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From: sb@linus.UUCP (Shimshon Berkovits)
Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish
Subject: Re: Bat Mitzvahs
Message-ID: <782@linus.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 29-Feb-84 12:26:49 EST
Article-I.D.: linus.782
Posted: Wed Feb 29 12:26:49 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 1-Mar-84 02:55:39 EST
References: <402@sii.UUCP> <3395@utcsrgv.UUCP>
Organization: MITRE Corp., Bedford MA
Lines: 18

Andy is actually correct. Bar mitzvah is something a boy becomes on his
thirteenth Hebrew birthday; bat mitzvah is something a girl becomes on her
twelfth Hebrew birthday. Nobody has to do anything. (I am told that in the
case of my father, a reasonably well known Orthodox philosopher and theologian,
nobody did anything for several weeks. When it was his "turn" to be called
to the Torah for a weekday reading, he was quietly called. That was a matter
of several weeks later.)

However, once a boy reaches religious majority, he is elligeable to be called
to the Torah. It has become the practice to call him on the first oportunity
that arrises. If he comes to services only on Shabbat (Saturday), that's when he
gets called. It has further become the practice to make note of this recognition
of his becoming bar mitzvah by having a party. Unfortunately, the party often
becomes the main focus of the boy's passage into religious adulthood. He
becomes a bar mitzvah even if his parents have not told him he is Jewish.

				Shim