May a Minor Read from the Torah?

by Rabbi Joel Roth, 1982; Edited by Rabbi Robert Binder

Question (Sh’eilah)

May children below the age of bar or bat mitzvah read from the Torah?

Answer (Teshuvah)

The issue of whether a minor may read from the Torah is first dealt with Mishnah Megillah 4:6, where it is stated that a minor may both read the Torah and act as a metargem (who translates the Torah reading from Hebrew to Aramaic). Permission is given without any reservations, but it should be explained that in the period of the Mishnah and the Talmud each person called to the reading of the Torah read the corresponding section from the scroll. There was no distinction between the baal kriah (Torah reader) and the oleh (person called to the Torah) as we know it today. Furthermore, the Torah blessings were recited only once: the opening blessing (asher bachar banu mikol ha-amim…) was recited before the first aliyahand the concluding blessing (asher natan lanu Torat emet…) was recited at the end of the last aliyah. These differences in custom assume great significance in later discussion of the practice.

In the Mishneh Torah, Maimonides allows a minor to read, provided he knows how to read from the Torah and to Whom the blessings are addressed [Laws of Prayer 12:17]. This provision is echoed by Rabbi Yosef Karo in the Shulchan Arukh [Orach Hayim 282:3,] and in his gloss to this section, Rabbi Moses Isserles (the Rema) adds that not all seven aliyot may be given to minors.

Commentators on the Shulchan Arukh, however, tend to prohibit minors from reading the Torah, presumably because a minor cannot fulfill a religious obligation for an adult, but in light of the permission granted by the primary sources and the absence of satisfactory explanations on the part of later authorities, it seems that children below the age of bar or bat mitzvah may be allowed to read from the Torah. Such an allowance should be viewed as an impetus for youngsters to take greater interest in the Torah reading and develop their skills in reading and prayer, and is not intended as permission for “early” bar mitzvah, which entails the assumption of all adult obligations.