Sparking Jewish Joy

How much to give for a Bark Mitzvah?

I’ve never been credibly accused of overt optimism. The Kiddush cup half full Jews are, I observe, long dead. Nevertheless, who am I to spurn the words of Rachel Goldberg-Polin, mother of Hersh, who was murdered after 328 days held hostage by Hamas?

Speaking in October after the ceasefire agreement was signed, Rachel quoted from the book of Kohelet, which is read during the Jewish festival of Sukkot:

“We are told in chapter three there is a season for everything and a time for everything, but now, we are being asked to digest all of those seasons, all of those times, at the exact same second — winter, spring, summer, fall — experience all four right now.

“It says there is a time to be born and a time to die, and we have to do both right now. It says there is a time to weep and a time to laugh, and we have to do both right now. It says there is a time to tear and to heal, and we have to do both right now. And it says there is a time to sob, and there is a time to dance, and we have to do both right now.”

Sob and dance. One doesn’t need to be Jewish or to have experienced a loss as deep and profound as Rachel’s, to choose to follow that path. Any given day, let alone a lifetime, asks us to hold sorrow and joy in the same breath. It’s for this reason Jews break a glass at weddings, why we light the Hanukkiah, heck — why we tell Jewish jokes!

“Antisemitism,” wrote the great historian Deborah Lipstadt, “renders the Jew as ‘object,’ what is done to Jews. It elides Jew as ‘subject,’ what Jews do.” To that end, I submit to the jury my long overdue contribution to Jewish joy:

• Starting with some practical advice: if you can’t remove that stubborn chunk of wax from your menorah, for goodness sake don’t use a corkscrew! This guy radiates Talmudic authority and he says use a blow dryer on high heat, low fan.

• I’m conscious this could easily devolve into a list of people you only just realised were Jewish, but my favourite actor from the original production of Hamilton, Daveed Diggs, who played the dual roles of Marquis de Lafayette and Thomas Jefferson, is Jewish.

• Thierry Henry (right) and me at my bar mitzvah party

  

  (Jack Kessler)

• “Let my babies go!” The iconic Rugrats Passover episode.

• “My Bubbe would have scored that!” This extraordinary miss by former Liverpool striker Ronny Rosenthal.

• Bringing a whole new meaning to ‘coming out of bondage’: Buttmitzvah, a queer Jewish club night.

• Speaking of which, what’s a Bark Mitzvah? It’s a dog’s coming of age ceremony, my dear. You can host it at 13 months or 13 years (it’s not set in stone). This isn’t just a Gen Z thing, by the way. The first documented Bark Mitzvah took place in Beverly Hills, California in 1958, celebrating a black cocker spaniel Duke of Windsor (Windy for short).

• Who said it? Taylor Swift or the Torah?

• Want a new Hanukkah song in your life? Simply take a pre-existing Christmas song (it was probably written by a Jew anyway) and change it to a minor key.