Living in a poverty-stricken town in Poland in 1935, Esther Warblud missed out on a bat mitzvah when she turned 12.
Create a free account to read this article
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The traditional Jewish coming-of-age ceremony was sidelined by the struggles of daily life, and later by the horrors of the Holocaust.
But on Sunday,the 82-year-old Auschwitz survivor was one of 75 residents in a Melbourne nursing home to celebrate their bat mitzvah or bar mitzvah, the former for women and the latter for men.
Jewish Care oversees four aged-care facilities across Melbourne, and Sunday marked the first time the special ceremony had been held.
Typically, Jewish girls and boys celebrate their coming of age when they turn 12 or 13 so for many residents, the ceremony came more than 70 years late.
Rabbi Nerenberg, from Jewish Care's Caulfield facility, said the oldest resident to attend the ceremony was 99 years old, and most were Holocaust survivors or had fled Europe as the war broke out.
The ceremony symbolises "a boy or girl's time to become a man or become a woman, to stand up and carry the flame", he said.
"The war was definitely the number one factor as to why they didn't celebrate it properly."
The Rabbis at Jewish Care only learnt many had missed out on the milestone occasion after a resident made an offhand comment about it earlier this year.
On Sunday morning, more than 150 family members watched as their elderly loved ones took part in the ceremony, described by Rabbi Nerenberg as "meaningful and moving".
The festivities included a call up for the men and a candle lighting ceremony for the women, followed by dancing and singing.
"It actually transported me back in time to when I was a little girl in Poland before the war," said Esther Warblud. "I feel lucky that I live in a place like Australia."
Rabbi Nerenberg said that it was the second bar mitzvah for one elderly resident. Just hours into his first, when he was only 13 years old, Nazis invaded his town and took his parents away. He never saw or heard from them again.
But despite the tragic history many of the Jewish Care residents share, the ceremony was one of joy.
"It's never too late to celebrate," said Rabbi Kohn, one of the event's organisers.
The Age
