At what age does a child become an adult? The classic barmitzvah speech used to be “Today I am a man”. But do you know any 12- or 13-year-old who is truly an adult? We are allowed to drive at 17, vote at 18, or should 16-year-olds vote?
Our sidrah counts Jewish males as part of the community “from 20 years old and upwards, all who go to the army.” So is army service the criteria for adulthood?
Some years ago, David Brooks coined the phrase “אhe Odyssey Years,” suggesting a new stage between adolescence and adulthood: “20-somethings go to school and take breaks from school. They live with friends and they live at home. They fall in and out of love. They try one career and then another. Their parents grow increasingly anxious.”
Jewish sources, too, seem to view a person’s twenties as a period of flux and formation. Take the Levites: Numbers 8:24 has them starting work at 25, whereas Numbers 4:3 puts it at 30. Rashi resolves this: “At 25 they come to study the laws of the service, and at 30 they begin work.” Army at 20, study from 25–30 – sounds quite like the route young Israelis take.
A midrash asks directly: “until what age is a person a na’ar — a youth? (Yalkut Shimoni 929)
– Rabbi Akiva says: 25
– Rabbi Meir says: 30
– Rabbi Yishmael says: 20 — ‘from 20 years, all who go to the army’” (Numbers 1:3).
So where is the transition, and why is the military draft at 20? Ramban offers two criteria: first: “the body is strong enough” at that age. Another: “adolescents do not wish to join the adult community until 20”, meaning it is not physical strength but the maturity to settle down, develop a career, marry, buy a home.
Rabbi Immanuel Jakobovits once remarked that some think Judaism is for children; they send their children to cheder and hold a seder “for the children” but they don’t study, pray or practise. In Judaism, he said, adulthood means responsibility and responsibility starts at 12 or 13. Only adults are obligated in mitzvot. Adulthood does not grant licence; it is synonymous with mature and committed responsibility.
To reassure worried parents, Brooks offers good news: “The Odyssey Years do end. By 30, the vast majority are through it. After a youth dazzled by possibilities, they discover that committing to the few things you love is a sort of liberation.”
We might even posit: the sooner we confer responsibility, the sooner the children will grow up.
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