Top secret: The first batmitzvah
The first South African batmitzvah was held at Temple Israel, Hillbrow, in May 1938. It was one of the earliest anywhere in the world. Since the word “batmitzvah” had not yet been coined, it was described as “confirmation for a girl”.
In the days leading up to the ceremony, there was considerable fear of an adverse public reaction. The event was given scant publicity, and the girl was not named. When no backlash occurred, the relieved management committee heaped congratulations upon Rabbi Weiler – but gave none to the girl.
She was Lisellota Rosalie Lindenberg. Her father Herman had recently arrived in Johannesburg and ‘expressed his desire to have his daughter confirmed on Shavuoth’. The second batmitzvah, the next year, went to Olga Marx, daughter of community leaders Max and Rita Marx. In both cases, the families were émigré German Jews.
From the war years until the mid-sixties, the ceremonies always involved groups of girls dressed in all white, much like the Orthodox batmitzvahs which followed from the 1950s. The difference was that the Reform girls were called to the bimah to read portions of Torah, usually on the festivals of Shavuoth or Sukkot.
Girls who had batmitzvahs during the forties and fifties recall that there was considerable antipathy to females reading from Torah. As a result, only the most determined girls were willing to have batmitzvahs. However, by the late sixties, encouraged by the new “feminist” movement, a “batmitzvah” came to be identical to a “barmitzvah” in the Reform movement, and could be held on any Shabbat close to the girl’s thirteenth birthday.
The first such ‘modern’ batmitzvah seems to be that of Hilary Wainer, daughter of Issy Wainer, the much-loved youth movement convenor in Johannesburg. Her batmitzvah was held at her father’s youth camp in Margate, the Alan Isaacs Camp, in July 1967. Her ‘solo’ batmitzvah set a precedent at her home synagogue of Temple Shalom in Johannesburg, where this became the norm, soon spreading to neighbouring Johannesburg congregations. But congregations elsewhere lagged years behind, still celebrating group ‘confirmations’ well into the seventies.
Lilo Lindenberg, aged eight, at the right of this picture with her father Herman, mother Martha and brother Werner. At right, Lilo in her early twenties on a holiday in the mountains. There are no pictures of her at the time of her ‘batmitzvah’. (Photographs courtesy Carol Engelman, Lilo’s daughter)
The second girl to have a batmitzvah – and the last to have a ‘solo’ batmitzvah for some 30 years – was Olga Marx, seen here years later as a mother herself, with her daughter Jennifer Hochstadter, her mother Rita Marx, long-serving leader of the United Sisterhood in Johannesburg, and her grandmother Mrs H Frenkel
Young ladies. Batmitzvah girls in the early fifties in Johannesburg, wearing identical dresses, gloves and hats, and carrying identical handbags
Reverend Isaac Richards with his daughter Monica and Denise Nagel at their batmitzvahs in 1958. Monica’s mother, Lily Richards, died in 1951, a few months after the family arrived in Port Elizabeth
High fashion in 1962. Natalie Kapelus and Hazel Simon show off the latest beehive hairstyles for their batmitzvahs in Port Elizabeth
Rise of the hemlines over 16 years. Lorna Kremer, left, whose batmitzvah was on the festival of Sukkot, 1953, in long white dress and white gloves. Right, Judy Friedberg, in a white mini-skirt and no gloves, whose big day was on Shavuot, 1969. Lorna’s ceremony, in Johannesburg, was already called a batmitzvah. Judy’s in Cape Town, was still called a confirmation.
A pioneering moment, the first ‘modern’ batmitzvah. Hilary Wainer reads from the Torah at the Alan Isaacs youth camp in Margate. Alongside are her sister Devorah, mother Betty, Rabbi Walter Blumenthal of Temple Shalom and her father Issy Wainer.
The gloves are gone. Daniella Jaff celebrates at Temple Emanuel in 1985, flanked by father Steven and mother Naomi, who is now the only one wearing a stylish hat. The photograph was taken from the choir room above – Naomi is a long-standing choir member
Perched on her mother’s lounge sofa, Gabi Gasparotto reads her batmitzvah portion to an online audience during a Beit Emanuel service conducted over Zoom during in the Covid-19 national lockdown, on 4 April 2020.