by Rabbi Rachel Ain
It was apropos for me to read Rabbi Bradley Solmsen’s response to Patrick Aleph’s article on Kveller about banning the bar mitzvah because this week I will be facilitating the first of five sessions of an annual b’nai mitzvah family curriculum that I teach at my congregation. As I read both Aleph’s article and Solmsen’s response I had the following thoughts. He (Aleph) is not as radical as he would like to be and while yes, there is tremendous work to be done in the area of b’nai mitzvah education and Solmsen addresses the great work being done, I would like to add one other piece and that is the central role of the community in the providing meaning to a moment in one’s Jewish lifecycle.
First and foremost, Aleph tries to present a radical idea about banning the bar mitzvah (which he actually rejects, since what he is banning is in school instruction) but one of his conclusions is to have a service where the family, (the bar/bat mitzvah themselves, their family, and friends) have meaningful ritual roles. This is not radical, this is very standard for many communities. In many congregations there are opportunities, including reading from the Torah, chanting the blessings, and reading English prayers that demonstrate that the service doesn’t need to be all about the child.
Second, as Solmsen points out as a response to Aleph, Jewish life is not just about the home (sure, it needs the home and parental support) but Jewish life is also about a connection to the larger community. Solmsen writes “Yes, Judaism thrives in the home, but it cannot be so limited that it thrives only there. We need to remember – and present to our young people and their families – that Judaism is a practice, a permeating way of life not confined to a home or a synagogue, a camp or a trip to Israel.” It is this point that I would like to take one step further. While the experience of becoming b’nai mizvah isn’t always done as well as it could be for sure, I strongly believe that the “ritual” of marking one becoming a bar or bat mitzvah, should be done in a community setting, in the presence of family, friends, and yes, community members since this ideally affirms the child’s commitment to their role as a member of the “adult” Jewish community. This signals that learning about Judaism is not only for its own sake but demonstrates that Judaism is a tradition that has wisdom to teach people throughout the generational spectrum and often it can be infused better when experienced in this context. This is often expressed as the child is able to deliver a d’var torah (a sermon) assuming the role of learner and teacher, modeling for others that they too can understand, interpret, and share words of Torah to the larger community. This is not to say that critics of this weekly ritual don’t have valid points about the tension that can exist between the “regular” service and the way of integrating the celebration of a bar/bat mitzvah child, however just because something is wrong doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t find what is wrong and improve it and what is right and enhance it.
Finally, I would like to add my personal experience as a congregational Rabbi who has, for 9 years been actively involved in working with families to make the bar/bat mitzvah process more than just about the one day. Through a series of classes with parent and children learning in each others’ presence dealing with issues of values, ethics, observance, and identify, as well as through a comprehensive d’var torah writing process which complements what the child has learned in their religious school and/or day school, and in individual preparation with their tutor (in my current case a wonderful Cantor), the family learns that this is not a “one off” task that can just reside on a checklist. This connection to the entire community in the preparation for this moment provides an opportunity to affirm one’s connection to the past, present, and the future in a way that is joyful, meaningful, and substantive.
Rabbi Rachel Ain, a Conservative Rabbi, is the Rabbi at Sutton Place Synagogue in NYC. You can follow her on twitter @RabbiRachelAin
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It is only in some Reform congregations that I have been in that the bar/bat mitzvah seems to be about one child only on that one Shabbat. In the conservative synagogues that I have been in the rabbis, cantors and families have gone to great lengths to involve as many other people in the service as possible — sometimes requiring long lists of service participants to be distributed to the congregation so that we know who they are. And after that Shabbat those children are asked repeatedly to help lead other services and.or learn additional torah and haftarah readings.
I couldn’t agree more, thank you for this thoughtful response. My synagogue in Park Slope, Brooklyn is very much what you’ve described in terms of community engagement around B’nai Mitzvah; and my little cousins, who were both Bar Mitzvahed in Westchester Chabad, had a very different experience where they hosted the “event” themselves at home (due to lack of a building/space for their Hebrew School/synagogue), which translates to only the people you invite being there, which translates to a feeling of a vacuum where there should be a community. It also made me sad because it took the experience of B’nai Mitzvah so wholly out of the experience of Shabbat; and this is particularly problematic when you’re in a situation where it’s obvious that the vast majority of the Bar Mitzvah guests do not have any regular Shabbat practice, and feel uncomfortable because they don’t know what to “do” throughout the service. Your analysis is completely right on. It’s all about the community– and family is part of that, too!!!