TODAY I AM A MAN:

Joining the Party: The Bar or Bat Mitzvah celebrated as a soulless and godless excuse for spending money is a real problem for a secular Jewish community that wonders about its future. It is a custom other faith communities should imitate only at their peril. (Jonathan Tobin, 2/03/04, Jewish World Review)

Just when you thought that the integration of Jews into American culture couldn't be more complete, now comes news that non-Jewish adolescents are afflicted with a new problem: Bar and Bat Mitzvah envy.

Laugh all you like, but this curious trend was the subject of a front-page article in The Wall Street Journal on Jan. 14. In it, Journal staffer Elizabeth Bernstein reported that upscale non-Jewish kids are bummed out about the lavish parties their Jewish classmates are getting — and want in on the action. The result is that some parents are giving them catered 13th birthday parties with DJs and dancers that bear a striking resemblance to contemporary Jewish celebrations. [...]

The formal ritual of the Bar Mitzvah for boys dates back to early modern Europe, while the Bat Mitzvah for girls was a 20th-century American innovation. But the notion that the age of 13 was a time for assuming religious and legal obligations goes back much further in Jewish consciousness.

Mishnaic literature tells us that it was at age 13 that our biblical father Abraham tore down the false idols of his father. But it is probably not stretching a point to note that the many extravagant parties these days seem to be more of a homage to false idols of popular secular culture than a reaffirmation of religious values.

It is this noxious aspect of our culture that leaps straight out of the bourgeois gaucheries of Philip Roth's classic Goodbye ,Columbus that some of our neighbors are seeking to imitate, not the nobler ideals of Judaism.

Why not keep the Goy Mitzvahs but teach the kids about the responsibilities and obligations of adulthood? If it catches on, schools could even start teaching a useful language like Hebrew, instead of a worthless one like French.

Posted by Orrin Judd at February 4, 2004 6:39 AM