Go Ahead, Laugh a Little!

• Buy Jewish

· Buy Books   · Buy Music   · Buy Software   · Search the Kosher     Restaurant Directory   · Celebrations Directory

• Laugh A Little

· Jewish Humor - Home   · This Is Funny:)   · Dating Oys & Vays   · Jewish Movies?   · Jewish Mothers, Food, and Guilt   · Yinglish At Its Best

• Why Jews Laugh

Insight on Jewish Humor -Why do Jews laugh? What else can they do? Click here for an in depth analysis of Jewish humor. Laugh and the World Laughs with You?

• Recommendations

The HAUNTED SMILE:  The Story of Jewish Comedians in America by: Lawrence J. Epstein - From the Marx Brothers and Allen Sherman to Joan Rivers and Jerry Seinfeld. Big Book of Jewish Humor; William Novak, Moshe Waldoks (Photographer) 101 Classic Jewish Jokes : Jewish Humor from Groucho Marx to Jerry Seinfeld; Robert Menchin, Joe Kohl (Illustrator) Jewish Humor : What the Best Jewish Jokes Say About the Jews; Joseph Telushkin A Treasury of Jewish Humor; Nathan Ausubel(Editor) A Treasury of Jewish Folklore : Stories, Traditions, Legends, Humor, Wisdom and Folk Songs of the Jewish People; Nathan Ausubel(Editor)

Looking back at Jewish history… you’ve got to laugh.  What else can you do?  Laughter, as you know, is triggered when the unexpected happens.  And is there anything more astonishing, unlikely, and improbable than Jewish survival?  To quote Mark Twain,  “The Jew has made a marvelous fight in this world, in all the ages; and has done it with his hands tied behind him.”

So Jews laugh, and make others laugh and have done so for years.  Hey, even God practices his sense of humor when dealing with the Jews.  Just consider this… who did he send to “talk” the Egyptian Ruler into letting His people go, but the speech challenged Moses?   

You may argue, and justifiably so, that over the years Jews needed laughter and wit to brighten their darkened days of oppression and persecution.  However, here is another plausible perspective.  Perhaps it was the prejudice, bigotry, and the restriction of physical and professional freedom, that left the Jews no choice but to take flight in words and refuge in the world of humor. Indeed, it may have been those “hands tied behind [their backs]” that propelled them into this world of laughter. A world where ruthlessness, stupidity, and muscle succumb to the weak, defenseless, but clever.  A place where wisdom and wit reign supreme. 

In honor and deference to an old, beautiful, and funny tradition, Mazornet and Jewish Celebrations will bring laughter and joy to you, our visitor.  A compilation of funny tales of yore and jokes galore, about Jewish leaders and Jewish mothers (aren’t those two one and the same?); about affairs of state, and affairs of the heart; about dating woes and pregnant glows. 

So laugh a little… won’t you?

Jewish Celebrations Recommends:

The HAUNTED SMILE:  The Story of Jewish Comedians in America
by: Lawrence J. Epstein

Epstein  has done yeoman work to make this enormous subject accessible. His saga includes nearly all the top-level Jewish-American comedians, from the Marx Brothers and Allen Sherman to Joan Rivers and Jerry Seinfeld. Their stories are contextualized by era: the vaudeville years of immigrant America; the rise of radio and the Borscht Belt before 1950; the "years of acceptance," when Jews entered the mainstream on TV and on stand-up stages; and "the years of triumph" for Jewish comics and filmmakers since the mid-'60s.