Mazel tov! Glad it all went well.
Hopefully the Bat Mitvah didn’t actually memorize all that but she learned to read Hebrew. Even if she doesn’t learn the language, you can learn to read and pronounce the alphabet without too much trouble, even without vowels.
You have to memorize the chanting. Although you don’t recite strictly from memory, by the time you’ve practiced the chanting enough, you have it memorized.
I grew up in Reform and for a person to be Bar/Bat Mitzvah without being able to read Hebrew would be impossible even in our ultra-liberal congregation.
I’m pretty sure I basically memorized my Torah portion, just because of the number of times I studied it. Useful - if I remember correctly, the Torah is written in quite fancy lettering.
I know I had my haftarah section memorized.
I had a lot of my torah and haftarah portions memorized, but I wouldn’t have made it through either if I couldn’t read Hebrew. The chanting wasn’t difficult, even though my Bar Mitzvah was during the High Holidays so we had a different tune.
Okay. I have to tell this Bat Mitzvah story. It’s long. You may be excused to go find the punch and cookies table if you’re not interested.
For people who, for any number of reasons, didn’t become b’nai mitzvah when they were kids, they can do it later in life, really, at any age–there’s no limit. (Digression: There’s a great episode of the Dick Van Dyke show where Rob is convinced Buddy Sorrell is having an affair, because he starts sneaking around, turning down invitations, and getting calls from a woman. Turns out the woman is the Rabbi’s wife, and he has been preparing for his bar mitzvah. Very sweet and heart-warming. Another great Fraiser episode where Frasier asks Noel, the Trekker at the radio station to teach him something to say in Hebrew at his son Frederick’s bar mitzvah, and he does-- but in Klingon, not Hebrew. One of the kids in the congregation was REALLY impressed.)
Back to my story.
A single, elderly woman (a physician in her mid-70s) in our congregation decided to study for her bat mitzvah several years ago. We have an ongoing class for adult students, so this was no big deal. She worked at it for a year or so and was ready to lead the service, read her Torah portion, etc., etc. She invited a few close friends to the Friday night service, and typically the place is NOT crowded on an ordinary Friday.
Meanwhile, unrelated, a controversy had erupted in the local religious community. I won’t go into detail, but the Jewish community was the recipient of some insulting, condescending, and challenging comments by some insensitive loudmouths associated with a big religious sect… It wasn’t WWIII or anything, but the Jewish population here in South Texas is a minuscule minority, and it smarted.
Anyhoo, the very prominent and well-beloved (by all) pastor of the largest Southern Baptist church in town asked to come to a Friday night service and address the congregation to offer his personal apology for the insensitive and out-of-line comments of some of his colleagues.
Well, you guessed it. It was the night of this lady’s bar mitzvah.
Where she thought she would be addressing a mostly-empty room, populated by a sprinkling of her closest friends and maybe a niece or two, she steps to the podium to face a crowd of 2,000. The place was packed to the rafters with TV cameras and reporters lining the walls. It looked like Yom Kippur (which is when everyone turns out.)
Her cake-and-punch reception turned into a receiving line where every Temple member wanted to shake the hand of the pastor who had taken the time to come, and of course, they shook her hand, too. It was a great evening.
What a great story!
My father never became Bar Mitzvah, though after marrying my mother he did become more actively Jewish. When it came time for me to begin studying for my Bar Mitzvah, I asked him if he would be willing to do it with me.
He studied, learned a portion of my own Torah portion, and shared the day with me.
Holy cow…that made me cry. How absolutely lovely. 
I’ve been to two bar mitzvot and a Seder, and was never asked to wear, or even offered, a yarmulke. But then, as I understand it, Reform Judaism is like the Baptists in stressing congregational autonomy.
(A related question - do synagogues which offer them also offer bobby pins? Every Jewish man I’ve ever seen who wears a yarmulke has it pinned to his hair.)
The lamentation that Mark records as Jesus’ last cry from the cross - Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? ((My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?) - is Aramaic, which would have been his mother tongue. If memory serves, it is the only Aramaic in the New Testament.
Aramaic still exists and a dialect of it, Syriac, is a liturgical language of several Eastern churches.
Beautiful story! Hooray for your Dad and you, both!
After learning their lesson (thinning hair, you know?) Jewish men who have run afoul of keeping the yarmulke on will start carrying their own bobby pins. At Jewish funeral homes, beside the yarmulke box will be a box of 4" diameter black lace/netting circles for women to pin to their hair. Odd bobby pins are supplied with those, but they wouldn’t work for a yarmulke.
When we bought kippot for our wedding they came with a clip that functions like a bobby pin - Clips Accessories Clips, Ladies head cover - skullcap.com When I bring my own kippot I always bring one of those.
I’m glad to hear the whole thing worked out.
As a slight nitpick to those talking about growing up and not having a ceremony: a girl becomes a bat mitzvah at age 12, and a boy becomes a bar mitzvah at age 13, with or without a ceremony. There is no basis in halacha [Jewish law] mandating a ceremony or a party.
My dad recounted his bar mitzvah party to me several times over the years: herring, cake, and schnapps for those who wanted.
And as far as clips to keep the kipah on the head, most men use what are termed dib clips.
Ouch. Leviticus can be kind of a bummer of a book for a bar/bat mitzvah portion (although chapter 19 contains a lot of lessons for behaving like a mensch).
My kids got lucky. My daughter got the Deuteronomic reading of the Ten Commandments (so everyone had to stand up when she read!), and my son got the story of the ten spies scoping out the Land of Israel. Much easier to do a d’var torah on those.
Okay, but my question was about those non-Jews, or non-traditional Jews, for whom the congregation leaves the basket of kippot (thanks for the new word!) near the entrance. Do they also leave out clips, or are you supposed to stick it on your noggin and hope for the best?
I’ve never seen them out as a matter of course, but a lot of times you can fish around the bottom and find one.
The latter, services are inside (no wind) & you’re only sitting & sometimes standing, not really bending over so the chances of it falling off aren’t great. Those who wear all the time typically clip it on.
Whenever I, as a gentile, have worn them because I was at a Conservative congregation or a yeshiva or otherwise asked to wear one, it’s always been without a clip. Never had an issue of it falling off.
By the way: it doesn’t matter if it falls off your head.
As a visitor, you might think that you’re committing a social blunder, or even insulting somebody’s religious beliefs, by letting a sacred object fall on the floor. But don’t worry about it—You won’t offend anybody. The head covering isn’t anything special, has no “Sacred” status*. Just pick it up and drop it back onto your head.
*hey, it’s not uncommon for people to wear a kippa with the name of their football team emboidered on it.
Football is a religion, down here. (And Florida fans are the spawn of Satan…)
Yeah, and if I’m unsure, I just ask. Last bar mitzvah I was at, I noticed a big stack of kippot by the entrance into the sanctuary (or whatever the proper term is). I’m not well-versed enough on my synagogues to know which congregations are which, so I just asked if I should wear one, to which the person replied “oh, we’re Reform. You don’t need to wear one.”
Oh, and forgive my ignorance here, is there an easy way of figuring out whether a particular synagogue is Reform or Conservative (or other?) The only thing I’ve seen that clued me in is that in the one or two Conservative temples I’ve been in, there has been a sign by the kippot saying that all men must wear a kippah in the sanctuary.
