and familiarity with all of Tanach at a very young age. A delicious pizza lunch siyum, and the spirited discussions were a fitting end to this first cycle of learning. As a special treat, Rabbi Zucker brought in a gold coin, from his collection, minted by Daryavesh (Darius), more than 2,500 years old, that helped pay for the building and upkeep of the second Beit HaMikdash. The coin itself is even mentioned in Tanach! The students marveled at seeing ancient history come alive in front of their very eyes.

But, for Rabbi Zucker, the greatest part of the program was when he asked the students what they remembered as the most exciting story from Tanach. Each student mentioned, in detail, the story they chose. Clearly, these students retained what they learned and it made quite an impression on them! As the siyum drew to a close, students approached Rabbi Zucker and their teachers and asked if they could please have Tanach all the way through kitah chet. BPY can’t wait until Tuesday, when the narrative continues with Adam and Chava and Gan Eden!