What It's Like to Have Your Bat Mitzvah at the Kotel
A Seattle girl braved protestors to have the ceremony "in a place of my ancestors."
“We wanted to be part of the movement.”
A Seattle family reflects on harassment they experienced at the Western Wall during their bat mitzvah ceremony, and why they feel it was worth it.
Traditional Judaism, with some exceptions, only allows men to read from the Torah. Girls typically do not read Torah at their bat mitzvahs. Nowhere on earth is this ruling more guarded that at the Western Wall, or the Kotel, Judaism’s holiest site, located in Jerusalem. In recent years, a group called Women of the Wall have been defying these rules by chanting Torah at the women’s section of the Kotel on Rosh Chodesh (the start of a new month, a holiday with meaning for many Jewish women). They are met with vigorous opposition, let’s just say.
Last week, a Seattle teenager made headlines when she read Torah at her bat mitzvah ceremony with the help of the Women of the Wall. The bat mitzvah, Lucia da Silva, a rising 8th grader at Hamilton International Middle School in Wallingford, and her mothers, Ada Danelo and Cara Stoddard, talk about how they endured attacks during the ceremony and why they would do it again.
Lucia, starting with you, what made you decide to have your bat mitzvah at the Kotel?
Lucia: I just felt that somewhere [in Seattle] didn't really give it the special occasion that all the hard work deserved. I wanted to have it somewhere more meaningful and be in a place of my ancestors. And I wanted to be with my godfather, (former StandWithUs shaliach in Seattle and Israeli influencer) Hen Mazzig—it would be cool to be there with him, where he grew up. Since it was a big event, I wanted to have it at a more meaningful place for me. A more spiritual location for Judaism.
What was it like for you, moms, when Lucia came up with the idea to have her bat mitzvah there?
Ada: We were looking for a rabbi who would do it at the Kotel, and it was just problematic I think, because we weren't fully aware of the context of all the protests. And so then we found Women of the Wall through Hen and his work, because the Tel Aviv Institute has done some work with Women of the Wall. They were immediately welcoming.
Cara: Yeah. Lucia had already started learning some of her Torah portion with Linda Elman that corresponded with her Jewish calendar birthday. Because Women of the Wall only goes to the Kotel on Rosh Chodesh, Lucia would have to start over. And Lucia was like, “I wanna do this. I really wanna do this. And I’m totally willing to start over.” It was really a willingness to kind of scrap the work she’d already done. It was both my and Lucia’s first time going to Israel and going to the Kotel, and to go there in the month of Av and to talk about the destruction of the Temple, to be in that physical place, was pretty powerful.
Were you aware of the potential opposition? At what point did you realize this might be kind of a big deal?
Ada: When we walked into the Kotel. I mean, we knew that we might not get to read from a Torah. But what I didn’t realize is that we would be getting whistled at from the men’s and egalitarian section. And women trying to physically step into our prayer and sitting down in the plastic lawn chairs that they have available at the Kotel pushing up against us. There was a loudspeaker in the men’s section that was aimed directly at us, and they were trying to drown us out with their own prayer. I just didn’t realize it would be like this full-on kind of verbal and audio and physical assault during the entire hour and a half.
Lucia: I wasn’t exactly sure if there would be fifty or a thousand or two thousand [people]. There were a lot of them. Once I learned more about it and how controversial it is there in Jerusalem with all the ultra-Orthodox people and rules in their community, I did kind of predict that there would be some resistance by them. But I didn’t really know that it would be that many people. I did think that there might be some sort of retaliation or protest.
Why did this ceremony happen to get so much attention?
Ada: I think we just got lucky.
Cara: It feels like having more equality at the Kotel is like really in the crosshairs right now.
Ada: I was talking to Israelis there. There had been some expectations that [Prime Minister] Yair Lapid would be a more effective governor than he has been. I think this is maybe one of the issues that folks expected Lapid to take action on and they haven’t seen movement on.
There is a spot where women can pray safely with a Torah and not be up against so much opposition. Was there an easier route that you could have taken? And if so, how come you chose this particular path?
Ada: Robinson’s Arch is really not the Kotel. It’s kind of like separate but equal, but, you know, not quite. From what I’ve read, people get protested for doing b’nai mitzvot at Robinson’s Arch as well. If we're going to get protested anyway, we might as well do it at the most meaningful place.
If we’re going to get protested anyway, we might as well do it at the most meaningful place.
Lucia: Even if it were to be a little bit safer we were doing it not only because it was more meaningful for us, but also because we wanted to be part of the movement. That’s partly why we chose it to do with Women of the Wall as well. I feel like we decided to do it to help be part of a movement to gain more rights for women. It wouldn’t be very meaningful if we just did it in a more protected area. I feel like doing what we did would really be more of a step forward, because like we wouldn’t really get much success or recognition if we did it in a safer space.
Lucia, you have compared this to being in a soccer match. But were there times where you were actually afraid? Did you lose concentration? Reading Torah in front of a crowd is super nerve-racking without anyone even making a sound. What else was going on in your mind?
Lucia: I don’t know. There were times when I did feel a little bit nervous and scared, especially when there was a girl screeching really loudly right next to us. It was really horrible in that moment. It did make me feel a little bit uncomfortable and scared. I quickly realized there was a group of really powerful women and they were like making me feel safe. So there were moments where I would get a little bit nervous. But the Women of the Wall group really did protect me mentally and physically.
As for the soccer thing, that was a big thing that helped me stay focused while I was reading the Torah. Soccer’s a thing that I’m really passionate about. A World Cup final is something that I’ve dreamed of being in my whole life. Imagining that I was there really helped me focus. I can’t mess this up. I’m in the World Cup final. I’ve spent my whole life living for this moment. That really helped me get in the zone of just focusing on the Torah.
Were you surprised by the level of opposition from other women and girls about your age?
Lucia: I was a little bit surprised. I expected a lot from the men. I guess I thought that maybe they would feel like they deserve to get more rights, but I guess it just depends on how you’re raised, because that’s not how they are being brought up, believing that they have the right to pray more than what they’re allowed. I don’t really think it was a problem with them individually.
Ada, you have talked being attacked for being a Zionist in Seattle, but there you felt attacked for being Jewish. Now that you’re back, how are you processing this?
Ada: I think that the tension with the ultra-Orthodox is something that Israelis face, too. There’s no point at which it made me feel less connected to Israel or to Judaism. It’s just like people protesting the right to gay marriage in the US. It doesn't make me feel like less of an American. It did make me really sad that there’s this division within Jewry, because we don’t really see Orthodox versus Reform in Seattle. Where we do see it is the anti-Zionist Jews who are observant, but who won’t hang out with people who identify as Zionists. I’m accustomed to that tension, especially in queer spaces. I’ve personally been excluded from liberal-leaning advocacy groups and just social situations because I don’t shy away from being an overt Zionist. But with our relation to Israel, I don’t think it changes anything. If we were there, we would be going to Women of the Wall every month. We’d be trying to fight for these reforms within Israel, but we don’t live there. So it's more of a duty to just make sure Israel has a right to exist.
Cara: Because we’re queer and a lot of our closest friends are in the queer community, there’s a lot of people who identify as non-religious or who have had experiences growing up in a religious community that was not accepting of queer people or queer narratives. I think that as religious Jews, we move through Seattle in this way — it’s almost taboo to acknowledge that we are practicing our religion and are really proud of it and are raising our kid in that context.
Lastly, what are your takeaways from this experience, and what advice might you give to other bat mitzvah girls or parents?
Cara: I guess my advice for parents who are supporting their kids through that process is to find a good tutor and to take the backseat to your kid and to let your kid kind of drive what that looks like. And really trust that it's not a one-size-fits-all process for any kid.
Lucia: Just find a loving community, whether it’s your friends or your family, or an organization, or a mixture of all three of those things. Just find someone or a group of people that will be able to give you support unconditionally and love you when you really need it. That is the most important thing. I was pretty calm at the Kotel having my bat mitzvah, but it wasn’t because I’m a stoic person or whatever. It was because I had this support from a really strong and loving community. Just find a strong, loving group of people. That’s the most important thing when you’re doing anything, really.
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Kvetches
Once again, AIPAC has disappointed me. In Michigan’s 11th Congressional District, their PAC spent significant amounts of money to defeat a Jewish congress member, Andy Levin. Truly a shandeh. —Jerry Barrish
A note about Kvetches: I got a little flak for introducing a Kvetch section last week. I thought maybe I wouldn’t have to run it again, but this week I got another kvetch.
One level of complaint (kvetches about kvetches?) is, “don’t run kvetches, this should be a positive newsletter.” The thing is, I want this to be a place where everyone has a voice. That means sometimes people will say unhappy things. It’s more important to me to have free speech than to have only happy speech.
This means you can kvetch about me, too.
The second level of complaint is calling it “kvetch.” The argument goes that this minimizes the serious issues our community members are taking up as petty gripes.
Here’s the solution. If you are truly unhappy about something going on in the Jewish community near or far, and you don’t want to be labeled a kvetch, then please submit your feelings in the form of an op-ed or letter to the editor. If you want to submit a complaint about something going on in the form of one or two lines, it will end up here in the Kvetch section. If you would like to suggest a name other than “Kvetch,” I’m all ears.
