Batmitzvah
Last Saturday I had the privilege of attending the Batmitzvah ceremony of one of my daughter's schoolfriends. The candidate was only just twelve, and the ceremony was held in an orthodox synagogue, very much by the book. I was expecting an impenetrable event, something completely foreign to my lapsed Protestant understanding. As I entered the Synagogue with my blonde hair and blue eyes, I felt like an intruder. Instead I was invited into and witnessed a true rite of passage. The young girl had prepared over many months for this event. For her Mitzvah, she had decided to paint a series of six canvases to represent the six days of Creation, and she spoke eloquently about how each canvas had come about. She had understood early on that, although she had wanted to create something out of nothing, in fact, as a created being herself, she was only capable of creating something out of something — she was not able to create raw materials for her art ex nihilo . Only an ultimate Creator...