February 13, 2005
Hi!
I can’t believe that it’s February and that I have no news to report!
Hope all is well with you…..Please let me know what’s happening!
And send photos to Rick at ricks@car.org
Love,
Eemah
Here is some stuff sent by Joel and Barry Gendelman’s dad, Max
Subject: mel brooks on being a Jew
Mel Brooks on being a Jew
I may be angry at God or at the world, and I'm sure that a lot of my
comedy is based on anger and hostility...
It comes from a feeling that as a Jew and as a person,
I don't fit into the mainstream of American society.
Feeling different, feeling alienated, feeling persecuted, feeling that
the only way you can deal with the world is to laugh -
because if you don't laugh you're going to cry and never stop crying -
that's probably what's responsible for the Jews having developed
such a great sense of humor.
The people who had the greatest reason to weep,
learned more than anyone else how to laugh.
Based on the accomplishments of individual Jews,
Nobel Prize winners and heroes of modern culture,
as well as the amount of attention Jews get in the media,
you'd never believe the correct answers:
There are little more than 13 million Jews in the world,
comprising less than 1/4 of 1% of the world's population !!!!
Do you think it's just a coincidence?
Twenty-one percent of Nobel Prize winners have been Jews,
even though Jews comprise less than one-quarter of
one percent of the world's population. Choose any field, and you will
find that Jews have excelled in it.
Think of the names of many modern-day figures most responsible for the
intellectual turning points in history - MARX, FREUD, EINSTEIN - and
you will find proof of the Biblical verdict: "Surely this is...a wise
and understanding people." There simply is no way to deny it.
Jews really are smart. There must be a reason - and I can give you
three:
HEREDITY, ENVIRONMENT and A UNIQUE VALUE SYSTEM:
HEREDITY - Historians have pointed out a fascinating difference between
Jews and Christians. In Christianity, as well as in many other religions,
holiness was identified with asceticism, great spirituality with the
practice of celibacy. For centuries the finest minds among Christians
were urged to join the church and become priests. That
effectively condemned their genetic pool of intelligence to an
untimely end.
Jews, on the other and, took quite seriously the first commandment to
mankind - to be fruitful and multiply. Sex was never seen as sinful,
but rather as one of those things created by God that he surely must
have had in mind when he declared, in reviewing his work, that "Behold
everything was very good."
Among Jews, the most intelligent were encouraged to become religious
leaders. As rabbis, they had to serve as role models for their
congregants as procreators and "fathers! of their countries." Brains got passed
on from generation to generation, and Jews today are still reaping the
benefits of the frequent sexual activities of their ancestors.
ENVIRONMENT - If challenge and response are the keys to creativity and
achievement, it's no surprise that Jews are smart; they've been
challenged more than anyone else on earth. The school of hard knocks is
a wonderful teacher. Jews had no choice but to learn to be better than
anyone else since the odds were always so very much stacked against
them.
When you're born with a silver spoon in your mouth, you tend to get
fat and lazy. When you're born with the lash of a whip on your back, you
quickly learn to become crafty, street smart, and knowledgeable in
everything that will help you make it through life.
A UNIQUE VALUE SYSTEM - We still haven't touched on the most important
reason of all. Jews are smart because they have been raised in a
tradition that treasures education above everything else, that considers
study the highest obligation of mankind, and that identifies the
intellect as part of us created in "the image of God." To be illiterate
was unheard of in the Jewish world, not only because it was a sign of
stupidity, but, more significantly, because it was a sin.
Jews are obligated by law to review the Bible in its entirety every
year, dividing it into manageable weekly sections. The widespread custom
when a child turned three years old was to write the letter of the
Hebrew alphabet on a board in honey and have the child learn them as he licked
them off, equating their meaning with the taste of sweetness.
Jews studied the Midrash, and it taught them: The Sword and the Book
came from Heaven together, and the Holy One said: "Keep what is written
in this Book or be destroyed by the other." Jews studied the Mishna and
it taught them, "Say not when I have leisure."
Philosophical Tevye, that delightful creation of the Yiddish writer
Shalom Aleichem and the star of Fiddler On The Roof, explained that Jews
always wear hats because they never know when they will be forced to travel.
What he didn't say, which is probably more important,
is that they always made sure to have something under their hats,
and inside of their heads - because physical possessions could be taken
from them, but what they accumulated in their minds would always remain the
greatest "merchandise" a Jew possesses.
And you thought Mel Brooks was only a funny man.
MONA LISA'S JEWISH MOTHER: "This you call a smile, after all the money
your father and I spent on braces?"
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS' JEWISH MOTHER: "I don't care what you've
discovered, you still should have written."
MICHELANGELO'S JEWISH MOTHER: "Why can't you paint on walls like other
children? Do you know how hard it is to get that schmutz off of the
ceiling?"
THOMAS EDISON'S JEWISH MOTHER: "Of course I'm proud that you invented
the electric light bulb. Now turn it off and go to sleep!"
ALBERT EINSTEIN'S JEWISH MOTHER: "But it's your senior photograph!
Couldn't you have done something with your hair?"
MOSES' JEWISH MOTHER: "That's a good story! Now tell me where you've
really been for the last forty years!"
BILL CLINTON'S JEWISH MOTHER: "At least Monica was a nice Jewish
girl!"
