Saturday, June 25, 2016

Yiddish versus Hebrew and Jewish Humour in Zion

Jews and Bars .... A Jew walks into a bar.... much like Hebrew versus Yiddish 





Sebastian James Henry Stevenson- Oakly-Halekile goes to watch Manchester United play Bacon on Friday from Hashemknowswhere on the Uconmenot Village in the County of  Stokely Isle.  , brink and you miss it, who have made it through to the FA Cup first round.draw and for the hell of it puts a a fifty   at 25,000 to one on Bacon and Friday to win. Given that the population of .Hashemknowswhere on the Uconmenot  village has just 14 males under 35, José Mário dos Santos Mourinho  field just the bench warmers of this 2nd  reserves squad. Old Trafford is filled to capacity as the United Faithfully expect a goal fiesta like none before it. The Bacon on Friday squad play their hearts out . Goalless until into 2 minute of stoppage time when they win a corner. Paddy Mechane steps up to take it.  Ball whistles  in and Paddy Joelcane walks on water and connects with a blind backward bicycle kick. The ball sails into the net and Bacon on Friday win the upset of the millenium.

Sebastian James Henry Stevenson- Oakly-Halekile cannot believe his luck . Collects his 1,250,000 quid in cash and walks into the nearest  bar overflowing with Manchester United supporters drowning their sorrows in beer and whisky chasers..    Sebastian James Henry Stevenson- Oakly-Halekile steps up to the bar and shoutsat the baman "Drinks are on the Me" but sees a couple both dresses in black at the end of the bar. He with ear locks dangling to his belly button, clutching a book with a Star of David with frilly threads dangling from holes in his white shirt. She in black from toe to neck and matching doekie  thing on her head and a  prominent Star of David around her neck.....Sebastian James Henry Stevenson- Oakly-Halekile, shouts again, "Drinks are on the Me except for those two Kikes at the end of the bar.". The bar goes wild and orders for a pint and  whiskey chasers come think and thin. from 209 in the bar who text and instagram friends and foe in nearby bars. They pound Sebastian James Henry Stevenson- Oakly-Halekile on the back and start singing his name . The Kike couple in the corner , beam and high five themselves  to Sebastian James Henry Stevenson- Oakly-Halekile puzzlement which pisses him off no end .  Sebastian James Henry Stevenson- Oakly-Halekile shouts again and again and again, "Another round for the House. drinks are on Me excepts for that godforsaken Kike couple " . The patrons have now grown to 3067 and orders are now a pint and a bottle of Highland 40 year Supreme chaser on the side .  Mrs Kike has now divested herself of everything black and i with flowing brown hair and just a Victoria Secrets pink slip and matching red bra and thong set , is doing the can can to the songs of praise that the patrons are singing to Sebastian James Henry Stevenson- Oakly-Halekile. with Mr. Kike accompanying them on the piano.  Sebastian James Henry Stevenson- Oakly-Halekile now down to his last pound turns to the barman and asks , "What the fxxk, why are the Kikes so happy to be excluded from my "Drinks are on me" repeatly?" ..... the Barman replies " Kikes ? Hey that is Mendel Dovid Chaim and Shoshana Chanya Ruthie Shabelowitz- Cohen.... they own the bar"
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Yiddish is a Germanic language, Hebrew is Semitic. That is the obvious difference.

Yiddish developed from High German that had two branches - German and Yiddish. Yiddish and German are somewhat similar but Yiddish even though it is Germanic throughout history had a lot of influence from Slavic languages and compared to German, a more loan words coming from them. It is the language that was and still is used by Ashkenazi Jews (Jews from Central and Eastern Europe). Yiddish generally has a lot in common with German and other Germanic languages and to some extent, Slavic languages as well. The only thing that makes people think that it is related to Hebrew is the fact that it is written in the Hebrew alphabet (or better to say abjad?).

Hebrew on the other hand belongs to the Semitic language family. It is closely related to Arabic and Amharic (though not completely intelligible with them). Hebrew was used mostly for liturgical purposes in history and Jews didn’t speak it. They mostly used Aramaic and various other languages (Ladino, Yiddish, Judeo-Arabic). Aramaic died out and since Jews were living in various places and when they started immigrating to Israel, they needed a language that will be common for them as they didn’t spoke the same language at that time (Jews from the Iberian peninsula spoke Ladino, Jews from North Africa and ME spoke various dialects of Arabic and Jews from Central and Eastern Europe spoke Yiddish). Hebrew was their ancestral language that was never actually spoken but since they thought of Israel as their ancestral land and Hebrew as their ancestral language, they revived it. As more and more Jews were immigrating to Israel, to avoid anti-Semitism, more and more children were born and they started learning Hebrew from a young age and thus becoming native speakers of it. That continued and a whole new generation of native speakers of Hebrew was created. It went from having 0 native speakers (and speakers in general) to having more than 8 milion today. It is the only known example of this kind of thing happening.

A great portion of Israeli Jews today are of Mizrahi-Sephardi/Ashkenazi descent. Hebrew is a common language for three groups - Mizrahi/Sephardi, Ashkenazi and Ethiopian Jews. While a lot of Ashkenazi Jews still speak Yiddish and are trying to keep the language alive, Hebrew is becoming more and more important because again, for most Jews, it is their ancestral language and the only common language between Jews of various backgrounds. Number of Yiddish speakers is increasing, especially in the Haredi community. Most Jews speak Hebrew today and Yiddish is the second language spoken by Jews when comparing number of native/L2 speakers. Other languages like Ladino or Judeo-Arabic are slowly dying out. Essentially, Yiddish is a language used primarily by Ashkenazi Jews while Hebrew is used by everyone - Mizrahi/Sephardi, Ashkenazi and Ethiopian Jews.


Two Jews Step into a Bar. One of them is leading a giraffe. They get drinks, and they feed drinks to the giraffe as well. The giraffe gets very drunk and passes out on the floor. The guy who brought him in steps over him on the way to the exit, and the second guy says, "Hey, you can't leave that lyin' there!" The first guy says, "It's not a lion, it's a giraffe."

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