Barmitzvahs: Fact and Fiction Gather round, children. Lauren's birthday again.Time for another grandfatherly chat. Well. I don't mean 'chat' do I? You can't in- terrupt and, really, the best part of any chat is your interrup- tions. Let's all start by hoping Lolly has a very happy birthday. If we had a cake, she could blow out the candles and you could ll eat a slice whilst you listen to me. I suppose, if you like, you could eat a slice instead of listening tome. I'm in the middle of reading a book called KALOOKI NIGHTS by Howard Jacobson. Jacobson is a Manchester born Jewish writer, about the same age as me, and I enjoy his books not only because I think he's one of the best writers in England but because his (or, at least, his characters - he writes mainly fiction) range of experiences is similar to my own. Kalooki, by the way, is a card game much favoured by his mother and, whilst I can't quite get the hang of the rules from his book, I'm sure it's like Klab- biash, the game my grandfather used to play and which I told you about in an earlier letter, in that the main purpose of the game is to provoke discussion and acrimonious argument, rather than create a winner. After all, there can only be one highest scorer in a game. How much more equable is a game which ends with every- one disagreeing with everyone else, whilst each knows that they occupy the moral highground. So, one might not have scored the most points but, at least, one is a mensch. (look it up). Actual- ly, I've just looked up the rules and the two games are quite different, but the end result is very similar - players end up arguing and insulting each other and agreeing never to speak to each other again as long as they live, then they deal the cards and play another game. However, Kalooki is not the main motivation for this letter. There is another chapter in KALOOKI NIGHTS where Max (the narra- tor) tells us about his non-Bar Mitzvah. I expect you know what a Bar Mitzvah is. It happens to every Jewish boy on or around his thirteenth birthday, when he is deemed, by Jewish law, to achieve adulthood and, forever more, be responsible for his own actions. In recent years, they've added a similar occasion for girls but, as we all know, girls are much more grown-up than boys, they have it when they are twelve years old. That's called a Bat Mitzvah. In the olden days which Max and I both remember, though, it was strictly a man thing, if you can accept that a just-thirteen year old boy, quaking in his first long trousers, standing up in syna- gogue, squeakingly reciting that day's portion of the law in a tuneless, uncomprehending, incomprehensible sing-song voice can be called a 'man-thing'. I'll write a little more about Bar Mitz- vahs later but right now I want to talk about Max's non-Bar Mitz- vah, because that was a much rarer thing for Jewish boys/men in my youth. Naturally, there was a wide range of degrees of reli- giousness, from those who barely observed the practices of Ju- daism to those whose lives were subsumed (and consumed) by ob- serving every nuance of religious teaching. For example, I was at school with one boy who would not write the word 'God' because it is forbidden to utter the name except in prayer at synagogue. Such Orthodox Jews had to distort the word to save themselves from sin (Go figure!).So Harold use to (still does, I suppose) write 'G-d'. My family's religious position was somewhere between 'G-d' and 'Oh my God!' and, of course, I knew lots of Jewish kids from right across the range of piety. In my school alone, for ex- ample, this range spread from Harold (and many like him) to a guy who eventually went to jail for murder (a very unusual event for a Jew in my day - that is, committing murder was very unusual; going to jail rather less unusual). But I never knew or heard of a Jewish thirteen year old boy who didn't have a Bar Mitzvah in a synagogue on a Shabbas morning. Always with a party afterwards at which he had to make a speech. Usually it was the same speech, with only the names changed. I'm going to talk about Max's non-Bar Mitzvah in a minute. But what I've just said reminded me of my own Bar Mitzvah. Nearly sixty years ago and suddenly it's vivid in my mind. Just shows you how society messes you up when you're not watching. Of course, a Bar Mitzvah doesn't just happen. Plans have to be made. Synagogues booked. Banqueting Halls (well, Shul Rooms) to be ar- ranged. Caterers to be commissioned - Kosher caterers at that; in Leeds it was always Addlemans who did it and, if you consider that there might have been a couple of Bar Mitzvahs on the same day and maybe a wedding or two, you can imagine just how many chickens there must have been in old Mrs Addleman's kitchen on an average weekend (chicken being ubiquitous - if you didn't have chicken soup, you had chicken liver pate and/or roast chicken breast. I bet Addleman's kitchen was like a Colonel Sanders. You had to book the rabbi from the synagogue for the party (no, he didn't do after-dinner miracles, just eat his dinner and make a speech). You had to send out the invitations. Some even had to book the band to play at the party. I've just remembered the name of the band. It was The Charlie Marcus Dance Band. I think Char- lie Marcus maybe worked at Montague Burton The Tailor Of Taste during the week and, I suppose, so might the band, there being more demand during the week for tailors and cutters and Hoffmann- pressers and button-holers and lining-makers than pianists and saxophonists and fiddlers and drummers and accordionists and a man waving a stick whilst smiling at the same time. You also had to buy new clothes for all the family. And you had to worry con- stantly for weeks ahead that you hadn't forgotten anything. That's what you had to do if you were a parent. If you were the Bar Mitzvah boy, though, all you had to was spend weeks learning your solo in the synagogue. And for that you went to the Talmud Torah -Hebrew School. My Rebbe, who taught me all he knew about reading my portion of the law, was reputed by fellow twelve year old students to have at one time been a defence lawyer for Al Capone and, after Al Capone was sent to jail, he (the Rebbe, that is, not Big Al) came to England where he was spending the twilight of his life teach- ing Leeds boys their Bar Mitzvah portions. I suppose it was quite an effective smokescreen. I can honestly say that never once was the classroom door broken down by gun-toting henchmen seeking re- venge for my Rebbe's failure to keep their gangster boss out of jail. Of course, we preferred to believe this story rather than any other mundane version of the Rebbe's roots. Mind you, he was about as effective in instilling in me any reverence, any lust for biblical knowledge, any interest even as he may have been in keeping Al Capone out of jail. He was obviously no match for that Elliott Ness. (Wonder if he was a Jew? Elliott? That's a Jewish name, isn't it?) Anyway, I eventually absorbed enough from him to be able to per- form by rote in the synagogue. The enduring image is of facing a large audience (sorry, congregation) including my father sur- rounded by my uncles in the main synagogue and my mother sur- rounded by aunts in the balcony reserved for women. My father looking anxious, my mother beaming and platzing (look it up) with pride, my aunts with broad smiles but (am I being unfair?) criti- cal eyes (no, I'm not being unfair). Anyway, enough about my Bar Mitzvah. I'll tell you the full story another time when you can't escape. Let's get back to Max. I hope I've given to you enough of the flavour of a Bar Mitzvah, even a middle-of-the-road, no-big-deal Bar Mitzvah to show you how important it was in England in those days. Probably as impor- tant an event as your daughter's wedding and certainly beats (for fun if nothing else) the only two other significant markers in a Jewish boy's life - his bris and his funeral. So you can imagine that it came as a big surprise to Max (back to KALOOKI NIGHTS) when his father announced he wasn't going to have a Bar Mitzvah. Jack (his father) was an atheist, communist, anti-religious, an- ti-fascist, anti-ghetto mentality ex-boxer who thought that the only safe future lay in the total integration of minorities (es- pecially, in those days, Jews). Only, he thought, when Jews were absorbed into the wider community so they were indistinguishable from anyone else would it be safe to be a Jew or (in his case) a dissenting ex-Jew. So, instead of a Bar Mitzvah, he arranged for Max to have a non-Bar Mitzvah. That way, he said, Max would be liberated. He would have future choices. He would not be shackled to a particular mind set. He woulde be as free as his father. Naturally, he didn't want to let Max down. So, instead of a Bar Mitzvah, he bought him a pair of boxing gloves and set about bonding in the back yard, sparring and rough-housing with his son. It didn't quite work. Why didn't it work? Well, for one thing, Max would quite have liked to have a Bar Mitzvah. Not from the religious aspect, you understand, because he didn't subscribe to that view either. Mainly because he was the only Jew he knew who hadn't had a Bar Mitzvah and he didn't specially like the idea of going through life as the only Jew he knew who hadn't had a Bar Mitzvah. Also, he didn't like boxing. But it was no big deal for him. He could get by with or without benefit of Bar Mitzvah and knew, which- ever, he'd be kept fully occupied screwing up his life just like the rest of us. On the other hand, life was not trouble-free for his father. Af- ter the non-Bar Mitzvah (although I suppose it's nonsense to talk about 'after' something that didn't happen) this free-thinking, liberated, un-shackled by doctrine man began to have a few doubts. Remember, you can't get back your thirteenth birthday. I've never heard of anyone having a Bar Mitzvah in later life. I suppose that may be because everyone has already had it done and, a bit like being christened, you don't need to do it again. Any- way, Jack started asking Max if he thought he should have given him a Bar Mitzvah. As so often is the case, the child was wiser than the parent. Max said it didn't really matter. Jack asked his wife. As is always the case, the wife was wiser than the husband. She said that Jack had followed his principles and his conscience and that was alright. But Jack kept asking and, I don't doubt, he also kept asking himself. That's about all for this year. I hope you enjoyed the cake. Hap- py birthday, once again to Lauren and lots of love to all of you. Grandpa