It has been nearly one hundred years since the first Bat Mitzvah took place in Manhattan when Judith Kaplan Eisenstein, the daughter of Rabbi Mordechai Kaplan, was called to the bima to read from a chumash on a Shabbat morning. Perhaps that is why I came across two different articles this week about the Bnei Mitzvah experience that are both critiques and reflections on Bnei Mitzvah process.
Here is an excerpt from the first written by Gary Rosenblatt:
Changing Up The Bar and Bat Mitzvah Experience
Did you chant a Haftorah at your bar or bat mitzvah?
Do you remember what it was about?
Have you chanted any others since then?
Rabbi Joy Levitt, executive director of the JCC in Manhattan, believes that the heavy emphasis on teaching youngsters to chant a Haftorah on their special days is a sign of “wasted training and the wrong message” for bar and bat mitzvah youngsters.
“We’re not preparing them for Jewish life” with such rituals, she says. “On the contrary, we’ve sabotaged their Jewish life.”
Rabbi Levitt goes on to critique what we call in the filed of Jewish education a focus exclusively on “transmission,” instead of “transformation.” In essence, she is critiquing the choice to teach a tangible set of skills at the expense of a deeper understanding of why Judaism is important in the first place. Rabbi Levitt is encouraging Jewish educators to explore what Jewish traditions, practices, and values have to say to our teens (not to mention their family) during the years leading up to and after their Bar or Bat Mitzvah.
The article goes on to say:
Whether or not you’re on board with the specifics of these observations, I hope you agree that it’s important to step back and re-think what message we want to convey to the next generation in preparing them, at a tender age, to become members of our community.
Why should they continue their Jewish education if what we have taught them until now doesn’t seem relevant to their lives or inspire them to dig deeper into their Jewish identity?
For the full article, click here:
Cantor Siegel, Mr. Laskowitz and I have discussed these very questions as we continually work to create a program at Torat El that will balance learning a set of skills with the critical goal of creating transformative experiences for our youth. I applaud our youth (and their parents) who remain involved after bnei mitzvah, but all of us would like to see many more of our teens involved in our program. So this morning, I want to hear from you-especially if you have a teen.
What do you think? Do you remember your haftorah? Does your child? What could we do differently to ensure that we are providing a “transformative” experience to our youth that helps them understand the power and beauty of our tradition, in addition to learning the skills that go along with prayer and chanting Torah and Haftorah?
What message was conveyed to you about why you should be a member of the Jewish community? What message do you want to convey to your children and grandchildren?
I look forward to hearing from you!
**For a retrospective on bnei mitzvah nearly 100 years after the first Bat Mitzvah, click here.