By Esther Korson
One of the gifts that the Lord has given us as a people, and it truly is a gift, is a sense of humour and the ability to laugh at ourselves. It has nothing to do with telling jokes which is how humour is expressed in some other countries. It is simply the ability to see humour in almost any situation and make a comment about it!
I’ll share with you a few of my favourite examples, but first I’d like to tell you about a cartoonist in Israel who beginning in 1973 published a weekly cartoon in The Jerusalem Post called ‘Dry Bones’. His name is Yaakov Kirschen and it is possible to sign up to receive his weekday cartoons as an email. He is incredibly clever and often prophetic and I love him! It would be a wonderful way for you to tune into Israeli humour on a regular basis! Google Yaakov Kirschen, click on the Dry Bones Blog, enter your email—and the daily cartoons will be sent your way! One of his cartoons that still makes me chuckle was published in the 1970’s. Nowadays Israel is incredibly sophisticated when it comes to communications, but in those days almost nobody had a telephone and it took forever to get hooked up for one! So the cartoon pictures Methuselah being interviewed. “Tell me, Methuselah, you’re hundreds of years old. What is it that keep’s you going?” He holds up two fingers in a peace sign and says with a weary expression on his face, “I’m still waiting for my telephone!”
Here are a few examples of Jewish humour-in-action. After the Yom Kippur War, when the Sinai desert was in our hands, two soldiers were returning home to Israel in a jeep. Every five minutes, one of the soldiers would check his compass. It was really annoying to his friend, until finally he said, “What’s wrong with you? You’re checking your compass every five minutes!” To which the second soldier replied, “Look, I’m not taking any chances. Last time it took us forty years to find our way out of here!”
An Israeli was standing next to the Red Sea with a tourist from another country. The tourist finally said, “I don’t believe that God actually parted the waters of the Red Sea. I think there was around a foot of water and that’s how the Israelites managed to cross!” The Israeli looked really surprised and thought about it for a minute, and then replied, “Wow, then—it was even a greater miracle that the entire Egyptian army drowned in a foot of water!”
On Monday this week, the air raid sirens sounded throughout the nation in order for the school children to practice what to do in case of a national emergency. It unexpectedly brought tears to my eyes as it was a reminder of the Gulf War. We felt so vulnerable then as we carried around our boxed gas masks wherever we went. The sirens sounded frequently. One day during that time I was driving and ahead of me one car cut off the other. The first driver yelled, “What’s the matter with you?” to which the second driver replied, “There’s a war on!” The first driver yelled back, “I know, but which side are you on?”
As you can probably tell from the comments about the Sinai and the Red Sea, faith and our Biblical heritage cannot be separated from daily life in Israel. The country is characterized by ‘secular’ and ‘religious’ Israelis. “Religious’ designates the Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox Hassidic sects. But ‘secular’ does not mean that the rest of Israel does not believe in God. Many times truly miraculous things happen here, and people readily say, “Zeh ness gadol”—that is a big miracle! Or they will often say, when talking about plans, for example, “b’srat ha Shem”—in God’s will. The Israeli holidays, of which most are mandated in the Scriptures, are wholeheartedly celebrated by everyone. And on Yom Kippur, the holiest day on the Jewish calendar, the entire nation comes to a standstill as people go to the synagogues and the Western Wall in repentance towards God. Most Israelis fast totally on that day. There is no traffic on the streets; not a single shop or business is open; the airport is closed and all public transportation has stopped. There are no radio or television broadcasts, and it is a quiet that is unimaginable.
Religion and faith and the sense that God is with us in a real way all add immensely to a sense of happiness and security in this land. Remember, also, that the Bible is our history. When little children go to school, their history lessons are Biblical, beginning with Genesis all the way through! Plus this land is dotted everywhere with archaeological finds from Biblical days, with new ones being uncovered all the time. There is no way to separate Israel from faith in God!
Once in 1993, Israel was facing a severe drought, and the rabbis called for a national day of prayer. The prayer was intense—and then it began. It rained and it rained and it rained. On the hilltops, it also snowed. The Sea of Galilee, the main source of drinking water for the country, became so full that the sluice gates had to be opened or the lake would have flooded Tiberias! So the joke was, “Wow, that was so successful—now we should pray for oil!”
It may seem odd to include ‘manners’ on a happiness list! In many countries, there are a myriad of rules governing daily behaviour. The fork is on one side of the plate, the knife on the other. Ask for something to be passed to you at the table. Some countries even have sides of the sidewalk to walk on! The list goes on and on. But here, instead of worrying about things like that, we’ve been busy surviving. Almost every person in this country has served in the military. When there is a war or a conflict, our fathers and sons and daughters are called to the front. When you live in a survival mode, all of those rules and regulations seem superfluous. We’d rather celebrate being alive and being together. So at the table, people will reach for what they want, usually while busy talking, and no one will notice and no one will care.
Once a couple from England noticed that two Israelis were talking on the sidewalk and blocking the way, so they stopped to see what would happen. A third Israeli came along, walked by in the middle of them, and no one noticed it at all! When you wait in line at a bus stop—well, there is no line at a bus stop! When the bus arrives, everyone just mashes together to board. But the person who cut in front of you, if you tell him you need help, will help you in a second. Be sure that not having to worry about all of those little details of life leads to happiness. It leads a person free to be involved and spontaneous.
Yikes, I think I could add another dozen blogs on happiness, there are so many aspects to it here. The bottom line is—we’re a family. And when you believe in Yeshua (Jesus’ name in Hebrew), you’ve been grafted into this family. So—be happy!!!!!!!!
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