By Lisa Levitt Ryckman
Denver Rocky Mountain News Staff Writer

Chaim Shimon Feldheim's day begins with prayer and ends with prayer.

Chaim Shimon Feldheim, center, plays with classmates at the Hillel Academy before afternoon prayers.

In between, he's a regular kid who plays soccer with his friends, does his homework and baby-sits his four little sisters. He also studies the word of God, and prays some more, and studies again, and prays again.

More than anything else, it is faith that has shaped the long days for Chaim Shimon during his short life. At 12, his pursuit of wisdom has just begun.

In Orthodox Judaism, the study of the Torah -- God's teachings to the Jewish people -- starts young and never ends. To study is to learn, to learn is to understand, to understand is to achieve a connection with God.

"It keeps the world going," Chaim Shimon says. "We believe that without the Torah, the world can't exist. So the more the Torah is being read, the better God judges the world. So it has a big effect."

Viewing the world through a filter of faith makes it easier for a 12-year-old to find answers to the really hard questions, questions about how to live life, how to make it meaningful, how to change the world for the better.

"Everyone should think about the next person," Chaim Simon says. "The last of the Ten Commandments is that you can't covet anything the next person has. That's the last cornerstone of the world. God's saying that you need to focus on the next person, and what they need. That's not really happening in America. People think that they need to have what the next person has."

A television, for example. There isn't one at Chaim Shimon's house.

"Sometimes I think that if I had one, it would be great. But really, I'm not missing anything."

His computer's broken, but that's OK, too. "I'm happy that it's broken, because I don't waste a lot of time on it. So I could help out more, and learn more."

The Ten Commandments most people know are just the beginning. The Torah contains 603 more commandments, or mitzvos, that address every aspect of life.

"All the mitzvos are important," Chaim Shimon says. "But one of the most important is learning. I would just like to become a sage, and know the Torah, and try to learn as much as possible."

He's up at 6 to study with his father. He's at school by 7:15 for more prayer and study of the Torah. There are Hebrew classes before and after lunch, afternoon prayers, followed by language arts, history, math and science until 5 p.m.

The Torah is difficult to understand, and volumes were written in past centuries by sages with differing explanations and interpretations. Chaim Shimon and his classmates struggle to make sense of it all. There's so much to know.

"For me, just understanding a little bit could be success," Chaim Shimon says. "But my older brother, he wants to understand much more. He goes much deeper. So it depends who you are. For me now, it's just like a little bit I'm usually happy with. But as I get older, I'll have to understand more to be happy."

Chaim Shimon's eighth-grade class at Hillel Academy has the intensity of a college seminar, a mixture of religion, philosophy and ancient history steeped in tradition. The teacher walks through the room, explaining, questioning, encouraging his students to think.

The boys speak up, argue a bit, make observations and hope they are right. It's Chaim Shimon's favorite part of school.

"The questions, the answers," he says. "It's like a challenge. There are a lot of books about what the laws mean. So you never run out of anything to learn."

Just the time to learn it. At home in the evening, Chaim Shimon helps with his sisters -- there are four between the ages of 1 and 9 -- and does homework for another hour or two. Then he goes to Yeshiva, a high school for boys where his father is principal, and studies with a friend. Then the night prayer, and home, and bed. The end of a 15-hour day.

"Lots of times, having long days like I do, usually it doesn't bother me," Chaim Shimon says. "But there are some times, if I have a bad day, like I don't understand something, you have to just understand that it's for the good. When you get angry, you forget about everything. So I try to keep calm. It's hard, but you have to think that everything's for the good. Everything's for your future."

Sundays, he has Hebrew class until noon. Fridays are shorter days, because everyone has to be home when Sabbath begins at nightfall. Saturday is the only real day off, a time to spend with family.

There are fewer than 300 Orthodox Jewish families in Denver, Chaim Shimon's father, Michael Feldheim, estimates. They are a community within a community, small enough so no one's a stranger. Yet there's a certain sense of isolation; it's possible to feel alone here. Visiting relatives in New York has given Chaim Shimon a more global perspective.

"In Denver, there's not a lot of people, and you think there's not that many Jews," he says. "And then you go to New York, and you get to see a lot of people who have the same faith as you. And it gives you a lot of courage."

Chaim Shimon is the fifth of nine children and the youngest of four boys. He is named for his mother's grandfather, who was a cardiologist. But Chaim Shimon has no passion for science. His greatest passion is for his faith.

"He's young," his father says. "But I think he has a single-mindedness about life, about following the mitzvos of the Torah. He sees himself on that path."

In many respects, Chaim Shimon's path was mapped out centuries ago. Next month, he will turn 13, the age that marks the passage from childhood to manhood. He will have his Bar Mitzvah, where he will read from the Torah for the 250 people in attendance. From then on, when 10 men are needed to form a prayer group, Chaim Shimon's presence will count.

He knows that he will always cover his head, and he will let his beard grow -- that's a few years off. There are certain foods he has never eaten at the same time or from the same plate, others he will never eat at all. He knows that he will always study the Torah and live by it, because that is what God intended for him, for his family and for the world.

"It makes me feel very good," Chaim Shimon says. "They say all the time, if you do this, then good things will happen. So I look forward to a good life.

"We say a parable -- the doctor tells you to do something, you do it, you don't ask any questions about it. And you do it as well as possible. It's the same thing -- God told you to follow all the commandments, to keep the Torah and everything. So God's like the doctor -- he knows everything you have to do.

"If God wants you to do it, it must be the right thing."

December 26, 1999

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