the.com/bar mitzvah
Where a thirteen-year-old grabs a microphone and Jewish law agrees they're an adult now.
means A Jewish coming-of-age ceremony marking when a boy turns thirteen and becomes responsible for observing the commandments, typically including his first reading from the Torah, followed by a celebration.
from From Hebrew and Aramaic: 'bar' means 'son' (the Aramaic word) and 'mitzvah' means 'commandment' (Hebrew), so literally 'son of the commandment' — one now bound by the rules. The phrase 'bar mitzvah' appears in rabbinic literature meaning a person obligated to keep the law; its use for the ceremony itself came later. The feminine counterpart, 'bat mitzvah' ('daughter of the commandment'), is a much more recent development. Note that 'mitzvah' shares the same root that gives the everyday sense of 'a good deed.'
- literal meaning
- Aramaic for son of the commandment
- no ceremony needed
- Boys become bar mitzvah automatically at thirteen
- medieval origin
- The party tradition emerged only centuries later
- torah reading
- Teen chants ancient Hebrew before the whole congregation
- girls counterpart
- Bat mitzvah arrived widely in the twentieth century