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68

Changing the World
One Simchah at a Time

CELEBRATE • 2006

JN

wish this book had
been around when my
children were becoming
bar and bat mitzvah. If you
know a family that will soon
approach this event, run,
don't walk, to get them a
copy. They will bless you
for it.
On the one hand, bar
and bat mitzvah are wide-
ly observed. There was
even a story in the Wall
Street Journal a while ago
about how non-Jewish
kids pestering their par-
ents that they want one,
too, since they are envi-
ous of their Jewish
friends who get to have
such big parties.
But on the other
hand, children and
parents are bewildered
and confused over
how to make these
events meaningful.
Children and adults
wake up the next morning,
after the out-of-town relatives have left,
and before the mountain of waiting
thank-you notes has to be attacked, and
they ask themselves:
What was this event which took over
our lives for the last six months or more
really all about?
Was the party that we threw only a
way of reciprocating for the ones that
our kids were invited to? Were the adults
whom we invited really there only for
business reasons or for social ones?
Was this Haftorah that our kids broke
their teeth learning how to chant for so
many weeks connected in any way to the
world in which we live? And what mes-
sage did we send our kids about our val-
ues by holding such a lavish bash?
Danny Siegel's Bar and Bat Mitzvah
Book: A Practical Guide for Changing the
World Through Your Simcha is filled on
every page with wise and helpful sug-
gestions on how to avoid the let-down
that the child and the family so often

I

feel after such a simchah.
First of all, it provides the child and
the family with a whole different per-
spective on what this event means. And
then it provides the family with a
plethora of ideas on how to make this
turning point in the life of the child and
in the life of the family.
Siegel provides a definition of what it
means to become a bar or bat mitzvah
that sets the service and the party into
a good perspective. He says that in
some cultures, the stages of life are
counted as infant, toddler, child,
teenager, young adult, adult, mid-life,
empty nester, retiree, etc. In Jewish
thought the stages of life are: infancy,
childhood and then Mitzvah Manhood
or Womanhood. The whole point of the
day is to understand and accept the sta-
tus of one who is now capable and obli-
gated to do good deeds.
If bar/bat mitzvah families accept this
perspective, then everything else begins
to fall into place. What you say on the
invitation, whether you buy your kippot
from Mayan women in Guatemala who
do good work and who live in utter
poverty and desperately need the work,
what the child says in his talk, what
kind of gifts go into the goody bags that
you give your guests, who you honor
and how you honor them and what hap-
pens with the leftover food after the
party — all flow directly from this
understanding of what the event is real-
ly all about.
Here is one example of what Siegel
proposes families do with a bit of imagi-
nation and good will:
Everyone has a challah at the dinner,
right? Technically, you don't need a chal-
lah except at the Shabbat or the holiday
meal but, for some reason, almost every-
one has a big challah at the banquet
table.
And usually we call upon Uncle
Herman, who is still sober this early in
the evening, and who gave a pretty good
gift and therefore deserves an honor,
and who is one of the few in the family
whom we can trust to do it right, to
recite the Motzi. But what more can we
do with this ritual?
Level one: At most parties the caterer
takes the challah away the moment
Uncle Herman recites the blessing. It