ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the question What is Jewish self-education? and what is a possible conceptual framework for it? by way of the story of Joseph, a onetime spoiled brat who became, through his own efforts, a paradigm of righteousness. A plausible place to begin the investigation is “Education for Mitzvot,” an essay written by the late Isaiah Leibowitz, one of Israel’s most notable savants. Leibowitz’s rhetoric seems to confirm the notion that Jewish education is, and should be, zealously oriented toward narrow socialization. Only one personage in the entire Torah is, in rabbinic literature, called the righteous one: Joseph, son of Jacob. It should be a good text and context to explore the processes of self-educadon, of moving toward the perfection that Maimonides finds in the ninth chapter of Jeremiah. Nehama Leibowitz, in her Studies in Bereshit, and in her teaching, dealt extensively with the Joseph stories.
