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Of Making Many Books

And further, by these, my son, be admonished: of making many books there is no end (Ecclesiastes 12:12) A pdf version of this essay  can be downloaded here [*] Years in brackets refer to an individual’s or book author’s year of birth Thought experiment for the day: Anyone born 1945 would be pushing towards 80 and mostly past their prime. So name any Charedi sefer written by someone born post war that has or is likely to enter the canon, be it haloche, lomdus, al hatorah or mussar. Single one will do for now — IfYouTickleUs (@ifyoutickleus) July 27, 2022 A tweet in the summer which gained some traction asked for a book by an author born from 1945 onwards that has entered the Torah and rabbinic canon or is heading in that direction. I didn't exactly phrase it this way and some quibbled about 'canonisation'. The word does indeed have a precise meaning though in its popular use it has no narrow definition. Canonisation, or ‘entering the canon’ is generally understood to

Press roundup

It's about time we holies of holy start holding an 'Idiot of the Week' competition. The contenders would be many and the competition strong. It could go under the name of Stamford Hill's Got Little Talent, though some may object on the grounds that buffoon yitzchok's weekly 'Overheard' epigram counts as originality of the first order. Anyhow, were such a contest to be held no doubt this week's prize would go to the one and only Judith Weil. While she has deserved an accolade many a time for her insightful reports into the even holier and thus madder in Israel, this week she has outshone even herself which is no mean feat. In a headline piece on 'flu, apostrophe compliment of Ms Weil being as she must a kvetch in grammar as in chareidi mores and madness, Weil and her esteemed blockheads at the Jewish Tribune dedicated a significant part of the article on the 'flu (aka s*** flu) to why its proper description is verbum non grata in chareidi circles

A Dilemma

I have a non-Jewish friend. Wow! I hear you say. Where did you get her from? What, it's a her!? Does your wife know about it? Shikses have Jewish friends!? How did you do it? What did you say the first time? You know how many times I've tried, but whatever I say doesn't seem to impress them. Antisemites . Sometimes they don't even smile. There's a counterpoint too. Whom are you trying to impress, you shaigetz ? You think that by having a goy for a friend you'll save your skin when Hitler, the sequel rolls into town? You think goyim look up at you because you have one of theirs for a friend? And who is she already? Your Polish cleaning lady probably. A classy English girl like the ones on aeroplanes won't even look at you. So we're not jealous and you can stick her in your mikveh bag. Anyway, what do you think she thinks of you? That you're cheap and you're selling out and just wait till you fall out with her and she'll call you a b

Mutterings

The time of week when I most think of this non-entity of a blog is Friday night. It starts in shul , me sitting hidden away in the alcove that is my place, assuming no one has pinched it or there is no simche with brothers, uncles, nephews and cousins far removed from all over the globe taking up the spare and not so spare seats. It is always my seat, chair is more like it, and a rather wobbly one at that, that goes first as I have a revered minhag passed down to me from previous generation to tuck in kugel and salad after the candles have been kindled and if I turn up to shul late, well, unlike a plate of kugel , whatever is missed is shul can always be made up. The only downside of course being that my seat gets pinched and unfortunately I'm not one of those who shove people off MY seat. First because I don't really have a seat as that was nicked ages ago and second the place I do have to rest my posterior is in reality no more than a tiny space improvised once a week

A Krugerrands worth

So much has been written and said about the near collapse of our banks but still I can't resist my two Krugerrands worth, the liquidity of my bank having put paid to tuppences, so here goes: 1. Poor poor Scotland. If Alex Salmond and the SNP had their way Scotland, with its 2 main banks glengarries in hands at the door of the Treasury , would by now probably have been an Iceland no. 2. We may have had to freeze their bagpipes and whiskey vats using anti-terrorist legislation. And what really makes you shiver is imagining those Scottish balls covered with no more than a kilt frozen by the nefarious English. Some sobering thoughts for go-it-alone nationalists having downed a Glenmorangie too many. 2. It was this government and this prime minister as chancellor that took away the regulation of banks from the Bank of England and transferred it to the FSA . But it would be too much to expect some remorse from a gloating prime minister triumphant for 'rescuing&

Grateful grace

Firstly thanks to the many nice people who've left comments. Thanks too to those established writers who've written to me privately not wanting to damage their reputation by publicly associating themselves with this blog. I share your concerns and will respect your privacy. Secondly, or, this being Stamford Hill, second of all, thanks to the millions who've yet to discover this site and so the pressure to continue has been manageable whereas if pleas were coming in by fax, email, post and phone not to mention a demonstration on my doorstep as if this were a threatened cemetery in Eastern Europe I would have barely been able to cope.   As things are it feels more like a neglected cemetery in North London which it being one of our own we can tolerate foxes devouring corpses so as to prove that we have nothing against the welfare of animals and all the fuss about circling poor chickens above our heads is no more than fabrication by those who seek nothing less than our tot