We would probably have expected that China would be in the news a great deal this week because of the official state visit of China’s president, Hu Jintao, who was hosted by President Obama in the White House over the last few days.  What we might not have expected, however, was that China would be in the news for another reason, namely the sudden fascination with a recently published book written by a young law professor at Yale by the name of Amy Chua.  The book is called “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother”, and it chronicles the author’s trials and tribulations while raising her two young daughters.  

Mrs. Chua, who was raised in the States by Chinese parents, but who is married to a Jewish man, and is raising her daughters as Jews, decided that she would create in her home the kind of atmosphere and the level of expectation that would be found in what she calls a traditional Chinese home.  In her mind this means that children are expected to behave perfectly, that they should score a 100 on every test they take, come home with straight As on every report card, that they should win every spelling or math contest they enter, and play an instrument better than any other child in their school.  The book is filled with anecdotes that might strike the modern American parent as borderline abusive - in one story, Mrs. Chua describes locking her 3 year old out of the house on a cold day and telling her she will be let back in when she knows how to behave properly.  In another, her daughter misses some questions on a math test, and the author makes the girl complete literally hundreds of math problems every night before she allows her to go to bed.

Mrs. Chua has had a bit of a rough ride in the media over the last 10 days, but she is on the circuit, and has appeared on every major radio program and TV show, and her book has been reviewed in every major news paper in the country, all of which is to say that it is selling like hotcakes!  Something about this book has captured the public’s attention - our attention - and the question to ask, is why?

Now debate about parenting techniques is probably as old as humanity itself.  This week’s Torah portion begins with a strange story about Moses and his father in law Jethro.  The Israelites have finally escaped the Egyptians, and they are making their way to Sinai.  As they journey they are greeted by a small group comprised of Moses’ father in law, Moses’ wife Zipporah, and Moses’ two sons  Gershom and Eliezer.  A close reading of the text shows that there is some kind of unspoken tension between Moses and his family, especially his boys.  In other biblical reunions there is a great deal of emotion - think of Jacob and Esau meeting and falling into one another’s arms and weeping.  But here, after not seeing his own sons for months, Moses ignores them entirely.  

The midrash speculates that although Moses was a great leader for the Jewish people, he was not able to be a good father to his sons.  Of all the perplexing and daunting problems that Moses had to face in the course of his career - confronting Pharaoh, bringing the law to the people, leading them through the wilderness - it was the challenge of being a good parent that eluded him.  Of course Moses did not have the advantage of walking into his local Barnes and Noble to buy Amy Chua’s book, or any other book about parenting for that matter.  And one thing is for sure - there is no shortage of options today in that department.  Of course that is not a new phenomenon - those of you who raised children in the 50s and 60s probably have a copy of Dr. Benjamin Spock’s “Baby and Child Care”, first published in 1946.  If you had trouble with your children not sleeping well in the 80s or 90s you may have used the “Ferber method” on them, named after the child care and sleep expert Dr. Richard Ferber.  Whatever it might be, there is no end to the advice available to us about the proper way to raise our children, whether that advice comes from a book or from a bubbe.  

And of course despite Amy Chua’s suddenly discovered popularity, seeing as that we are sitting in shul this morning we should probably acknowledge that Jewish mothers have long had their own particular reputations.  We all know the joke about the Jewish mother who is attending the swearing in ceremony of her son, the first Jewish president of the United States.  When the person next to her leans over and says “you must be so proud,” her response is “you know his brother is a doctor.”  And when we say that Amy Chua has expectations for her children that are simply over the top, it is not like the Jewish community is a stranger to the idea that Jewish children should all do well in school, get into a good college - Ivy League wouldn’t be so bad - and preferably go on to graduate school.

And that leads me back to my question - why has Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother created such an uproar? 

One answer has to do with some of the general trends in today’s parenting styles.  As in society at large, parenting today is more permissive, more laissez faire, and less strict than it was a quarter of a century ago.  So when a book comes along that suggests that the way a lot of people “do” their parenting today might not be the best way, people don’t like it!  It feels a little bit threatening, a little bit uncomfortable, and people suddenly want to see what it is all about.  

I think a second answer has to do with what I call “the reality TV phenomenon.”  For whatever reason people seem to love to watch other people struggle through painful, embarrassing, or difficult circumstances - that is essentially the definition of reality TV.  In a way Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother is reality TV in written form.  As you read it, you watch Amy Chua - who is brilliant, successful, a Yale law professor, many things that many of us might like to be -  but you see her struggle, sometimes painfully so, with how to be a mother.  

And this, of course, is something we all can relate to.  Whatever parenting style we choose, whether Chinese, Jewish, American, whatever it might be - we know that raising children is one of the most challenging things we will ever do in our lives.  A guide book might help a little bit here and there, but ultimately it comes down to the particular values and ideas that are central to our lives, that we hope to give our children.  And where do we get those values?  From the same place that Amy Chua did, that is to day from our parents and grandparents.  

Today happens to be the yartzeit of my Bubbe, Kate Schwartz.  She died 12 years ago, just after Becky and I moved to Baltimore, at the ripe old age of 98.  Although she liked to read, it would never have occurred to Bubbe to write a book, but if she had, it might very well have been called “Battle Hymn of the Eastern European Bubbe.”  She was enormously strong willed, could be very tough when the occasion called for it, and was a fierce defender of her family and the importance of living a Jewish life.  At the same time, she loved you unconditionally, thought you were the best at whatever you did, even if that wasn’t the case, and she was prouder of her family than just about anyone I’ve ever met.  Her parenting style would never have worked for me, but the impact she left on everyone in my family was profound, and I know, to this very day, that I am trying to teach my children many of my Bubbe’s values.  After looking through Amy Chua’s book, I don’t think it will be much help to me in that process, but I can promise you, I will keep working at it, in my own way, and to the best of my ability!