![]() At some point the celebration and price tag began to snowball. No one knows, or will admit to knowing when it began, but some people say the bigger Bar/Bat Mitzvah parties date back to the 1930s. (The Torah is read on Mondays and Thursdays too in some congregations.) This was generally followed by sponge cake and herring. It wasn’t all that long ago that a typical Bar/Bat Mitzvah was celebrated by the rabbi calling the kid up to the Torah to do an Aliyah during services on a Saturday morning, or sometimes on a weekday. But arriving at the party in a helicopter, or booking Bruno Mars? Hell no. A lot of our kids don’t feel connected to Judaism, and a Bar/Bat Mitzvah is indeed something to be celebrated. ![]() Today’s Bar/Bat Mitzvahs have a not-altogether-undeserved bad rap, especially in the U.S., because in many cases, so much focus is placed on the party, the clothes, the food, the entertainment, the theme, and all of that, that the spiritual side gets eclipsed. This letter was written by Paula Gottesman (Archie’s mom) when she wanted to have a Bat Mitzvah for her daughter, Sally. And for many years, their Bat Mitzvahs were held on Friday nights, when the Torah wasn’t read. Fun fact: Girls only started having Bat Mitzvahs in the 1960s. This actually happens automatically when a boy becomes 13 and a girl becomes 12, which is kind of ridiculous when you look at the maturity of most kids that age. (In Hebrew, bar means son, bat means daughter, and mitzvah means commandment.) A Bar/Bat Mitzvah marks the transition from childhood to adulthood in the Jewish community, meaning they can fast on the High Holidays, become part of a minyan, etc. Bar Mitzvahs are for boys and Bat Mitzvahs are for girls. ![]() Clearly, those experiences were not very meaningful because if they were, they wouldn’t have been the last Jewish thing the person ever did. ![]() It always makes us sad when we hear 30-year-olds say that the last Jewish thing they did was at their Bar/Bat Mitzvah. The answer is A! Honest to God, with a little extra effort and a rabbi with some creativity, it’s not that hard to make a Bar/Bat Mitzvah a meaningful milestone that isn’t a gaudy mess. ![]()
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