JBFCS: Rita J. Kaplan Jewish Connections Programs

Rita J. Kaplan Jewish Connections Programs of the Jewish Board of Family and Children's Services

March 2006

The below is an excerpt from the National Center for Jewish Healing’s annual publication, The Outstretched Arm, Volume 2, Issue 3, Fall 2005/5761. For more copies of this or any other issue of this publication, please contact us at .

Purim

Purim, like Hanukkah, is not a biblical holiday, but a rabbinic one. Similar to Hanukkah, the holiday of Purim reflects some historical realities and responses like wandering and exile, majority/minority relations, and the like. But our response to the threat of annihilation in this instance is to celebrate with masks and noisemakers. By drowning out the name of the wicked Haman during the communal reading of the Purim story, by dressing up in funny costumes and being silly, we play with the relationships of laughter and fear — of humor and rage. Silliness becomes an unexpected, yet meaningful way to relate to pain and suffering. Many of us who are confronting illness and loss can relate to this "topsy-turvy" experience.

We have included some classic jokes (several donated by our friend and comedy maven, Len Belzer), just to bring you some smiles.

From the "eveybody’s a doctor" category:

"Ladies and gentlemen," the manager of a thriving Yiddish theatre announces, "I am terribly sorry to have to tell you that a great actor, Yankel Leibovitch has just had a fatal stroke in his dressing room, and we cannot go on with tonight’s performance."

A woman in the second balcony immediately jumps up and cries out, "Quick, give him an enema!"

"My dear lady," says the manager, "the stroke was fatal!"

"So give him an enema!" she shouts, and even more emphatically.

"Madam, you don’t seem to understand. Yankel Leibovitch is dead. An enema couldn’t possibly help."

"So, it wouldn’t hurt!"

Yearning for the old country:

Two immigrants meet on the street in New York. "How’s by you?" asks one.

"Could be worse, and you?"

"Surviving. But I’ve been sick a lot this year and it’s cost me a fortune. In the past 5 months I’ve spent over three hundred dollars on doctors and medicine."

"Ach, back home on that kind of money you could have been sick for two years!"

It can be hard to ask a rabbi for help:

It was a dark and stormy night, and Goldberg, 87 years old, knew the end was near. "Quick! Call the priest!" he said to his dear Sophie. "Tell him to come right away!"

"The priest, Sam? You must be delirious! You mean the rabbi!"
"No," Goldberg says, "I mean the priest. Why disturb the rabbi on a night like this?"

These "Spirituality Notes" are excerpts from our monthly E-newsletter. Articles are © JBFCS Rita J. Kaplan Jewish Connections Programs and may be reprinted free of charge as long as this credit line is included.

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