Let There Be Play is more than a col­lec­tion of activ­i­ties for reli­gious instruc­tion. The book is also full of joy, encour­ag­ing young learn­ers to use both cog­ni­tive and emo­tion­al skills. In a detailed intro­duc­tion, Jonathan Shmidt Chap­man points out the gap in Torah teach­ing mate­ri­als for chil­dren aged four to sev­en. While there are numer­ous children’s books describ­ing the sto­ries of Noah and the Exo­dus from Egypt, there are far few­er about oth­er, equal­ly sig­nif­i­cant events and fig­ures. This com­pre­hen­sive col­lec­tion includes every par­sha (Torah por­tion) of the year, ini­ti­at­ing read­ers into the life­long process of Jew­ish learning.

In this learn­ing guide, Shmidt and illus­tra­tor Hec­tor Bor­las­ca suc­cess­ful­ly bal­ance accu­ra­cy and imag­i­na­tion. Icons point to six cat­e­gories for every chap­ter: read, imag­ine, make, explore, and play. Young read­ers have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to do some math, art, and act­ing. At var­i­ous points, they are asked to per­form Joseph’s task of rationing food dur­ing years of famine by divid­ing snacks into con­tain­ers, and to build a Mount Sinai – esque fort out of pil­lows and blan­kets. The Torah is full of dra­mat­ic encoun­ters, and these the­atri­cal reen­act­ments offer an entry point to under­stand­ing them. Borlasca’s draw­ings are live­ly, depict­ing both bib­li­cal char­ac­ters and con­tem­po­rary chil­dren in full color.

Shmidt con­tex­tu­al­izes the char­ac­ters in a way that is mean­ing­ful for chil­dren. When Adam and Eve explore the world that has just been cre­at­ed, they make some mis­takes. God responds by telling them, ​“Now that you know more, you can’t go back to before. You’ll need to work like grownups, and you won’t be able to stay and play in the gar­den all day.” He con­cludes Par­sha Miketz with a cliff-hang­er in the form of a ques­tion, as Joseph tells the Egypt­ian guards to take his broth­er Ben­jamin to prison: ​“Would the broth­ers let him go, or would they speak up to pro­tect him?”

Whether you are an edu­ca­tor look­ing for a new resource, or a care­giv­er explor­ing ways to learn with your fam­i­ly, this book is essen­tial. As Moses says to the Israelites in Par­sha D’varim, ​“Before you go for­ward into the land, you have to look back at where you’ve been” — a truth that appears in every nar­ra­tive and activity.