Illustration Credit: Rivka Tsinman
Halakhah הֲלָכָה
When do you become a Jewish grown-up? You probably think it’s at age 12 or 13, when you hit bat or bar mitzvah, right? But if you paid attention to this week’s parashah, you might have seen some other ages. As Moshe plans to count Benei Yisrael, we hear over and over that he is supposed to count only those who are above age 20! And then, later on, when counting the Levi’im, Moshe is told to count only those over the age of 30! That’s a long time to wait to become an adult!
Actually, it took a while for the ages of 12 and 13 to become the main age of adulthood in Judaism. Many earlier sources talk about stepping up to do mitzvot as soon as you are able. Here’s one:
קָטָן...יוֹדֵעַ לְנַעְנֵעַ חַיָּב בְּלוּלָב, יוֹדֵעַ לְהִתְעַטֵּף חַיָּב בְּצִיצִית.
A child…who knows how to shake something is obligated in lulav. A child who knows how to wrap themselves up is obligated in tzitzit.
This sounds like age doesn’t matter much—what matters is if we can do the mitzvah. Still, the Shulhan Arukh says that we aren’t totally obligated until 12 or 13—this “obligation” at a younger age is for practice to get us ready. (See Orah Hayyim 657:1.)
Similarly, it’s mostly thought that the ages of 20 and 30 don’t actually represent adulthood; they were just special requirements for serving in the army or in the mishkan (and later in history, the Beit Ha-Mikdash). But in halakhah, those ages don’t disappear entirely. The Shulhan Arukh (Orah Hayyim 53:8) says that, unless you look older than your age, you can’t be hired as the main cantor in a shul until you are 20! And the Rema (Orah Hayyim 581:1) reports that ideally, you shouldn’t lead services on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur unless you are 30!
The bottom line is, you might be a little more grown up than you realize, and you might also have a bit longer than you think until you become a full grown-up!
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