|
Time for some Purim Torah:
How do we know that Jews in the time of Mordechai and Esther were
hard of hearing?
'Cause it says:
Vayehi biymei Achashverosh -
Who????
ACHASHVEROSH!
Explanatory note for the language impaired: The opening words of the
Book of Esther, in Hebrew, are:
Vayehi biymei Achashverosh, hu Achashverosh, hamolech meHodu...
\/ \/ \/ \/ \/ \/ \/
It happened of Xerxes, the Xerxes from India...
in the days (this is who ruled
|
| Didja like the last one? OK, here's another:
(I most recently read this in net.jewish (whatever its new name is. Haomer
beshem omro, and all that.))
We see that Achashverosh (unlucky man) must have had two mothers-in-law:
we read "chamat hamelech boara vo" -- the king's mother-in-law was
Boarah-Vo, and later we're told that "chamato shachacha" -- his
mother-in-law was Shachacha. So clearly he had two mothers-in-law,
one called Boarah-Vo and one called Shachacha. Well, you may not be
surprised, after all, he had two wives: Vashti, and Esther. But
we are told of Esther that she lived with her relative Mordechai
because "eyn la av va-em" - she was an orphan and had no father or mother!
The solution? Obviously, as we are told, "Vashti asta mishte-noshim" --
Queen Vashti was made of two women! Therefore, two mothers-in-law.
(detailed explanation hidden behind form-feed)
"Cham" in Hebrew is a homonym for both {fury, anger} which is
what it really means in those passages, and for in-law, upon which
mis-reading the joke depends. "Chamat hamelech boara vo" really
means 'The king's anger burned within him'. "Chamato shachacha" really
means 'His anger was forgotten'.
"Mishte" in the passage means 'party' (so real meaning is, Vashti
made a party for the women) but it is a homynym for "mi-shtey" = from two.
|
| There was another note in this conference which I can't find
at the moment, relating to Purim. I read it last week, but I
couldn't reply, since I was out most of this week..
This isn't really intended to be PurimTorah, but I'll make
the "drusha" anyway! :-)
People say, for some reason, that you're supposed to get so drunk
on Purim that you shouldn't know the difference between "Blessed
be Mordechai" and "Cursed be Haman".
I have wondered for a long time where that comes from. If you
read Megillah (Gemara, not Megillat Esther!), it says that
"a man should become _spicy_ (b'samti) on Purim". That's not
the Hebrew word for "drunk". "Spicy" does not necessarily imply
alcohol! The real mitzvah is to _enjoy_ the holiday.
(Traditionally, the sages say, when a person gets drunk, his "true"
personality comes out. If s/he's a boor when drunk, s/he's
really a boor, and vice versa. So perhaps I should say that
one should become spicy enough to give some good PurimTorah.
If that's not how one is, then maybe one should go to sleep. In that
case, one wouldn't know the difference between "Blessed
be Mordechai" and "Cursed be Haman", anyway.)
Have a good holiday!
/don feinberg
|