I have noticed more 83 year old men celebrating their second bar mitzvahs, and cannot find any source for this. Is it a new custom? Does it have any basis in pre-20th century practice?
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1cmose, welcome to Mi Yodeya, and thanks very much for bringing your question here! I hope you get useful answers to this question and that you'll also look around the site and find other material that interests you, perhaps including our 30 other bar-mitzvah questions.– Isaac Moses ♦Feb 10, 2014 at 21:21
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The first time I heard of this concept, was back in 1999 when Kirk Douglas had a second "Bar Mitzvah" which was well covered by the media. (He has since had a third בר מצוה!)– EphraimFeb 11, 2014 at 8:28
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1 Answer
The rationale behind it is that Tehillim describes a lifetime as seventy years in the verse
ימי שנותינו בהם שבעים שנה ואם בגבורות שמונים שנה
(90:10.) Thus -- the reasoning goes -- 83 is 13 years into your "second lifetime" which is as good an excuse for a kiddush as any. I do not know of any source for it prior to the twentieth century or of any book of halacha or official minhagim that quotes it, but that doesn't mean anything.
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Is that your own reasoning or you heard it somewhere? Either way, it's cute. +1– Y e zFeb 11, 2014 at 0:41
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I heard it from several people, mostly people celebrating their own second bar mitzvahs– YitzchakFeb 11, 2014 at 2:44
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So when we all Gd-willing hit 93, on our way to many more years, do we make a 3rd bar mitzvah? +1 Feb 11, 2014 at 6:31
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1@BabySeal No, it would be every 70 years since the Tehillim says you live 70 years Therefore, you a reborn Jew, and at 83 you are 13. My father always asks the question if a 70 year need to get recircumscised?– user9341Apr 24, 2015 at 12:56