Motherhood V: Birth Rituals

A new baby is welcomed into its family and community, and into the Jewish People, with a range of mitzvot, halachot, and customs.

Biblical stories of birth often recount the naming of a baby or, more rarely, a circumcision. Torah mitzvot prescribe a mother’s ritual observance postpartum, including purification and offering a sacrifice, and a son’s berit mila (circumcision), and pidyon ha-ben (redemption of the first born).

Previously, we discussed the beracha recited over the birth of a baby and the laws of ritual purity after childbirth, and in our next installments we will address berit mila and pidyon haben. In this piece, we look at traditional, but non-obligatory, birth rituals for boys and girls and some traditional sources about choosing a name.

Rituals for a New Baby

Looking at the prevalent birth rituals in many communities today, it would be easy to get the impression that the ceremonies around the birth of a boy are well-defined and religiously authentic, while those celebrating the birth of a girl are more improvised or of recent origin. A closer look at halachic history reveals that, beyond berit mila and pidyon ha-ben, there are early religious roots to celebrating births of both boys and girls in a wider range of ways.

The Talmud mentions two ritual observances that would take place after the birth of a son: shevua ha-ben and yeshu’a ha-ben:

With good logical basis, Rashi identifies these with the mitzvot of berit mila and pidyon ha-ben.

However, a brief ruling in Masechet Semachot, a minor tractate, complicates Rashi’s understanding of shevua ha-ben as berit mila. Masechet Semachot refers to a parallel ritual for girls called shevua ha-bat.

In the fourteenth century, Orchot Chayyim explains that there was a practice of keeping a vigil in a newborn’s home every night of its first week of life. The vigil would culminate with a celebration at the week’s end, on the night before the eighth day, known as shevua ha-ben or shevua ha-bat:

As a source for the vigil, Orchot Chayyim cites another Talmudic passage, which indicates that the concern is not uniquely—or even primarily—for the baby, but rather for the mother:

This passage mentions two other major lifecycle events that stretch on for a week: weddings (sheva berachot) and mourning (shiv’a).¹ Through the shevua ha-ben or shevua ha-bat, birth would entail a weeklong communal observance, much like marriage and death.²

Rashi’s identification of yeshua ha-ben with pidyon ha-ben was also challenged. Rabbeinu Tam (in some texts of Tosafot the identification is Rav Chayyim) suggests that yeshu’a ha-ben refers not to pidyon ha-ben, but instead to a postpartum feast of thanks:

In this comment, Rabbeinu Tam recognizes the significance of birth rituals that are not specifically prescribed by Halacha. Though his prooftext is a prophetic parable of a male being born, his underlying logic—that we would wish to give religious recognition to the miracle of birth beyond what is clearly defined by the Torah—could apply as easily to the birth of a girl.

In perhaps an early indication of more spontaneous birth celebrations, the Talmud quotes Rav as saying that Boaz threw 120 celebrations for his children, two parties each for his sons and his daughters. Rabbeinu Gershom identifies one set of sixty as marking the birth of each boy and girl:

Taken together, these sources suggest that there were time periods in which birth rituals like these for both boys and girls were commonplace. Such rituals have included weeklong observances, celebrations at the conclusion of the first week of life, and festive meals of thanks. Even if a full week of observance following birth is no longer viable, it leaves a legacy to consider at any child’s birth.

Rituals Before Berit Mila

A vignette in the Zohar tells of two rabbis who stay awake the night before a berit mila engrossed in learning Torah:

The gathering described here, like the “shevua ha-ben,” takes place exactly at the conclusion of a baby boy’s first week. Here, the convergence of this timing with the eve of the berit mila takes center stage and may account for the practice’s longevity where other rituals have faded. To this day, in many communities, a minyan of friends and family gathers the night before a berit mila, as a measure taken to protect the baby boy.

Customs include reading from the Zohar and other texts and enjoying food and drink with a range of berachot. In Ashkenazi communities, this is often called Wachtnacht (night of watching). Shach attests to it being called “Woch”, which means week, like shevua ha-ben, but also sounds similar to Wacht.

A couple of hundred years later, in the late eighteenth century, Rav Tzvi Elimelech of Dinov describes this as a practice kept in many, but not all, communities:

In Sefardi and some Chassidic communities, this practice has been more widely kept and is often called Berit Yitzchak, after the common compilation of readings for the event (referenced above), and referencing Yitzchak Avinu, the first of our forefathers to have a berit mila on the eighth day. Here is Rav Yitzchak Yosef’s description of the Berit Yitzchak:

In some communities, children gather to surround the infant and recite Shema on the evening before the berit mila, sometimes adding in other verses or songs. In others, such recitations were performed all week long for both boys and girls, as befits the shevua ha-ben and shevua ha-bat.

Shalom Zachar

Among Ashkenazim, there is a widespread practice to hold a shalom zachar gathering the Friday night after the birth of a boy. Terumat Ha-deshen suggests that the shalom zachar is based on the Talmudic passage regarding the meal of thanks of yeshua ha-ben (as explained by Tosafot):

On this reading, the yeshua ha-ben takes place specifically on Friday night for the sake of convenience. Rav Yechezkel Landau, in his commentary to Yoreh Deah suggests that the shalom zachar is fundamentally the same custom as the Wachtnacht or shevua ha-ben.

Drawing from Rav Landau, we can suggest that the linkage of the timing of this gathering to berit mila can explain why this custom persisted, while no comparable custom remains for a baby girl. Perhaps over time the vestigial evening celebration was moved to Friday nights for the reasons of convenience Terumat Ha-deshen cites.

Taz suggests additional reasons for holding a shalom zachar on Shabbat. First, to recognize the significance of a baby experiencing a Shabbat before berit mila (grounded in a midrashic discussion of why animals are sacrificed only from eight days old).³ Second, to comfort the baby over the angel making them forget the Torah learned in utero. The latter idea (originally proposed by Maharshal), may be that Shabbat is a day of “zachor” remembering⁴ or that pleasure in Shabbat is a sort of comfort.⁵

Though these additional ideas could plausibly be applied to baby girls as well, and there is no halachic bar to convening on the Friday night following the birth of a daughter, this is not customary. Perhaps the closest remnant is in Iraqi communities, where a celebration, the Sheshe, is held to welcome a girl on the sixth day from her birth.⁶

We’ve seen that there were significant birth traditions for boys and girls, and that berit mila seems to have been a factor in preserving more traditions marking a baby boy’s first week. Some ritual customs celebrating the birth of a girl, like the Sheshe, were also maintained over the centuries. Their common denominator seems to be naming the baby girl.

Giving a name is an important act that is naturally ritualized in many cultures. In the Torah, we are often told of a parent naming a son, and in at least one instance, naming a daughter. After giving birth to Zevulun, Leah gives thanks for the zeved,⁷the Divine gift of a child, and then names her son. Immediately after this, the Torah recounts that she gives birth to a daughter and names her Dina.

Though the Torah does not describe a formal naming ceremony, this sets the stage for naming as an anchor for the rituals that developed to recognize the birth of a daughter.

We present the general outlines of three such rituals below. As befits their non-obligatory status, the rituals’ exact parameters are fluid, and they could sometimes be combined.

Hollekreisch

In medieval Ashkenaz, a ceremony known as Hollekreisch would mark the giving of a secular name to a baby boy or girl. In a fifteenth-century responsum, Rav Moshe Mintz, a student of Terumat Ha-deshen, explains the etymology of the ceremony’s name as reported by his father and notes that a girl’s being named Hannlin at her Hollekreisch does not interfere with establishing that her Jewish name was Channa:

Rav Yosef Juspa Ha-levi, seventeenth-century beadle of Worms, describes a girl’s Hollekreisch in his community, as well as celebrations of women and girls on the Shabbat when the father is called to the Torah:

Here we see a whole communal network supporting the mother in her lying-in and celebrating the girl’s birth and new name with her. The wreath is evocative of the community’s bridal wreaths and would have been a way of blessing the girl for the future.

Baby-Naming

In sixteenth-century Poland, Rav Yehoshua Falk mentions a girl’s baby-naming as a central communal event. The naming parallels a boy’s naming at his berit. If the community happens to be celebrating a marriage at the same time, the festivities can be balanced and intertwined:

Here, naming a baby girl takes place in the home, and is a communal priority on par with a bride and groom or a baby boy.

Baby-namings for girls could also take place, as is customary nowadays, during the Torah reading. In the eighteenth century, Rav Yaakov Emden notes that the father’s receipt of an aliya stood in for his wife’s postpartum offering. It would take place when the baby was over four weeks old, at which point the laying-in period for the mother would typically be over, so that she could get to synagogue, and Halacha would be less concerned for neonatal loss.⁸

Rav Emden references baby naming over the Torah, a modified Hollekreisch (without the naming) and a zeved ha-bat (which we’ll discuss shortly).

Nowadays it is customary to name a daughter sooner after birth and to hold a communal celebration, often a kiddush on Shabbat morning, at a later date. Rav Moshe Sternbuch advocates naming a girl at the first opportunity with a big crowd at Torah reading, even if this is during the week, because he argues that the soul should not be without a name. He identifies the kiddush with the broader idea of meals of thanks postpartum, as well as with the importance of receiving a community’s blessings.

Though there are differences in the different naming customs we have seen thus far, they all share an emphasis on the communal importance of the birth of a girl.

Zeved Ha-bat

As Rav Emden noted, a zeved ha-bat was common among Sefardi communities. The name zeved ha-bat is adapted from the verse we saw earlier ⁹ where Leah names Zevulun, suggesting that the birth of a daughter is itself a gift.

The basic liturgy for the zeved ha-bat, as it appears in the late-seventeenth century siddur Me’ah Berachot compiled by Rav Yitzchak Abuhab, is as follows:¹⁰

The opening verse of the zeved ha-bat appears in a number of rabbinic homilies. One in particular seems especially significant for understanding its role here:

According to this midrash, God’s dove represents our matriarchs, most of whom suffered infertility. Their drive to conceive pushes them past their initial reticence so that their prayer can be seen and heard. In the zeved ha-bat, the mother joins her community in prayer. More than that, the birth of a girl is a sort of emergence from the cleft of the rock, and the ultimate goal is for the newborn, too, to someday join her mother in showing herself in prayer.

In this ceremony, the baby girl is welcomed with a plea that she develop into a full-blown spiritual personality, that she be seen and heard. This theme continues with the nod not only to the matriarchs but to two of the female prophets in the mi-sheberach prayer. Not only should the baby take her place as a mother in Israel like Rivka, but she may also aspire to spiritual communion with God and leadership of her people.

While this mi-sheberach blesses the girl that she may have “male children”, the modern couple might alter the text from “be-vanim zecharim” to “be-vanim u-vanot” (with sons and daughters).

The zeved ha-bat remains popular in many Sefardi communities today and is increasingly gaining traction in other communities as well. Many families celebrating a zeved ha-bat add on additional verses, liturgical poems, or prayers or divrei Torah of their own writing, for a sort of second naming ceremony in addition to a naming at synagogue. While some women recite birkat ha-gomel when the baby girl is named, others wait for the zeved ha-bat.

Jennifer Breger discusses some of the factors that go into personalizing a ceremony to mark the birth of a daughter, which she calls a simchat bat (lit., rejoicing at a girl):¹¹

We saw above a preference for giving a child a clear name and not just a diminutive. This is because halachically, names are relevant for contracts, including the ketuba, or a get in the event of divorce, where the laws of getting the names right are extremely important.

In addition to its practical aspects, choosing a name can also bear spiritual weight. Adam establishes his relationship to the rest of creation by assigning names. Our patriarchs and matriarchs—like Leah—often embedded their experiences in the names they gave to their children, and even God sometimes intervenes in a naming or a renaming.

The Meaning of a Name

Many biblical names have significant literal meaning. A midrash ascribes early names in Tanach to “ruach ha-kodesh”, a sacred spirit that parents would access to embed their experiences or aspirations into the child’s name. The midrash explains that the practice of naming after ancestors is more recent and practical in orientation.

Indeed, the dynasty of the exilarch has a preponderance of men named Shimon or Gamliel after their grandfathers.

The Talmud suggests that the spiritual origins of names are also linked to spiritual effects:

Drawing from this teaching, Rabbi Moshe Ha-darshan states that we should choose names for children that would be fitting for someone righteous, because a person’s name can influence their character:

Today, some parents choose names that express their gratitude for the child’s birth or convey moral or spiritual attributes that they hope the child will embody. And some coin unique and meaningful names in a way that harks back to biblical naming customs.

Naming After Another Person

Another way to give a child a meaningful name is to name them after a specific righteous person, often a family member:

Indeed, Sefer Chassidim considers naming after forefathers to be an established custom:

Note the mention at the end of varying customs regarding whether a child is named only for deceased relatives or also for the living. This difference in custom persists to our day, when many Ashkenazi communities name only for the deceased and many Sefardi communities name for the living. This debate may be connected to the halacha that we do not call our parents by their first names:¹²

While this halacha would seem to suggest that a parent is treated with proper awe specifically by their children refraining from calling them by name, one could argue that naming a child for one’s parent is a means to honor them:

There are also traditions in some communities of naming for the father’s side first and then for the mother’s side. These traditions, however, have some flexibility. In an important historical example, Rashbash, a direct descendant of Ramban, relates that Ramban encouraged his son to name his first son for his father-in-law who had just died, and not for him:

Naming for someone else also need not always be exact. Maharshal, for instance, suggests that the name Yeshaya was more popular than the name Yeshayahu in his day, because this was a way of honoring Yeshayahu with a slight change to distance the named from Yeshayahu’s tragic death:

Rav Moshe Feinstein cites Maharshal in his discussion of naming a baby after someone who died young (in this case, a man who wished to name his daughter after his deceased sister). Rav Moshe suggests that this matter is of concern but making a slight change to the name suffices:

Jewish and Non-Jewish Names

The question of deviating from traditional Jewish names is more contentious. A midrash attributes the Exodus to benei Yisrael’s maintaining their Jewish names in Egypt:

This midrash seems to also be engaging in a bit of polemic with Jews who might indeed be naming their children Rufus after Reuven or with Reuvens who went by Rufus. As we saw, however, in medieval Ashkenaz boys and girls were given secular names as well as Jewish names and those names were even ritually celebrated.

Even when a child is given a Jewish name (with or without a secular name), that name may not be Hebrew. Rav Moshe Feinstein acknowledges the history of Jewish names based on non-Hebrew languages and explains how one might reconcile this phenomenon with the midrash:

According to Rav Moshe, from the time of Matan Torah it is the mitzvot that distinguish us as Jews more than our names. Though, all things being equal, traditional names are preferred, a name that has entered into the Jewish people is fundamentally acceptable. Depending on community custom and family preference, babies can be given traditional Jewish names either in Hebrew or in other languages (e.g., Yiddish, Ladino, Amharic, etc.). In some communities, it is accepted to give Hebrew names that are of more recent vintage or even entirely new.

Sometimes, parents will name a child for a relative with a non-Hebrew name by giving them a matching Hebrew one. For example, Rav Chayyim David Ha-levi named his eldest daughter Nitzchiya (from the root “netzach” to prevail), after his mother, Victoria.

As with birth rituals, there is often room to balance respect for tradition and family with innovation and creativity. Ultimately, we hope that the new babies will grow up to imbue their own milestones with gratitude to God.