With love, gratitude, and joy, Dr. and Mr. Mitzvah invite you to celebrate Bat Mitzvah’s 100th birthday on Friday, the Eighteenth of March, Two Thousand and Twenty-Two. Reception to follow services.
A century ago, Jewish American girls gained the right to come-of-age ritually as their male counterparts do: with sheer terror delivering speeches and chanting biblical Hebrew in their squeaky voices before family, friends, and entire congregations. Like bar mitzvah boys, they too could receive the sorts of gifts “You’ll appreciate when you’re older,” like trees planted in Israel in their names.
As with many things rabbinic, debate swirls around nearly each detail. My article about the centennial of the American bat/s mitzvah appears in Washington Post Magazine. It draws on interviews with Lauren Strauss, an American University Jewish studies historian, and with American Jewish historian Jonathan Sarna, director of Brandeis University’s Schusterman Center for Israel Studies.
Here again is the article, titled “How a coming-of-age ritual for Jewish girls aided the rise of women’s rights.”