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Pain of the Student
Status of Jewish Learning Software Today
Talmud Chai Solution
Why Now?
Advantages of a Computer Based Solution
Project History
About the Logo

Pain Of The Student

Beginner level students try to understand the basic elements of a text. They mostly need a commentary feature so that they can translate, punctuate, structure a discourse they are studying.

In addition to this, advanced level students analyse texts. They need to be able to break down a discourse. For example, the Brisker Derech (otherwise known as lomdus/The conceptual approach to Jewish learning) involves identifying and tracking concepts, spotting important ambiguities & mapping out their possibile resolutions, and contemplating relationships between various phenomena in the text. Another example is the Shitat HaRevadim (stratification method) which involves identifying the historical layers of a talmudic discourse.
Often, the broken down elements are then adopted into some kind of macro organistion of information. In the case of the Brisker Derech the concepts are assimilated into a global system of user defined categories (which is known in computer science as a folksonomy). In the case of the Shitat HaRevadim the sections are ascribed to a one or more partially overlapping periods of history.

In the case of the Brisker Derech in particular it is very hard to reach a level where one has developed a global system of categories with which to conceptualise the law. One must master and be able to recall vast areas of the Torah and its commentaries. The time, intellectual agility & memory required preclude all but the very best and committed. The only way for more average students to build a global system of categories is to do so gradually

Indeed, studying is a gradual process. In order for a student to grow into a Talmid Chacham and Ben Torah one must build on what one has already studied. That means that a student will want access to things they have studied perhaps many years previously. Therefore they must determine for themselves a means by which to store and organise their current thoughts and discussions (or anything else connected with their current study) and commit the self-discipline and time to record it each time they study or face the feal risk of loosing the information.
Even if a student manages to make sufficient notes about what they have studied these notes are in some way detached from the texts they arose from making it hard to see where exactly where in the discourse they arose and thus harder to understand and appreciate them in the future, amend them, update them or organise them.

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Status of Jewish Learning Software Today

While there are many different programs around for aiding study of Jewish law from digital libraries to learning tools there are no computer programs yet that singly support all the activities described above let alone the associated workflow. A custom solution is required. For further information and links please see the What technology is out there page on the wiki

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Talmud Chai Solution

The basic solution here, which primarily focuses on the Brisker Derech (but can be used for the Shitat HaRevadim as well) is a program with a personal database to store and recall studied texts in addition to just four features that are key actions when studying talmudic texts and their commentaries:
1.) Commenting texts
2.) Identification, defintion & reapplication of categories/types in a text
3.) Identification of ambiguities in a text
4.) Identification of relationships within and between texts
By allowing each of these four to be applied to eachother the scope of solution rapidly grows and should be clearer: For example, the ability to categorise different types of comments (because comments could be anything: Translations, punctuation, structure, assumptions, etc) or the ability to categorise different types of relationship (relationships could be analogies, contradications, etc) .
All such information (comments, categories, relationships & ambiguities) is known as meta data (i.e. data about the text being studied) and is also stored in the database for future reorganisation, amendment and recall. The reason just these four features are enough is because together they constitute of all the types of metadata that would arise in a normal learning session.

This solution does rely on a student having access to a digital library of texts. There are many around including some free ones. The best digital library is the Bar Ilan library. This can be accessed through an internet browser for as little as $20/year. (More details on the support page.)

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Why Now?

The need for computer based study tools in schools and higher education is growing all the time. Now the largest computing companies in the world have started partnering with select schools around the globe to find ways of applying modern technology to education. There are also major projects to equip the third world with laptops to enhance their schooling and in Israel all teachers are being equiped with laptops. These projects exist partly because there is a social obligation upon us all to exploit developments in technology to enhance our ability to educate.

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Advantages of a Computer Based Solution

A computer based solution has many advantages. To list a few:
1. The continuity of learning and student growth is enhanced when they have a single place they store all learning throughout their education. They can take their learning with them where they go and indeed through life, constantly accumulating knowledge and new perspectives but still having access to past study.
2. Once a tool that supports the normal activities of students has been created it can be used to quickly guide the uninitiated in how to study.
3. It's cheaper for students to buy a digital library of texts than to invest in a personal library of books. Personal digital libraries are far larger than personal book libraries these days too.
4. Learning with a learning aid is a more productive use of their time than using paper alternatives
4. Computers exploit visual displays to enhance the learning experience &
5. Using a program with a set of accompanying tutorials makes the student more independent thus reducing the level of micro-coaching that is required of teachers.
6. Storing the information electronically means that storage is cheap, compact & portable, that organisation is easy and that recall is fast.

Once a solution is in place it opens doors to further applications of technology in Jewish Torah education. Computers can be linked up to networks to allow people both near and far to share, collaborate, review & publish - things which aid Chavrusa learning, Classroom learning, Chaburas and community relations in general. Also, alternative forms of media can be harnessed. For example, screen recordings and videos that can be made and published (for free) as a kind of shiur. Another example is that of digitised copies of manuscripts that can be accessed over the internet wherever textual variants impact the study thereby improving the learning experience. And another idea we've had is for an interactive daf that takes the traditional layout in the vilna edition of shas but whose commentaries and words are moveable on the page such that users can enter notes and so on but collapsing back to plain untouched page at the click of button. a

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The Project History

The project was started by Yehuda Newman in 2005. He realised the potential for Talmud Software while at university studying Mathematics and Computer Science. After graduating he embarked upon writing a proof of concept. Yehuda is in the process of opening it up to the community. The hope is to turn the early proof of concept into a full learning environment for the study of Torah.

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The Logo

The logo is a tree growing from a book. The book is inside a screen. The tree starts inside the screen but grows outside of it. This is a statement that while the effect of computer based learning is brought about by an electronic platform in reality it spreads far beyond.

At one level, the tree in the logo is the tree of life which is an analogy to the Torah. This is a play on the name 'Talmud Chai'.
At a second level, the blue colour of the book is water. The book symbolises Torah and the tree which is rooted in it symbolises a person who life and values are based on Torah. This is a reference to the verse in Psalms 1,3

"VeHaya K'Etz Shatul Al Palgei Mayim, Asher Piryo Yitan Be'ito, Ve'oleyhu lo yibol, VeChol Asher Ya'aseh Yatzli'ach"
"And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper."
A person is nourished by their study and observance of Torah and the psalm praises and blesses them.
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