One of the most frequently quoted biblical texts dealing with education is Proverbs 22:6: "Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it."
The Hebrew verb translated "train" is hanak. In the Bible this verb and its derivatives occur mainly in contexts suggesting the sense of "to begin, initiate, inaugurate."1 For example, the root is used for the formal opening of a building (Solomon’s Temple, I Kgs. 8:63), for an initiation gift for an altar (Num. 7:10), and for the time one begins to live in a new house (Deut. 20:5). Since cult sacrifices, consecration rites or prayers were often connected with the inauguration of a structure, the meaning "to dedicate" eventually became extended to hanak.
Hanukkah
This rendering, though not inherent in the root itself, accounts for Hanukkah being translated in John 10:22 as "Feast of Dedication."2 The New English Bible, following this apparent root-meaning of "begin," renders Proverbs 22:6: "Start a boy on the right road" (cf. NIV margin, "Start").
In practice over the centuries, however, it is evident that the Jewish community understood hanak as derived from a different root. The verb has customarily been linked with a root meaning "rub the palate or gums"; hence the cognate hek, (palate, roof of
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