BBC Comedy Uses Google to Translate Hebrew and Gets in a Pickle

With a quarter of a million Jews in England, you would think that a television production company wanting to put a Hebrew phrase on a tombstone for an upcoming episode of a comedy series would find at least one who could come up with a good translation.
 
But the producers of Episodes, a sitcom in its second year starring American actor Matt LeBlanc, either didn't have the time or the smarts to do so. What did they do instead?

When they wanted to put the phrase "dearly missed" in Hebrew on the tombstone of a character in the series, they turned to Google Tranlsator. Unfortunately, Google must have giggled when it translated the phrase as "pickled at great expense." And it compounded the error when it reversed the Hebrew letters.

Line by line, when read from left to right, the inscription says:
BA'AL V'AV AHUV (Beloved husband and father)
HECHEMITZ B'YOKER (Pickled at great expense)
AHUV BA'AL MISHPACHA (Beloved head of family)

As Nathan Jeffay wrote in The Guardian on Sunday,

Everyone in Israel is talking about the British-American BBC comedy Episodes. Not that it is airing there, but the show has recently become famous for its disastrous use of freebie online translation.

In episode three, Merc Lapidus, one of the lead characters, attends the funeral of his father. The episode was shown in the UK several weeks ago and is airing in the US later this summer.

The gravestone, as per Jewish tradition, is bilingual – the local vernacular, in this case English, along with Hebrew. But the entire Hebrew inscription is written backwards, starting with the last letter and working back to the first. The reason, of course, is that Hebrew runs in the opposite direction from English, from right to left. And it gets worse. If you go to the trouble of reading the text, you'll discover that the man commemorated, a certain Yuhudi Penzel, has been "pickled at great expense". This is what you get if you use Google Translate to render "dearly missed" into Hebrew. The blooper is now going viral in Israel.

Hebrew, with a particularly high number of words with multiple meanings, and complex linguistic relationship between the ancient and modern language, poses particular problems. I recently bought a bottle of grape juice. Kosher laws require that fruit is only picked from a plant over four years old – pick it younger and the fruit is called orla and can't be eaten. Seemingly an online translation threw up the more common meaning of orla: my bottle reassured me that I could drink it "without fear that it contains foreskin".

 (A tip of the kippah to Esther Kustanowitz for bringing this story to our attention.)

Israel's Chief Rabbi Blesses New Jersey Supermarket

Rabbi blesses Motel's sewing machine in Fiddler on the Roof

“Rabbi, is there a blessing for a sewing machine?”

“There is a blessing for everything.”

.....Fiddler on the Roof, 1971 

“Rabbi, is there a blessing for a supermarket?”

"Chief Rabbi Of Israel To Bless Fairway Market’s Extensive Kosher Offerings"

.....Paramus Post, June 2012
 

Yes, there is a blessing for a supermarket, if it’s the Fairway Market on Route 17 in Paramus, New Jersey.

Last Tuesday and Wednesday, Israel's Ashkenazi chief rabbi, Yonah Metzger, made a stop at Fairway Supermarkets in Paramus, New Jersey, and Plainview, Long Island, to tour the newly expanded kosher departments in the stores and to affix a mezuzah to the front doors.

Rabbis after affixing mezuzah to Fairway Market door

As Larry Yudelson wrote in an article titled "On Tuesday, the Chief Rabbi Toured Fairway" in The Jewish Standard, the oldest Jewish weekly in New Jersey,

“Let me emphasize, I’m here for a private visit,” Rabbi Yonah Metzger said on Tuesday after touring the Fairway Market in Paramus, affixing a mezuzah to its entrance, and blessing it using a formulation that did not include God’s name.

Metzger, Israel’s Ashkenazi chief rabbi, presumably did not sign off on the press release sent by Fairway’s public relations firm. It trumpeted: “Chief Rabbi of Israel to Bless Fairway Market’s Extensive Kosher Offerings.”

Metzger was in the United States for a two-day visit, primarily to speak at the Lubavitch Youth Organization’s dinner on Tuesday night. Metzger is “old friends” with Rabbi Shmuel Butman, head of the Lubavitch organization and organizer of the dinner, who said their connections go back decades.

The Fairway connection came from the honorees at Butman’s dinner: Howard Glickberg, Fairway’s chief executive and co-owner, as well as Richard Whalen, a leader of the United Food and Commercial Workers union, which represents Fairway employees.

“We have good labor relations,” Moshe Morrison, director of kosher foods for Fairway, said. Morrison’s position at the family-owned supermarket firm is proof that, in his words, “Kosher is a huge program for us.”

Rabbi Avrohom Marmorstein, Fairway’s longtime kosher supervisor, and Rabbis H. Zecharia and Daniel Senter of Kof-K Kosher Supervision also were on the supermarket tour. Kof-K has begun supervising the kashrut at the Paramus store and at Fairway’s other suburban locations, including the newly opened store on in Woodland Park. Marmorstein now works with Kof-K.

“Marmorstein is known in the city. He’s a great hashgacha,” Morrison said. “But people in the suburbs haven’t heard of him.”

Marmorstein, who heads a small Orthodox synagogue on Manhattan’s 100th Street, began supervising Fairway when it was just one market on Broadway at 74th Street. The same mashgichim, or kashut supervisors, are working in the stores under the Teaneck-based Kof-K supervision, said Marmorstein, who also is a hospital chaplain in Hackensack and Ridgewood.

In the video below, Rabbi Metzger affixes a mezuzah to the door of the store as Rabbi Shmuel Butman, head of the Lubavitch Youth Organization, looks on.

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Moses, Aaron, and Miriam Star in New Music Video

G-dcast.com,  the website that has created 66 short films based on Jewish texts including every parsha (weekly portion) of the Torah, has extended their range to include a music video that is making its debut this week. 

This work was created and performed by six families from Berkely, California, who after studying Torah together, decided to write a song about three famous siblings in the Bible: Miriam, Aaron and Moses. The song focuses on the relationships between them, and how they were there for each other when needed.

This is their music video, "I'll Be There For You" - from the words to the watercolors you see in the background to all the little choices about what color everyone's hair would be. 

Enjoy!

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Stuff Rabbis Say - Quotations From the Pulpit, the Classroom, and the Kiddush Room

Everyone who attends synagogue has encounters with the rabbi, both formal and informal. Rabbis give sermons, treach classes, preside at life cycle events, make small talk with congregants after services, and also socialize with members. Every encounter is unique, but patterns inevitably emerge, Expressions will  be repeated, and sometimes rabbis are pressed to remember personal details about their members that are not at the tip of their tongues, like the names of all of a bar mitzvah's aunts and uncles.

Most rabbis also have a sense of humor that really comes out when they go on retreats with their fellow rabbis. The most common rabbinic expressions were turned into a funny video that was made at the  CLAL Rabbis Without Borders Alumni Retreat Center in late February, led by Michigan Rabbi Jason Miller, who also has credentials as a stand-up comedian. What follows is a succession of 16 rabbis voicing one-liners and partial liners representing things that the rabbis find themselves saying repeatedly, or at least what they think they say.

The video features Rabbi Jason Miller, Rabbi Michael Ross, Rabbi Rachel Kobrin, Rabbi Geoffrey Mitelman, Rabbi Michael Bernstein, Rabbi Hillel Norry, Rabbi Tsafi Lev, Rabbi Rachel Brown, Rabbi Ruth Abusch-Magder, Rabbi Tamara Miller, Rabbi Rebecca Ben-Gideon, Rabbi Amy Small, Rabbi Alana Suskin, Rabbi Rachel Gurevitz, Rabbi Heidi Hoover, and Rabbi Rebecca Sirbu. 

It was written by Rabbi Jason Miller, Rabbi Rachel Kobrin, Rabbi Geoffrey Mitelman, Rabbi Michael Bernstein, and Rabbi Heidi Hoover, and edited by Rabbi Jason Miller.

If you're in synagogue this Shabbat, see if you can catch some of these phrases and expressions in any encounters you have with your rabbi. Shabbat Shalom.

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In Israel, a Bris Party to Remember, With the Guest of Honor Arriving by Remote Control Car

With a bris on our mind (we're attending a friend's grandson's brit milah today -- Mazal tov, Joyce, Amy, Noah, and Ruby) -- we just happened to come across a new YouTube posting from Israel that features a bris party like we've never seen before and we're unlikely to see again.

We think it's fun to celebrate simchas even if we don't know the celebrants, especially if there are some unusual and unexpected aspects. In this video, the celebrant arrives at the reception in style, in a remote controlled car. From the baby's size and alertness, we think that the party took place not on the day of the brit milah, but a few days later. But hey, you never know.

Watching the baby arrive in the car, we couldn't help remembering one of our favorite Saturday Night Live commercial parodies, the one for the 1978 Royal Deluxe II luxury car with a ride so smooth, a rabbi could perform a circumcision in the back seat. Well, we found the video, featuring Dan Ackroyd and Gilda Radner, and you'll see it below, just after the bris party video. Enjoy, and Mazal Tov to all!

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Jewish Comedy From Down Under: Australian Comic Jack Felman as Everyone's Favorite Jewish Grandmother

Jack Felman is a medical doctor in general practice in Melbourne, Australia.  He has been writing and performing comedy for 30 years. Twenty years ago he created the Bubba, everyone's favorite Jewish grandmother, a character who loves to give unwanted advice and who is well known to Melbourne and Sydney audiences. In this segment she (he) carries on about wedding gowns, brides, collagen and botox injections.

It seems that Australian comics have dual careers. We give a tip of the kippah to Robert Weil whom we profiled in October 2010 -- a Melbourne businessman who does his comedy shtick at weddings in the persona of Rabbi Mordy Katz, and who brought the Bubba to our attention.  Enjoy!

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Lipa Schmeltzer Music Video "Hang Up the Phone" Offers New Haredi Spin on Electronic Devices

Lipa Schmeltzer, a 34-year-old Skverer Chasid from New Square, New York has made a career as a singer at weddings and concerts. His CDs, DVDs, and YouTube videos have been big hits in Haredi circles. 

On Sunday, he released a new music video called "Hang up the Phone," in which he plays a robot (with a stubbly beard and peyot) among other robots who come to life in a Boro Park electronics store after the store closes for the night. The song is commentary on our ever growing infatuation with gadgets -- equal parts science fiction and practical advice for today's technologically obsessed society.

As Uriel Heilman wrote in a JTA news service release yesterday,

On Sunday, Schmeltzer posted the latest video from his new album, "Leap of Faith," with a song called "Hang Up the Phone." The lyrics include such gems as "All the hocus-pocus / forever tries to choke us / It's making such a ruckus / we can barely focus / Davening and driving / eating work and sleepin' / Why keep on replying / to all the rings and beepin'?"

No doubt the Haredi leaders who railed against unfettered internet use at last month's rally at New York's Citi Field would applaud this line: "Instead of searching Google / I'm busy making kugel..."

At just over six minutes long, the video offers a light hearted look at what we become when we spend more time interacting with our electronics than with our families and the people around us. 

Enjoy!

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Comedy Classics: Henny Youngman - "Take My Wife. Please."

It's Monday, a good day to start the work week with a joke. Not just any joke, but a Henny joke -- a series of rapid-fire classic golden oldies by Henny Youngman (1906-1998), who was known as the king of one-liners.

Youngman, a British-American Jewish comedian and violinist, was very popular in the 1950s and 1960s, with many appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show and on Laugh-in.

Watching one of his classic performances on the Sullivan show (see video below), it becomes apparent how much standup comedy has changed over the years.

As his biography in Wikipedia reads,

In a time when many comedians told elaborate anecdotes, Youngman’s comedy routine consisted of telling simple one-liner jokes, occasionally with interludes of violin playing. These gags depicted simple, cartoon-like situations, eliminating lengthy build-ups and going straight to the punch line. He was known as the King of the One Liners, a title bestowed upon him by columnist Walter Winchell. A typical stage performance by Youngman lasted only fifteen to twenty minutes, but contained dozens of jokes, delivered in rapid-fire fashion.

Many of his jokes were put-downs of his wife, including his most famous line, "Take my wife...please."  That line is included in the clip that we're sharing today, but you'll have to listen carefully because it comes and goes very quickly.

His Wikipedia biography continues:

Youngman's wife, Sadie Cohen, was often the butt of his jokes ("My wife said to me, 'For our anniversary I want to go somewhere I've never been before.' I said, 'Try the kitchen!'", or "my wife's cooking is fit for a king. (gesturing as if feeding an invisible dog) Here King, here King!" Also, "Last night my wife said the weather outside was fit for neither man nor beast, so we both stayed home.") but in reality the two were very close, with Sadie often accompanying her husband on his tours.

Youngman remained married for over sixty years until his wife's death in 1987, after a prolonged illness. While she was ill, Henny had an ICU built in their bedroom, so she could be taken care of at home, rather than in the hospital (Sadie was terrified of hospitals).

Henny explained the origin of his classic line "Take my wife, please" as a misinterpretation: in the mid-1930s he took his wife to a show and asked the usher to escort his wife to a seat. But his request was taken as a joke, and Youngman used the line countless times ever after.

Enjoy the video (from a May 1966 appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show.)

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Tracing the Origins of Hatikvah - The Search Goes On

Two years ago, we wrote about the origins of Hatikvah, Israel's national anthem, tracing its words to Naftali Imber and its melody to an Italian folk song and Smetana's symphonic poem, The Moldau.

But the song has become so important to the State of Israel and to the Jewish people worldwide, that new research continues to uncover details that were previously unknown and that add color and insight to the story of this beloved tune.

Pianist Astrith Baltsan, Israel's most popular classical performer, is also a musicologist who has undertaken a personal quest to find the complete story behind the song that brings Jews to attention whenever it is played.

Baltsan discovered some surprising facts about the words and the music that she shares in the video below, revealing this information amid scenes of the song being performed by children in Hungary in 1933, by survivors of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp on their day of liberation, in Israeli films, by Barbra Streisand, and at soccer games. Enjoy!

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(A tip of the kippah to Sheila Zucker for bringing this video to our attention.)

Israel Day Celebrated in Maryland with Kaveret Poogy and Dance

Last Sunday Israel was celebrated not only on Fifth Avenue in New York City, but also in Rockville, Maryland, where we were spending the weekend. 

Thousands of adults and children gathered at Rockville Town Square to enjoy an Israel @64 Festival sponsored by the Jewish Federation and Jewish Community Center of Greater Washington.

On a glorious sunny day, the square was filled with booths displaying Judaica, jewelry making, sand art, face painting, tefilin demonstrations, and lots of Israeli food. 

For us the highlight of the event was a one hour concert by Danny Sanderson and a musical troupe that brought to life many of the most popular songs by his band, Kaveret (Poogy) which has been a major presence on the Israeli music scene since 1973.

The band, several of whose members met during their service in the Israel Defense Forces, was formed in 1973. It broke up in 1976 by consensus of the band members. Subsequently, Kaveret veterans Gidi Gov and Danny Sanderson along with female vocalist Mazi Cohen and other musicians, formed a spinoff band named Gazoz, and later, another named Doda. As it turned out, six of the seven band members became stars in the Israeli music and entertainment scene in their own right after the band broke up.

The seventh, drummer Meir Fenigstein (whose nickname "Poogy" served as inspiration for the band's name abroad and for some of its material), went on to become a film festival producer.

Many songs by Kaveret became embedded in Israeli culture and are familiar also to the new generation of Israeli youth.

In 1974, Kaveret represented Israel in the Eurovision Song Contest with their song, Natati La Khayay ("נתתי לה חיי", "I Gave Her My Life"). It finished 7th. In the same year, Kaveret played one of the biggest concerts in Israel ever. While the population of Israel was only 3 million people, over 500,000 fans came to listen to the band perform. "The streets of Israel were empty", said band member Efraim Shamir after the event took place.

Here's a video of Sanderson and the band playing Natati La Khayay and Shir HaMakolet, and a Chassidic dance set to music from Fiddler on the Roof.  

For Poogy fans, we're including a video of the original performance of Natati La Khayay by the band at the Eurovision contest in 1974. For a transliteration and English translation of the song, click here. Enjoy! 

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Sholem Aleichem Variety Show: Five Minutes of Smiles

Here's a bit of Jewish humor that we find hard to characterize, except to say that we think it's funny and it will keep you laughing or at least smiling for five minutes.

The editors of Jewish Currents, a printed and online magazine that labels itself "A Progressive, Secular Voice" have come up with a collection of quotations from the famous Jewish storyteller, Sholem Aleichem, interwoven with an eclectic group of cartoons, mock baseball cards, and graphic comments and observations on Jewish life. The slide show is set to music with a distincive Jewish feel.

While we would never consider ourselves progressive or secular, and we don't agree with some of the political views expressed in this video, we're always delighted to see any segment of the Jewish community, wherever they are on the scale of observance or belief, devoting resources to creating and sharing Jewish humor in any form.

The cartoons are from Richard Codor's funny collection of illustrations, Babushkin's Catalog of Jewish Inventions, edited by Lawrence Bush. The baseball cards are fanciful imaginings of Biblical scenes featuring real baseball players with names like Tom Edens, Curt Flood, Les Cain, and Gerry Moses.

Enjoy!

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Oldies But Goodies: Three Classic Jokes From Deb Filler

Today we're doing a 3-in-1 special for our readers who keep asking for more jokes in our Jewish humor mix. 

Deb Filler, a veteran Jewish stand-up comic from New Zealand whom we profiled last year, weighs in with three classic jokes in one video. Sure, you've probably heard them before, but isn't that true of most Jewish jokes? Enjoy!

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Comedy Showcase: Meet Erez Ben-Ari, Israeli Stand-up Comedian

Erez Ben-Ari has a day job in computer security technical support, but at night he entertains at clubs in the Seattle-Tacoma area of Washington.

As an Israeli working in the USA, his routine is built around being an alien of sorts, difficulties that locals have in pronouncing his name, Israeli eating patterns, and the lack of subtlety of Israeli employers in giving notice to their workers.

Here's a video clip of Ben-Ari performing at the Maple Valley Creative Arts Center last August.  Enjoy!

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You Might Be a Frummie If...: Standup Comedy by Jerry Kahn

Jerry Kahn has been performing standup comedy around the New York area and in Israel since 1991. He's a member of The Big Mockers, the only Shomer Shabbos, frum (very religious) stand-up and sketch comedy group. The Big Mockers performs clean, kosher comedy for all audiences.

You may have seen him at private synagogue performances, at film festivals, or at The Jewish Week's Funniest Jewish Comic contest.

In today's video we see Jerry trying to define the meaning of the word frummie by giving a series of examples that many of you will recognize. Enjoy!

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Celebrate Israel Parade Kicks Off at 11 am Today on Fifth Avenue

A sunny, 77 degree day is forecast for New York City today as the annual Celebrate Israel Parade kicks off at 11 am on Fifth Avenue. From 11 am to 4 pm, thousands are expected to march  and hundreds of thousands are expected to watch and cheer on the American and Israeli community leaders and dignitaries, entertainers, artists, musicians, dancers, celebrities, floats and marching bands.

In 1964, thousands walked down Riverside Drive in support of the young State of Israel. This impromptu walk evolved into the Salute to Israel Parade on Fifth Avenue. Last year the name was changed to Celebrate Israel. It has become the world’s largest gathering in celebration of Israel attracting worldwide media. The Parade enables the tri-state community to celebrate in a non-partisan, apolitical show of unity with Israel.

For the Marching Groups and Clusters the Celebrate Israel Parade is a year-long Israel education effort using a creative theme. This year's theme is "Israel Branches Out." Each Group or Cluster works with the Parade staff to develop a creative presentation with colorful banners, costumes and props in a show of unity and pageantry.The participants will learn about Israel as it relates to: flowers, blossoming, being fruitful, growing, going out on a limb, branching out into (hi-tech), finding our roots, seeds etc. and they will bring a Garden of Delight to Fifth Avenue!

The Jewish Daily Forward published a graphic "Anatomy of a Parade," showing a breakout of the marching groups by category and other parade facts and statistics. For example, 48% of the marchers are day schools, 13.5% are youth groups, 11% synagogues, and 8% Federations and Pro-Israel advocacy groups. Of the participating day schools, 74% are Modern Orthodox, 14% Conservative, 6% nondenominational, and 4% Sephardic.

CLICK TO ENLARGE

If you can get to Manhattan today it will be a great way to spend a bright, sunny, joyous day in celebration of Israel's acheivements. Here's a short video with highlights of last year's parade. Enjoy!

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Comedy Classics: Three Mothers Brag About Their Sons

With all the attention that Old Jews Telling Jokes is getting these days -- as a new off-Broadway show and with a new season of jokes taped in Boca Raton, Florida -- we've been assuming that they're too new to qualify for our periodic walks down memory lane to showcase some of the old classic jokes.

But on reflection, we realized that even though the tapings were done recently, the jokes are still very old, and very memorable. So we're going to tap into the mother lode of standup jokes as presented by the producers of Old Jews Telling Jokes and include them in our humor mix -- that is, if we can find ones that are family-friendly.

So here's a recently posted classic tale about three mothers on the beach who brag about their sons, as told by Sheila Danzig, a 64-year-old marketing consultant. Enjoy!

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Coming in July 2013: The 19th Maccabiah Games in Israel

Every four years since 1932, thousands of Jewish and Israeli athletes from 65 countries have gathered in Israel to participate in the Maccabiah Games.

Next year, an especially festive celebration will mark 80 years since the first games were held. The opening ceremony will take place on July 17, 2013,and the games will run from July 18 through July 30. It's another good reason to plan a trip to Israel next summer.

The Maccabiah is the world’s largest Jewish athletic competition, emphasizing the centrality of the State of Israel in the life of the Jewish people. "The Jewish Olympics" as they are often called, are the Maccabi World Union's largest and most famous enterprise.

Within the Maccabiah there are four separate competitions that take place; Open, Junior, Masters, and Paralympics. Junior games are open to any qualifying athlete aged 15-18. Masters are divided into a number of different age categories mostly to accommodate older competitors and the Open division is generally unlimited in age, subject to the governing international rules in each sport, and is intended for the best athletes from each delegation. In order to participate in the Maccabiah, athletes must represent a delegation. Delegations are formed by each of the Territorial Organizations that participate, i.e. France, Brazil, Germany, United States, Canada, Hungary, Australia, etc.

The origins and history of the Maccabiah Games are described in the first video below, and a tribute to the 80 years of games is set to music in the second video.  Enjoy!

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Leonard Nimoy (Star Trek's Mr. Spock) Invokes His Yiddish-Speaking Childhood at Boston University Commencement

Leonard Nimoy, 81, best known as the half-human, half-Vulcan character Mr. Spock on the Star Trek series, delivered the commencement address at Boston University's College of Fine Arts last week.

In the 18-minute speech (click on the video below to see it all,) he travels back in time to his childhood in the Jewish and Italian West End of Boston, relishing stories of his early years of growing up in an ethnic neighborhood where he could tell the nationality by the aromas of cooking wafting through the tenement building.

He speaks freely of his Jewish roots and how proud he was to be "this Jewish kid from a Yiddish-speaking family at a Jesuit school (Boston College, where he was offered a scholarship in an 8-week summer theatre program) being blessed daily with 'Our Fathers' and 'Hail Marys.'

Nimoy gives humorous glimpses of advice that he received from actor Spencer Tracy and from President-to-be John F. Kennedy, whom he picked up at a hotel when Nimoy worked the night shift as a taxi driver to make ends meet.

He tells how he came to the role of Mr. Spock in 1966 and how his status of an alien parallels Nimoy's own role: "My folks came to the United States as immigrants (aliens) and they became citizens. I was born in Boston, a citizen. I went to Hollywood and I became an alien. Spock was the embodiment of the outsider, like the immigrants who surrounded me in my early years."

He ends his address, sprinkled throughout with funny comments and words of advice to the budding artists in the graduating class, with this request: "Please, please, for the sake of our culture, for the sake of mankind, don't create any more reality TV shows. And of course, I cannot leave without saying to you in all sincerity, Live long and prosper." (as he raises his hand in the gesture that the Kohanim make when they bless the congregation.)

Enjoy!

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Moves Like Moses - Bar Mitzvah a Cappella

Last December we posted a Chanukah video by the Pella Singers, a talented a capella group with an impressive record of performing at bar mitzvahs and bat mitzvahs, and also at the White House, various sporting events, and the annual Celebrate Israel Parade in New York City.

They've mastered the art of singing without using musical instruments, using only their mouths and voices to simulate the musical sounds. This comes in handy when performing musical numbers at Friday night and Shabbat simchas.

The Pella performers have released a new video called Moves Like Moses, based on the pop song Moves Like Jagger, We hope you enjoy it.

(A SPECIAL NOTE FOR NEW EMAIL SUBSCRIBERS:  THE VIDEO MAY NOT BE VIEWABLE DIRECTLY FROM THE EMAIL THAT YOU GET EACH DAY ON SOME COMPUTERS AND TABLETS.  YOU MUST CLICK ON THE TITLE AT THE TOP OF THE EMAIL TO REACH THE JEWISH HUMOR CENTRAL WEBSITE, FROM WHICH YOU CLICK ON THE PLAY BUTTON IN THE VIDEO IMAGE TO START THE VIDEO.)

 

A Shavuot Music Video - "Stay Up All Night"

It's become traditional on the first night of the holiday of Shavuot (this Saturday night) to stay up all night studying or attending lectures to mark the giving and acceptance of the Torah on Mount Sinai. The long hours of studying or listening, known as Tikkun Leil Shavuot, are often fueled by supplies of cheesecake and coffee. 

These sessions range from individual study to group study of Talmudic and other texts to lectures by professionals in their field and interested laymen on topics of Jewish interest. The program in many synagogues begins after midnight and runs until sunrise, when those still awake participate in an early morning Shacharit service.

There aren't too many songs or colorful symbols for this holiday, which ranks with Passover and Sukkot as one of the Shalosh Regalim, or three pilgrimage festivals described in the Torah. So it's refreshing to find an upbeat music video celebrating the holiday and its all-night study aspects.

We hope you enjoy "Stay Up All Night" as performed by Moshe Hamburg, David Bar-Cohn, and Mitch Rudy. The video was filmed at Kehillat Menorat HaMaor in Ramat Beit Shemesh, Israel. It's a project of Rebbetzin Tap and Friends.

We plan to attend a Tikkun Leil Shavuot at a shul in Riverdale, New York, and spend the next two days playing with two delicious granddaughters, catching up on napping, and dining on a variety of cheesecakes. So there will be no Jewish Humor Central postings on Shabbat, Sunday, and Monday. We'll be back with our usual mix on Tuesday. Chag Sameach to all our readers.

(A SPECIAL NOTE FOR NEW EMAIL SUBSCRIBERS:  THE VIDEO MAY NOT BE VIEWABLE DIRECTLY FROM THE EMAIL THAT YOU GET EACH DAY ON SOME COMPUTERS AND TABLETS.  YOU MUST CLICK ON THE TITLE AT THE TOP OF THE EMAIL TO REACH THE JEWISH HUMOR CENTRAL WEBSITE, FROM WHICH YOU CLICK ON THE PLAY BUTTON IN THE VIDEO IMAGE TO START THE VIDEO.)

A Comedy Classic: Mel Brooks on Why We Have Only Ten Commandments

The holiday of Shavuot, which commemorates God's giving of the Torah to the Israelites on Mount Sinai, starts this Saturday night right after the end of Shabbat. It's not easy to find jokes and funny material about Shavuot, unlike the large collection of funny stuff about all the other Jewish holidays, so we're glad that we have inspired comedians like Mel Brooks to fill the gap.

We've long been fans of Brooks' Jewish-influenced comedy, especially in his films. One of our favorites is History of the World - Part 1. In this classic scene, Brooks, acting in the role of Moses, gives us his explanation of how we ended up with only ten commandments. Enjoy!

(A SPECIAL NOTE FOR NEW EMAIL SUBSCRIBERS:  THE VIDEO MAY NOT BE VIEWABLE DIRECTLY FROM THE EMAIL THAT YOU GET EACH DAY ON SOME COMPUTERS AND TABLETS.  YOU MUST CLICK ON THE TITLE AT THE TOP OF THE EMAIL TO REACH THE JEWISH HUMOR CENTRAL WEBSITE, FROM WHICH YOU CLICK ON THE PLAY BUTTON IN THE VIDEO IMAGE TO START THE VIDEO.)