I started a thread about sweet sixteen parties recently which then veered off into quinceaneara talk. So why not cover all the bases and start talking about another coming of age ceremony, the bar and bat mitzvah? If you’ve had or attended one, what are your memories? What kind of post-ceremony party did you have? Did it influence the role of religion in your life? And will you have one for your kids and if so what will it be like?
We rebelled against religious training before I hit 10, and before my brother hit 13. Thus, we didn’t qualify for a bar mitvzah. I’ve attended a few over the years. They seem nice, but I will have to say, not much “memorable” happened. I don’t regret not having one, since–as I said–i see it mostly as a religious thing and we’re not religious people. My kids have never been inside a temple, as far as I know.
My Bar Mitzvah started out as usual, but while I was sitting up there, I started looking at the congregation . . . at the women gossiping and adjusting their make-up and their hair, at the men nodding off, at the kids teasing each other. When it was time for my speech, rather than giving the one I prepared, I mentioned what I saw, and asked, rhetorically, why they bothered to be there, and what they were getting out of the experience. My father was furious, but calmed down when the rabbi, afterward, said he wished others would give speeches like that.
What they didn’t know was that was the day I became an atheist. I don’t remember much of the party afterwards, except that several people came up to me and said they agreed with my speech . . . including some of the worst offenders.
I loved my Bar Mitzvah but two of the biggest memories I have of it are admittedly negative.
-
One of the foods they served was fried chicken. It was my request because that was my favorite. I had a neighbor who’s daughter would only eat wings and nothing else and even though I told my parents to not to do it because I figured it would mess things up, they requested this one kid get just wings. The kitchen screwed up (like I knew they would) and only served wings to everyone. I was really mad at the time (remember I was 13) because in my mind it was supposed to be my day and what I wanted and not what some random neighbor’s kid wanted.
-
My Cousin was videoed the Bar Mitzvah for us (he had really good equipment because he worked for a company that made it). He had also just had a new baby a few weeks before who was there with them. He was at the height of new baby fever and like 65% of my Bar Mitzvah video is him fawning over his new baby.
On the plus side, I had an aunt I had always heard was a singer when she was young. My Bar Mitzvah had a live band and the singer was also the MC found out and got her to come up on stage. She was hesitant at first but then started and was amazing. Totally brought the house down. She had so much fun she did two more songs.
Have to include Sam Levenson’s take - my parents had this on a 78 when I was a kid.
My temple let you have a Saturday bar mitzvah if you went to Hebrew School, and my father wanted a big party, so I went to Hebrew school. My portion was very short and from Malachi, on the butt end of the Bible. The Cantor did the classes, and was also a teacher at the Hebrew School. As the weeks ticked by I’d practice a section with the record I was given, go to class, and not get called on. Next week, same thing. Finally, about a week before, he let me sing, and I knew it. The cantor, a smart guy, knew how anal I was.
At the party, which was more for my father than for me, the kids sat at the dais. I had gone to all my friends parties, and they all came to mine (mine was the last one) so we, and our one Christian friend who didn’t have to put on a party, had a tradition of drinking most of a water glass and sticking all kinds of food and other stuff into it which made it nicely gross.
As for the presents, presents, presents, I got a tie tack, a collected works of Sherlock Holmes, both of which I still have, 3 shares of AT&T stock, and two transistor radios. I suspect the money presents went to financing the party.
I was an atheist before I ever had to start studying for my reading and it helped cement my atheism since.
I hated the entire experience, start to finish. Hated the Sunday private lessons and memorizing verbatim what I couldn’t understand or read in Hebrew. Hated the dumb grey slacks and plaid blazer they made me wear. Hated the whole religious kit I had to wear to pose for photos. My parents still have those photos hanging in their home and I hate having to be reminded of the experience every time I see the photos.
One day I’ll have to ask why they felt the need to put me through it when they were agnostics themselves at the time. I think they did it because it was the expected thing to do in the mostly jewish community where we lived.
Anyway, having been through all that, I made a conscious decision never to put my kids through it if/when I had them. And so I didn’t.
My Bar Mitzvah was when I proved that I was a terrible public speaker. I think I’m better now, but I still don’t like it.
I don’t remember much else. There was a party. The DJ screwed up by leaving off a last name when we called people up for lighting the candles, and the wrong person went. I think there was a pool table, somewhere.
We had a luncheon afterwards, followed by a smaller party at home with a DJ. My brother worked at a video arcade (fyi, coolest job ever!) and borrowed two bar-type video games, the ones that are not in the upright cabinet, for the party.
I don’t entirely remember when I became agnostic, but it was probably before my bar mitzvah. My kids go to Hebrew school and will have bat mitzvahs since my wife and I think that the tradition of community out weighs the lack of belief.
I was an atheist before and during my Bar Mitzvah days (not now, now more a Spinozan pantheist) and the Rabbi was not displeased - I had at least cared enough to think about the subject and was willing to engage in discussions about both God and ethics.
Memory 1: I forgot my written copy of my speech and was so nervous without that I must have said in in double time. Or faster.
Memory 2: A bit annoyed at the time that my elder brother had the big shindig at The Drake and I had a party at our house with friends in the basement. But let’s be real - he had lots of friends and I was not as socially … connected. Still true today.
I am thinking that all these posters who think that a B’nai Mitzvah is about belief are missing the point. It is about accepting responsibilities and about being part of a community, inclusive of but beyond extended family. Belief is fairly immaterial. There is a reason that so many cultures have similar coming of age ceremonies; they serve a valuable function. IMHO.
My youngest’s is just 12 days away! Forth and final. Nice reason to get lots of people we care about together. Shame my siblings can’t get along well enough to all show at the same event. (Parents both dead by now.)
Mazel Tov!
Never a jewish smiley when you need one.
Ok I have to ask. I work with a number of mentally disabled persons and I wonder have any of you gone to one of these where they adjusted things so the person with a disability could handle the requirements? Like for example, fewer readings?
Interesting point. I see what you’re saying. However, can a person really go through the process and not even pretend there is a god or that he or she is praying? If so, I’m all for it. If not, belief does factor into it.
For me, despite being ethnically Jewish, i don’t think I’d feel any more “part of a community” of Jewish people than I would with Brazilians or Kenyans. I like Jewish people perfectly fine, but never felt like I was part of the group. (Maybe because I skipped the Bar Mitvzh)
Well truth be told the ceremony is not required. One becomes Bar or Bat Mitzvah, according to Jewish law, just by reaching the right age (13 males, 12 females). The ceremony is to some degree a fairly modern affectation. I have not been to one for a person with significant mental disabilities but I would think that it would be a fine ceremony so long as the individual did something, any something, leading the congregation that was only permissible and expected for an adult Jew to do. I am sure it has been done.
(Don’t tell my daughter that she has actually been Bat Mitzvahed for a year already though …)
Well like I said, I was my class atheist and pretty straight up about it. Yes, you do say prayers. Still I stand by my statement … fairly immaterial. Honestly though that has always been my impression about the faith as well. What matters most is actions, not belief. FWIW (and a theologian I aint) Judaism isn’t about knowing God and being thereby guided to do the right things … it is about doing the right things and possibly thereby having a chance to know God.
I don’t have many fond memories of my Bar Mitzvah. It’s all tied in with my father’s long illness and his death which occurred 2 weeks after the BM.
My only direct experience was as a caterer for the party following the Bar Mitzvah. Fun party, crap ton of money spent and I’ve never heard more talk about real estate, stock and other financial stuff at a social gathering.
One of the Sunday School requirements for my Bar Mitzvah was doing a project on a topic of our choice. I did mine on reforestation efforts in Israel, and got pretty into it. I asked my parents to take the money that would have been spent on a big party and instead plant trees in Israel. Somewhere over there is a little grove with my name on it (at least in a karmic sense). We had a little backyard get-together instead.
The coolest thing about my Bar Mitzvah, though, was that my dad had his with me. He grew up completely non-observant, but had become increasingly more involved with Judaism after marrying my mother. At my insistence, he studied with me and did some of my Torah portion. We went tallis shopping together and had portraits done and all that good stuff. It was amazing and awesome, and one of the best experiences we’ve ever shared.
Oh, another fond memory of my Bar Mitzvah was something that my Rabbi said during the service the night before. He described Recontructionist Judaism as such:
Imagine you’ve inherited a house from a relative, a house which has been in your family for many generations. You move in and, while exploring it, come across the attic. The attic is stuffed with junk that’s been in your family since time immemorial. Some of it is familiar to you and some of it isn’t. Some stuff, you decide to move down into the house proper, some stuff you decide to keep up there. You also might decide to move some things from the house back up to the attic. And of the things that do end up in the house proper, you may not use them in the same way your relatives did. You might find new uses for them. You might only display them out of respect. Or you might find as much value in them as your ancestors did.
This is how you deal with a 4,000-year-old religion. There’s no way to pretend that it can all be relevant, nor that it can be relevant in the same way it all was thousands of years ago. The important thing, though, is that you don’t throw away the bits that aren’t meaningful to you right now. You store them in the attic, and you remember them, and maybe your children or their children will one day find them, pull them down, dust them off, and find meaning in them.
That one moment has shaped my understanding of my religion ever since.
Well, it seems like I’m the only (so far) Orthodox Jew to chime in, but I remember my own Bar Mitzvah very well, and so far two of my sons have become Bar Mitzvah and one daughter Bat Mitzvah, with a third son’s Bar Mitzvah coming up in October.
For mine, I led the congregation in all of the Sabbath morning prayers, plus read my portion from the Torah. The Rabbi gave a nice speech (mostly about what a fine family I’m from. IIRC) and then there was a nice Kiddush (party, but with Sabbath blessings made over wine first) immediately afterward. About 2 weeks later, we had a reception in a hall in Brooklyn, with a formal sit-down meal, all my friends and relatives in attendance, music and dancing. My father served as the MC, I gave a discourse on a Torah topic (written by one of my uncles) and there was a speech by my Rabbi and one of my grandfathers as well.
My sons’ Bar Mitzvahs have been much in the same vein, except that they didn’t lead the prayer services on Sabbath morning. At the receptions, I served as the MC, and speeches were delivered by the Bar Mitzvah boy, our Rabbi, and the principal of his school. One thing I have been rather proud of is that I wrote their speeches myself, and taught them the Torah behind it.
Traditionally, a Jewish boy begins putting on Tefillin (black leather boxes containing Torah portions written on parchment, with straps attached, one for the arm and one for the head) for morning prayer services when he becomes Bar Mitzvah, and in recent times, it has become customary for the boy to start wearing them one month prior as practice. The morning that my firstborn was to start happened to be a special day on the Jewish calendar - a special blessing that is said once in 28 years over the appearance of the sun. That morning, we all woke up extra-early and joined a large group of people praying outdoors in Flushing Meadow Park for the occasion, so his Bar Mitzvah was prologued by a very rare opportunity to perform a Mitzvah. That’s one memory that will always stand out.
My daughter’s Bat Mitzvah was a smaller, less formal affair - a buffet dinner for her friends and pretty-close family, music and dancing, party games, arts and crafts projects, speeches by me and my wife, and a slideshow of her life from birth to Bat Mitzvah.
I can’t really say that the Bar Mitzvah moment/ceremony itself affected the role of religion in my life, because it’s just a milestone of having been raised and schooled from the beginning to lead a religiously-based life. All it meant was that now I had the responsibility to observe G-d’s commandments properly, whereas life up till that point was my “learning/grace period”.
Seconding this. My father claims that his Bar Mitzvah was pretty much a joke - he did the basic minimum to be part of the service. Mumbled a few words, and let the Rabbi do the rest. I don’t see any reason something one can’t be arrainged for someone with a mental disability.
Do we have any Rabbis on the board? If not, I could ask a friend of mine, if you’re interested.