from the
Holy Land
from
Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz
"Your friend in Karmiel"
September 13th 2024 -Volume 13 Issue 47 10th of Elul 5784
Parshat Ki Teitzei
Knocking on Heaven’s Door
(Don't miss and quickly order my new book!!!)
The most terrifying sound in Israel these days are not the explosions we hear regularly in the North or South. They are not the sounds of sirens going off warning us to run to bomb shelters within a few seconds time. They are not the terrible endless noise of the news broadcasters who senselessly speak of the dire situation and who seem to have perfected the art of keeping the country on shpilkehs with the 24 hour news cycles of impending disaster. It’s not the pathetic and already stale and lame meaningless statements of politicians about ceasefires, about impending victory, of how we won’t tolerate this anymore, how they will return the hostages or the so many homeless ones back to their homes and farms. It’s not even the ridiculous and perhaps damaging protests, that seem to be playing right out of the playbook of Sinwar himself, that are dividing us once again. That are pointing fingers. That are ripping the country apart.
As terrible as all of that noise is, that is reminiscent of the plague of the frogs back in Egypt when the whole country was just deafening with cries, yet this time that plague is happening to us. Yet, those are not the worst sounds.
The worst and most terrifying sound of all is two simple knocks on the door that every mother dreads to hear. It is the knock of three Israeli officers that have come to tell them the news that no one should ever have to hear. They have been dreading those knocks since their loved one kissed the family goodbye and gave them hugs as he or she left their home and family in uniform to defend our country. It could be a father, a son, a daughter, a brother or sister or even a fiance. They told them as they kissed them that they would be back soon. They would be alright. Not to worry for them. They were doing what needed to be done. What only they could do. What they had to do. It was for them, that they were going. It was so that the next generation will have a safe country. It was to avenge the blood of our brothers and sisters who have fallen. But they would be back soon. Hashem would watch over them. They didn’t need to worry. The dreaded knock on the door though tells us that they were lying. That life will never be the same. That there’s a funeral to plan. That their loved one is never coming back.
There have been too many knocks on the door the past year. Not only to the families of the close to 1000 civilians that have been killed or the 785 security forces that have been killed. There are tens of thousands of wounded ones that have received those knocks, of them over 4000 soldiers. There are families of the 101 remaining hostages (hopefully) that don’t sleep at knighting waiting for those door knocks that the Goldbergs, Daninos, Yerushalmi, Sarusi, Lubanov and Gat families received last week. It is those knocks on the door more than any other sound that is the most terrifying of all. It is the one that no one ever wants to hear and that has made us into a country of imsomniacs.
The knock on the door is particularly noteworthy this month and certainly this year. This month, the month of Elul, as many of us know has many acronyms. Yet the most famous of them all is that Elul is an acronym of the verse in Shir Ha’Shirim- Sonog of Songs. “Ani L’Dodi, V’Dodi li- I am to my Beloved and my Beloved is to me.” It is the month when the King, Hashem, comes out to the field and wishes for us to come and greet Him there. Yet how do we know that He is truly there? That there is an end. That there is a field awaiting us. The Song of Songs tells us
Kol Dodi dofek pischi li- Our beloved knocks and calls for us to open the door for Him.
The entire year we view Hashem as our Father, as our King. In the month of Elul though Hashem is our beloved. He is our Dod. When a father comes in, he doesn’t need to knock. When a King enters he just breaks down the door. What about the beloved? Why does He have to knock on the door? He more than anyone else should just walk right in and hug, embrace and kiss their loved one that they missed for so long. They should have that song “gam ha’sha’ot ha’chashuchot”- that they used to play in the beginning of the war when it was still cute and people were still interested playing as the soldiers surprisingly enters. But that’s not what happens. In Shir Hashirim the Beloved knocks. Not only does He knock, but in fact He knocks and no one answers…
Rav Soloveitchik in perhaps one of his most important and poignant lectures given in 1956 on Yom Ha’Atzmaut addressed the door knock of the beloved in his drasha called Kol Dodi Dofek- (google it, it’s essential reading). He notes that the conversation of the Lover in this song is that He wants His beloved to prepare themselves properly and get dressed and come to the door and open it for them. He doesn’t want them startled. He wants them to be at their best for this joyous reunion. So He knocks to give them the heads up to come and open the door. So they too could be part of this.
Yet, as Shir Hashirim continues to tell us sadly the beloved, the ra’aya, doesn’t come. She makes excuses
Pashatiti es kutonti- I have taken off my clothes
Eicha albasheim- How can I get dressed again
Rochatzti es ragli- I have washed my feet
Eicha atanfem- how can I soil them.
The lover knocks harder and harder, but it is to no avail. Uri Uri- awaken awaken! But we continue to sleep. Until finally the knocks get so loud and we finally get up and open the door to go out to that field,
Kamti ani liftoach l’dodi- I got up to open for my beloved…
But to our avail it was too late
Dodi chamak avar- our beloved had already left. He has gone back out the fields to look for us. To the vineyards, to the hills, to pick the shoshanim, the flowers, the precious souls.
Rav Soloveitchik then proceeds to discuss what he refers to as the six knocks of Hashem on our door of his impending desire to redeem us are at that time. The knocks that were calling to us that went unanswered. There was the “political” knock in which, uncharacteristically, the United States and the Soviet Union in the early years of the Cold War both voted in favor of a Jewish state in the Land of Israel; the “military” knock, in which a tiny outnumbered Israel prevailed over its powerful neighbors; the “theological” knock, in which the new State of Israel refuted Christianity’s theory of the eternal wandering Jew; the knock on the hearts of our youth, who perceived the divine role in history and redemption after the concealment of the Holocaust; the knock of “self-defense,” in which our enemies realized for the first time in two millennia that Jewish blood is not cheap and Jews will fight back aggressively; and finally, the creation of a refuge for Jews and the beginning of the end of the Exile.
Yet he writes we are ignoring those knocks. Perhaps we feel we are not worthy. We’ve taken off our clothes. We’ve assimilated. We’ve washed our feet. We’re full of despair. We don’t hear the knocks because there is so much other noise going on. So many explosions. So much crying and mourning. So many internal fights. So many false alarms. We eventually rise up and get out of bed and run to the door, but by that point our beloved has left. We were too paralyzed to answer Him when He called.
While last week’s parsha of Shoftim began the discussion of going out to war and our army and preparation and contains the bulk of those laws on a national level. This week’s parsha begins with a personal story of a soldier that is a tzadik, that spiritually falls and loses his identity and what he’s fighting for in the midst of the war. He’s a tzadik because unlike all those that had the opportunity to leave for fear of any sins in their hands or the other excuses that exempt one from war, he chose to stay to fight. Yet in the heat of the battle the Satan who never sleeps sends him temptation. One that seemingly is incomprehensible to us. It’s the wife of a Hamas guy… He likes her… Really!? What happened to all that fire? That revenge. The thoughts of what they did to us. Yet, that’s what happens. Even the greatest can fall to the greatest depths.
Even in war, or perhaps precisely because the war is so difficult, Hashem understands the situtation has the power more than any other time to completely debilitate us. To not hear the sound of the knocking on the door from above of whom we are really fighting for. To not fully comprehend Who is on the other side of the door. We lose faith and perhaps even begin thinking we can get married to the “nice looking ones” of them. The chafei pesha- the innocent blameless ones. And then we don’t have to get out of our beds and answer the door.
The parsha then seems to leave the topic of war entirely, despite that being the title of the parsha. It continues with the most mitzvos of any parsha in the Torah. 74 in all. Yet if you note many of them have a common theme. They are all knocks on the door, that Hashem wants us to hear. They include the domestic shalom bayis problems we have. The stress and trauma that perhaps this war that the parsha begins with has caused. The kids at risk crises. So many orphans, so many traumatized youth, so many not getting the normal healthy education and the challenges of being raised in single family and dysfunctional homes in these times. There are the petty crimes and the failure to see the image of Hashem. There are all those lost objects, those lost souls who have no spirit to have faith, who have given up hope and the too many who have so much of their own stuff going on, that they just can’t look or hear anymore and thus hide their eyes from the pain and losses of their brothers and the suffering of the overloaded burdens that they and their possessions are shlepping.
It is a parsha that talks about houses being rebuilt and the fences and protections one has to make for them so there shouldn’t be any more bloodshed. Do they need bomb shelters? Will this ever end? It’s the so many mother birds that have watched their children being taken away and that flutter around that empty nest waiting for them to be returned. It is the terrible motzi shem ra- the lashon hara that destroys families. The so many that have been abused who’s lives are forever destroyed. There are those that have been seduced by the seductive call coming from those who only seek to take advantage of them. It is the call of the Moabites and Ammonites who only had cruel intentions and curses for us and yet now want our humanitarian aid, they pretend to want to join us.
There are mitzvos about the poor, the hungry, the needy, the financial crisis, the farmers, the unpayable loans. It is a parsha that talks about hostages and kidnapping. Of fights and of brothers that died without any children and that don’t have a hope for any memory or legacy unless their brother stands up and preforms yibum. Unless we do the most difficult task and give up everything for our brother. So no, the parsha doesn’t really discuss war. It discusses us. It discusses all the knocks on our door that we need to answer that are distracting us from the fact that we are at war. That perhaps have tired us out so much that we can’t get out of bed to answer. We can’t “Ki Teitzei”- we can’t go out anymore. Yet Hashem tells us at the end of this parsha that we can. We must. He doesn’t blame us. He doesn’t blame the righteous soldier that falls. He doesn’t blame us for all those lapses of faith amongst all the tzoros He has brought upon us. There is only one that is responsible. His name should be wiped out at the end of the parsha. It is Amalek.
Yes, the last verses of this parsha are the mitzva to always remember Amalek. Amalek is the cause of all the problems. We must remember to wipe them out of our memory, which seems to be contradictory. For if we are wiping them out then how can we remember them? Yet, the answer is that there are two Amaleks. The first is the physical nation of Amalek. A nation that seeks to destroy us physically. That wants to commit genocide against our nation. There are many that suggest that any nation that seeks to do that has the halachic status of being Amalek, despite the fact that we don’t have any other evidence to their biblical ancestry lineage. The desire for genocide, and calls for “river to the sea” is enough DNA evidence for us. Yet that is not only what Moshe is referring to over here.
At the end of our parsha Moshe describes Amalek as the nation that struck us when we were weak. When we were tired, when we were in bed and didn’t want to get up to answer that door. When we had fallen spiritually on the path to the holy land. That is a spiritual force that we need to destroy. That force is eternal. It’s not dependent on war. It’s a daily battle. It’s an internal one. It’s a fight to see that it is not Amalek that is knocking on our door and making the noise outside. It’s not Gaza. It’s not Hamas. It’s not the infighting. It’s not Bibi or Biden. It’s not even the officers with the bad and tragic news that is knocking on our door. It’s our beloved. It’s Hashem. It’s the redemption.
This Shabbos is the yartzeit of Reb Tzadok Ha’Kohein of Lublin. He notes in our haftorah of consolation that we recite this week of
Roni akara lo yalada - the barren one without children should sing
Open wide with song and rejoicing you who did not suffer.
Ki rabim bnai shomema- for greater will be the children of desolation
Mi’bnai be’ula- from the children of the married ones.
Amar Hashem- Hashem says.
How can the barren childless rejoice? How can those have lost children sing and celebrate? We are lost. We are desolate. We have sinned. We are too tired. We are too far gone. We have removed our clothing. The answer, he suggests is because we need to understand that in Hashem’s eyes, the bnai shomema can be even greater than the children of the happily married ones. The suffering and challenges and knocks on our door, the losses and deaths and desolation are all Amar Hashem- they are all from our Beloved- our dodi being dofek ba’delet- knocking on our door calling us out to the field.
Amalek first attacked us right at the high point of our miracles. Right after we left Egypt. Yet even at that great moment, we lost that spiritual level and faith very quick. We became weak. Miracles and open revelations are not knocks on our door. They go away. “Reality” and Hiddeness settle in. We enter the midbar. The endless desert without water and food. It is then that Amalek came to attack us and play on that feeling. We needed to fight them off before we could get the Torah. Before we could come to Sinai. Before the great revelation. We needed to answer the door of Hashem, that He sent them to knock on for us to answer. In fact it’s the only way that we can see Hashem. It’s the way that the beloved calls us. He wants us to open the door and so he knocks. Harder and harder. And we answered that call then. We destroyed them. We looked at Moshe’s hands raised up and realized who was knocking. We won and then we went to the Mountain and saw the revelation. We found our beloved. And He found us. And we need to do so as well today.
Parshat Ki Teitzei concludes with us erasing that doubt and hopelessness that Amalek tires us out with. It is the prelude to next week’s parsha of Ki Tavo. It’s the last thing we need to know before we can come into the land. Before we can bring the Bikkurim. Before we can finally conclude the Exodus from Egypt to our final redemption that we started so long ago. Our beloved is knocking. Pischi Li- Open up for me. It’s time to answer the door.
Have a beloved Shabbos,
Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz
************************************************************
EXCITING NEW NEWS!
HOT OFF THE PRESS LITERALLY!
The long awaited day is finally here… With gratitude to Hashem and all of my partners I’m delighted to share with you the news of the publication of my latest book, the first of what will hopefully be a five part series on the Torah
TOUR TORAH
FROM the Back Cover!!
There are Torah parshah books and there are Eretz Yisrael books and there are even tour-guide books, yet this latest work by Rabbi Schwartz puts them all together in a soulful literary adventure and exploration of the timeless messages of our Torah, seen through the eyes of a Rabbi and tour guide, that speak to each of us today.
Tour Torah is a collection of essays compiled from fourteen years of writings from his weekly emails, “Holyland Insights and Inspiration,” that reach tens of thousands of readers and fans of his Mishpacha Magazine columns and articles on sites in Israel. His work as an outreach rabbi in far-flung communities across the United States, together with his having studied under the great Rabbis and leaders of the last generation mixed with his unique sense of humor, make this series one that will invite discussion, laughter, and inspiration at every Shabbos meal and in all who have a passion for our Holy Land.
With resounding response from his previous publications, The Most Enjoyable Book series on Pesach, Rabbi Schwartz takes his love and passion of years of being one of Israel’s most popular tour guides and opens up worlds and gateways in Torah that can only best be appreciated with a tour and journey each week through the parshah to discover its stories, narratives, and insights.
THE BOOK IS ONLY AVAILABLE BY ORDER RIGHT HERE
PROCEEDS FROM THE BOOK PURCHASE GO TO SUPPORT OUR SHUL AND LOCAL WAR EFFORT.
THE BOOK IS AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE FOR $36 PLUS DELIVERY ($5 IN USA) BY
ZELLE OR PAYPAL TO RABBISCHWARTZ@YAHOO.COM
OR IT IS FREE (including delivery ) AND WITH THAT YOU CAN HELP US WITH OUR WAR EFFORTS!
WITH YOUR $72 US TAX-DEDUCTIBLE DONATION ON OUR LINK BELOW
https://interland3.donorperfect.net/weblink/weblink.aspx?name=E343033&id=50
FOR THOSE HERE IN ISRAEL IT IS 120 SHEKEL DONATION TO OUR SHUL AND WE WILL TRY TO HAVE IT DELIVERED IN JERUSALEM OR BEIT SHEMESH.
START OFF YOUR ELUL WITH THOUGHTS OF REAL TESHUVA… RETURNING TO ERETZ YISRAEL IN THIS LIFE-CHANGING BOOK THAT IS SURE TO LIGHT UP YOUR SHABBOS TABLE EACH WEEK…
************************
YIDDISH PROVERB OF THE WEEK
" Der toyt klapt nisht in der tir.- The dead don’t knock on the door.
RABBI SCHWARTZ’S COOL VIDEO OF THE WEEK
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiBI37frwVs – Eitan Katz Kol Dodi Dofek the beloved is knocking..
https://soundcloud.com/ephraim-schwartz/lecha-amar-my-versioon – My incredible Es Panecha- please don’t hide your face Hashem, that I composed last Elul before this war. With incredible vocals and arangement from Dovid Lowy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOqn14cArls – Naftali Kempeh magnificent hartzig new Chamol.. learn it before the High holidays…!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGz5fYZQoJ0 – A Gorgeous ne Min Ha’Meitzar with Motty Shteimetz
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p30BFM7Y_aI – Hershy Weinberger Melech Elyon a beautiful profound poem from Divrei Chayim…
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S TOUR GUIDE EXAM QUESTION OF THE WEEK
answer below at end of Email
22. The geographical area where the Rujum Al-Hiri is located is_______.
To which period has the temple area on Tel Megiddo been dated?
A. The Bronze Age
B. The Chalcolithic Period
C. The Iron Age
D. The Hellenistic Period
RABBI SCHWARTZ’S PARSHA PRAYER INSPIRATION OF THE WEEK
Tzitzis Kissing?– And you thought the chest-banging we discussed last week was strange, well at least on the men’s side of the mechitza we have something else that certainly turns those that have never been accustomed to shul services and that is the custom to kiss one’s tzitzis during the davening. Now understandably when one recites the parsha of tzitzis by Shema it would make sense to kiss those objects of mitzva that we are reading about. Just like when we walk out of our doorway we kiss our mezuzos or when we put on or take off or teffilin and recite in the shema about that mitzva. How can you talk about such a special mitzva and not kiss that object and be grateful and blessed to have such and easy command?
Yet fascinatingly enough the custom as well is to kiss one’s tzitzis - the mitzva of which is in this week’s parsha as well mentioned- in case you were wondering what the connection here is- during the beginning of the pesukei d’zimra the songs of praise we recite. They teach us this in kindergarten. It’s an age when sadly we just accept stuff our teachers tells us and then do it for the rest of our lives and never really ask why. And then we get older and are expected to know the answer and feel dumb asking anyone. Well here you go, boys, I’ll help you with that. Because to be honest, I wasn’t really sure why as well..
Before we get to the answer and explanations giving though, another question we should ask is why is the custom to only kiss the front two tzitzis and not all four corners as we do by Shema. Perhaps even more fascinating- which I bet you didn’t know- the Gaon of Vilna would only kiss the front two by Shema as well. This is unlike us that take our tzitzis at the point in the blessing when we ask Hashem to gather us from the four corners of the land to Israel as a symbolic gesture we gather all four. The Gaon felt that one’s tzitzis always had to be on the four corners and the strings should therefore never be gathered up to the front to kiss. Yet, for all of the rest of us why do we only take the first two strings and what does this have to do with Baruch Sh’eamar?
The great Kabablist The Abir Yaakov Abuchatzeira explains that Baruch She’amar we are told was a special prayer that was revealed by a letter that fell down from heaven. The blessing contains 13 “blessings- baruchs” and has 87 words in it. In our parsha the pasuk and mitzva of tzitzis is “gedilim ta’aseh lecha”- one should make strings for oneself. The word gedilim (which is written missing a yud at the end) is gematria 87, just like Baruch She’amar. In addition Baruch She’amar does not have the name of Hashem in each of those blessings. The reason suggested is because it was recited at a time when they were fearful of heretics snitching on them to the government when it was forbidden to pray and invoke Hashem’s name. Yet there are opinions in the Talmud that a blessing without Hashem’s name is not valid. And thus the idea was to take the two front tzitzis in one’s hands and kiss them. Why the front two? Because between the two of them one has 8 strings (4 on each one) and 10 knots (5 on each one) together that adds up to 26 which is equal to the gematria of the yud-hey-vav- hey name of Hashem.
As well each tzitzis contains 13 knots which of course equals echad -One. And corresponds to the 13 blessings of Baruch She’amar. Cool! Aren’t you glad you asked…!
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S ERA’S AND THEIR PLACES AND PEOPLE IN ISRAEL OF THE WEEK
Nachum from Elkosh 642 BC -It was a few years ago that I was driving along the Northern border of Israel and fell upon a small Yishuv called Elkoosh. I laughed. My favorite daughter’s name is Elka and we lovingly started calling her Elkoosh- because adding on an “oosh” at the end of someone’s name is a very Israeli thing. It’s the equivalent to adding on a “y” in English to Tom and Bob or in yiddish adding on a “leh” to Chana or Rivka or Moish or Yankel. Little did I know until this week that in fact the name Elkosh, where it comes from is actually mentioned in Tanach as the birthplace of the Navi Nachum Now where it is located exactly is another question.
The Elkosh next to me is named after the Arab village that was there before 1948 Deir El Kasi which could potentially have kept the name of the original biblical city of Nachum. Although it doesn’t seem to have been in the area where he lived. Alternatively there is a similar city in Iraq today called Elkosh, which probably makes more sense as it is right next to the city of Ninveh and the Assyrian kingdom about whose destruction Nachum prophesizes. In fact there is even a tomb there in that city of Nachum that Jews of Iraq used to go to daven there on Shavuos each year. In their words “He who has not prayed by the grave of Nachum on Shavuos has never experienced enjoyment in their lives”. It seems it was the Iraqi Jews “Uman” equivalent.
However despite that tradition, the more haymish tradition that dates back to the Ari”zl and Reb Chayim Vital is that the grave of Nachum is to be found in the Talmudic city of Kfar Nachum, right North of the city of Tiverya by the banks of the Kinneret. The city today is a big Christian site as there are some bubbeh maysehs of how yoshka was kicked out of there. The Christians even built a church there that they said was on the remains of that ancient shul that he was thrown out of. Yet, fascinatingly enough, archeologists have discovered evidence that the shul itself was built by Christians- rather than Jews much later, and it was built just to fabricate this story. I have not been to this cave where he is buried, but from what I’ve seen it was discovered in the late 1800’s and is still there, along the tradition is with grave of the Amora Rebbi Tanchum of Midrash Tanchuma.
Who was the prophet Nachum? Again we don’t have much in Chazal about his upbringing or his timeframe, besides the chazal we’ve been working with that he was one of the three prophets that were in the era of Menashe after the fall of Sancherev during Chizkiya his father’s reign. Reb Chayim Kanievsky, though it seems suggests that there are sources that Nachum was one of the children of Penina the co-wife of Chana who was the mother of Shmuel. It seems that Penina had ten children and Chana, as we know had none. Penina would scorn Chana in order to get her to pray harder. Ultimately though, when Chana began to have children as besides Shmuel it seems she merited to have more, Penina’s children started to die. Chana davened on her behalf and this last child Nachum was saved. If that’s the case though, this would make Nachum a few hundred years old at least, which of course is hard to understand. Yet, since it comes from the ARI”ZL you don’t want to argue with it and perhaps it is meant to be referring to the same shoresh ha’neshama the essence of the soul of the original Nachum.
Now that we know where he’s from and who he was a bit- or not… What is his book and prophecy about? The entire book which is 4 chapters is 47 verses and they pretty much all relate to the destruction and vengeance of Hashem against Ninveh the capital of Ashur. His prophecy comes after the prophecy of the prophet Yonah that we read on Yom Kippur. There Yonah ultimately comes along and prophesizes, after a little adventure getting swallowed by a fish, that the city will be destroyed in 40 days if they don’t do teshuva. They do teshuva in the end of that book, but seemingly it doesn’t last. The goyim always come back to get us and it seems 40 years is the max they can hold out. And thus in the period of Nachum he prophesizes about their end and the vengeance of Hashem against them. Ultimately this was very soon after fulfilled when Nevuchadnezzar of Bavel wipes them off the face of the earth.
We have a tradition that the prophecies and books that were written down were not just history of those times but rather they have eternal messages for us as well. In the case of Assyria and Ninveh the King at the time of the destruction of that city was Ashurnarsipal- whose name means keeper of the heir of Assyria the grandson of Sancherev and whose son eventually lost it all to Bavel. He had these huge doors where he brutally describes his cruelty to his enemies. I’ll give you a short quote.
“Their men young and old I took prisoners. Of some I cut off their feet and hands; of others I cut off the ears noses and lips; of the young men's ears I made a heap; of the old men's heads I made a minaret. I exposed their heads as a trophy in front of their city. The male children and the female children I burned in flames; the city I destroyed, and consumed with fire.”
Yeah… really nice guy. Isn’t it amazing how almost 3000 years have passed and these subhuman monsters don’t change their game up, their hatred and their pride in their atrocities. Well, hopefully the prophet tells us Hashem won’t change His game either and He will inflict upon them all of the vengeance that Nachum foretells will befall them. And as the prophet writes the The hills of Judea will resound with the sound of the mevaser tov- the good tiding of the redemption that will come upon the heels of the vengeance of Hashem.
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S TERRIBLE KNOCK KNOCK JOKES OF THE WEEK
Knock Knock!
Who’s there?
Chaim
Chaim who?
Chaim glad to meet you!
Knock knock! Who’s there? Talia
Talia who?
Talia neighbors their music is too loud! ast guilty? Lincoln. He is in a cent.
Knock Knock.
Who's There ?
A little boy who can't reach the doorbell.
Knock Knock.
Who's there ?
A little old lady.
A little old lady who ?
I didn't know you could yodel.
Knock Knock.
Who’s there?
Dwayne.
Dwayne, who?
Dwayne the bathtub! I’m dwowning!
“Knock, knock
Who’s there?
Owls say
Owls say who?
Yes. Yes, they do.”
“Knock, knock
Who’s there?
Ida
Ida who?
Surely, it’s pronounced Idaho?”
Knock, knock
Who’s there?
Spell
Spell who?
W-H-O.”
“Knock, knock
Who’s there?
Cash
Cash who?
No thanks, but I’d love some peanuts.
“Knock, knock
Who’s there?
Amish
Amish who?
Really, you’re a shoe? Uh, okay.”
“Knock, knock
Who’s there?
Ya
Ya who?
No thanks, I use Google.
“Knock, knock
Who’s there?
Europe
Europe who?
No, you’re a poo!”
“Knock, knock
Who’s there?
Hatch
Hatch who?
Gesundheit!
Knock, knock.
Who’s there?
Want.
Want who?
Want, who, want who three four!
Knock, knock.
Who’s there?
Water.
Water Who?
Water you waiting for? Answer the door!
**********************************
The answer to this week”s question is A- Another good week here in this weekly quiz with both questions correct! The first one was easy Rujum el Hiri, although I think I’ve only brought people there once or twice is Israels stonehedge its this ancient huge circle of rock walls one inside of the other that looks like it something out of an alien movie. When your inside of it you really don’t appreciate it as it just looks like rocks but from an aerial view its quite impressive. Archeologists assume its some kind of ancient temple but who knows? It’s in the Golan Heights of course, maybe its from OG Melech Ha’Bashan, who lived there… Who knows? The second part as well was quite easy. The temple in Megiddo is one of the largest and most complete from the Bornze Era. Now the Bronze era is quite long it starts pretty much post-flood Noach and goes through the Avos until we went down to Egypt, so although they date this back to Noach and Tower of Bavel time but again who knows? So we got two weeks in a row hopefully next week we’ll make a chazaka! and the new score is Rabbi Schwartz 14.5 and Ministry of Tourism 7.5 on this exam so far.
