Ben-Amos. Folktales of the Jews: Eastern Europe

Title: Folktales of the Jews: Volume 2, Tales from Eastern Europe
Author: Dan Ben-Amos (editor)
Year: 2007

As the contents of this book are copyrighted, I will be able only to provide summaries of the stories, but even that will be useful for research purposes I hope.

25. The Long Had Gadya. This is a historical anecdote about improvising a long version of the Had Gadya to thwart the Polish police. The commentary notes: "The choice of [this] song to delay the police adds a humorous twist to the tale because in Yiddish slang "Had Gadya" is a code reference to prison." There is also an intriguing link in the commentary to the Greek tradition of the sorites. Consider BT Bava Batra 10a in name of Rabbi Judah bar Ilai: "R. Judah also used to say: Ten strong things have been created in the world. The rock is hard, but the iron cleaves it. The iron is hard, but the fire softens it. [...] Death is stronger than all, and charity saves from death." See also Ecclesiastes Rabbah 7:26 where there are 14 things, and it concludes "Illness is strong, but the Angel of Death dominates it and takes life away. Stronger than them all, however, is a bad woman."

40. There is No Truth in the World. A Jewish version of the jackal-and-tiger. It begins: "A man was traveling a long way. It was a very warm day, and he grew tired. he came to a pile of rocks and sat down to rest. Suddenly, he heard a voice from underneath the stones. "Help me get out of here! The rocks are crushing me." The man's heart was filled with mercy. he stood up and lifted a stone. A snake emerged and slithered away." In the commentary, see long (!!!) list of other IFA tales of this type.

59. The Elderly Cantor. This is a take on the animals-and-their-allotted-years which ends: "And this is why until the age of forty a cantor sings with the voice of a cantor. But when he passes forty he starts neighing like a horse - and eventually he brays like a donkey." See commentary for more ATU 173/828 tale types.

66. The Death of a Wicked Heretic. This story features of a series of frustrated attempts to get rid of the heretic's corpse. It ends: "Oy, my masters and teachers, follow God's way and observe the Torah, so the fire will burn you, the water will swallow you, and the ground will take you. Speedily in our days, amen." The commentary classes this as a sermon parody and offers bibliography on that topic.