In studying the roots of civilization, Mrs. Caspe's 6th grade Social Studies class ran into a particularly sticky problem: How was it that Mrs. Caspe was describing events that took place tens and hundreds of thousands of years ago if just this week we welcomed in the beginning of 5770? Just how old is the world, anyway? Sensing an opportunity for a wonderful Torah U'Madda moment, Mrs. Caspe invited Rabbi Ross to speak with her class about this very issue.
Rabbi Ross began by explaining that both sides of the discussion have merit. The Torah is of Divine origin and thus must be taken seriously; at the same time, science has developed highly sophisticated methods of determining the age of fossils and thus cannot be simply dismissed. And so - what to do? Based on a number of sources, and prodded by many incisive questions from the students, Rabbi Ross explored a number of suggestions made by Gedolim of the past two centuries as to how to resolve this issue.
When all was said and done, Mrs. Caspe had the most important question of all - which opinion is correct? That question allowed both teachers to stress to the students that a key purpose of this exercise is not necessarily to reach a "correct" answer, but rather for them to both know to ask questions, and to know how to search broadly for answers while simultaneously maintaining their beliefs.
