Did you ever hear the one about the Mohel who carries around a suitcase that grows when he rubs it? I’m sure you have, it’s the type of joke your Rabbi tells you to make you think he’s cool because he knows about boners, of course you may come to realize someday that a foreskin, merely a piece of dead skin can;t actually force blood into itself and make it stand at attention to some gentle rubbing or accidental porn download, but did you know that foreskins are actually used for things.
I always figured they through them away, or maybe put them in shamos – after all – it is part of a treaty between the baby and God right? That would make it a holy item right? But what would all the non-Jews do with this valuable piece of dead baby skin? Would they do anything with it? It’s not like I do anything with all of my random skin that falls off due to bike accidents, poison oak scratching and cutting myself when I’m in a particular teenage angst kind of mood, I merely throw it away, or leave it stuck to the tree I ran into on my bike.
So my dear friend Gila (whom I don;t actually know, but sends me lots of goodies over facebook) found this article about the random usages of foreskins used for. Did you know foreskins can be used for skin grafting, in high-end skin creams and cruelty-free cosmetic testing? I wonder if the ADL ever had trouble with the fact that a Jewish inspired surgery was being used to support the skin cream market – it sounds to Hitler-esque to me.
Oh and I’m not making this up – check out the articles about where your babies foreskin goes on Strollerderby and The Stir
Does this mean that if the mohel throws the foreskin away that he is over the issur of baal tashlich (wasting)?
Now that we’re on the subject I was thinking of other usages for foreskins, Jewish usages, like mouthpieces for the shofar or maybe some sort of parchment for an environmentally friendly torah – but in the end I am at a loss, my mind is going blank and I’ll leave it as an informative article – although based on the fact that human meat is parve, we could make a gourmet parve meat sandwich – but I don’t know anyone who’d be willing to eat a foreskin sandwich – do you?
Ick. Ack. And Uch. And Human meat is pareve? WTF is that about? I know human milk is pareve, but human meat is pretty much as trayf as you can get, AFAIK. Seriously, Hesh, what were you smoking and/or drinking when you wrote this one? Because I want to make sure I stay away from whatever it was.
Oh, and first! (That was satirical. I think people who say, “First” are silly.)
If I remember correctly human meat is technically pareve, but we’re not supposed to profit from the fruits of crime such as murder.
Meat that doesn’t result in death? Suppose you carefully lopped off bits and ate them leaving enough so the person was still technically alive when it was all over? I just don’t know. But I have this sneaking suspicion that someone would rediscover the Ancient Universal Commandment “Thou shalt not suffer the really frickin’ twisted to live amongst thee” and break out the torches, pitchforks, noose and mob. Sadly, the noise would be too much for anyone to hear the frum witnesses explain that lynching the werewolf was a crime, much less for the witnesses to hear the reply.
Actually, leaving him alive would be an Eiver Min HaChai issue. 😛
And even if you just found him dead, there’s no shechting, so it’s another issue.
And if he’s Jewish, then there’s Kavod LaMeit.
My friend summarized it best as “It’s not non-Kosher, but you can’t eat it.”
On the other hand, it makes for hilarious theory.
Eating bits of skin would be eiver min hachay
yes if u noticed on the big bottom girls thread, i celebrated my joy at being 21st, i happen to like the number
If it’s done in a hospital, then it has to go to the pathology department. Once they’re done with it it goes into the incinerator like any other medical waste.
Using it for medical purposes makes a lot of sense. Using it to make or develop cosmetics disgusts me for reasons which have as much to do with emotion as reason.
After I do a circumcision, I never send the foreskin to pathology. It’s into the red bag with the rest of the bio-trash.
Policy at the last hospitals I worked at was a little different. Different places, different rules.
But I don’t suppose you saved them, had them bronzed or preserved them.
uh, no. 😉
I have to laugh at your latest blog entry… I am currently reading “An Irreverent Curiosity: In Search of the Church’s Strangest Relic in Italy’s Oddest Town” by David Farley. (http://www.amazon.com/Irreverent-Curiosity-Search-Churchs-Strangest/dp/1592404545/ref=sr_1_12?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1289370718&sr=1-12)
There were SEVERAL Churches in the Middle Ages (Roman Catholic, of course) that venerated the “Holy Foreskin” (of Jesus, who was, of course, a Jew.) Saint Catherine of Siena (a nun) swore she wore Jesus’s foreskin as a “wedding ring” (given to her by Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and no one else but she could see it.)
The town in the book used to parade “the Most Holy Foreskin of Our Dear Lord Jesus” through this tiny, backwater, Northern Italian town for public veneration until 1983, when it “disappeared.” The Vatican had been discouraging it, for centuries, literally, though the Vatican itself is supposed to have at least one (!!!) in the “Sanctum Sanctorum” (Holy of Holies).
No, I am not making this up.
baal tashchis. not bal tashlich
hahahaha
Earlobe replacement surgery. Or a kosher football. Or super-soft gloves.
If the glove don’t fit,
you may not acquit,
you must rub it,
keep on, don’t quit,
I swear it will grow and cover your mit.
Michal wants some orlah gloves.
A relative of mine – a mohel – has always warned me “never buy chicken cracklins from a mohel……”
As Robin Williams’ character says in “Mrs. doubtfire”: “Never by grievens from a mohel, they are so chewy”
(If you dont know what grievens are, well you are missing out)
I had a leather bomber jacket that turned into a trench coat when I buffed it!
Where I come from, they say that the mohalim put the foreskins into the ground and afterwards policemen will grow out of it!
Zing!
When my sons’ had their bris, the mohel asked if it can be donated to a place that does stem cell research. I thought that was a great idea. I readily agreed.
Best use wd be to turn them into kosher condoms.
Mouthpiece for shofar??? I got to tell that to our baal tokeah, he happens to be a mohel as well..
first if hesh you ruined the original joke;
a mohel after years of saving up forskins brings it to the leather maker and asks him him to make him somehting grand, a week later the mohel comes back and the leather maker hands him a wallet; a wallet? Screams the mohel I gave you all those fabulous forreskins and alll you make me is a wallet, to which the leather maker replies yes a wallet but if you rub it it turns into a suitcase (rimshot)
as far as testing make up on forskins I think it’s a great idea as long as they are testing lipstick
Foreskin cells used for gingival grafting:
http://www.joponline.org/doi/pdf/10.1902/jop.2008.080017
@c dubya That is hilarious
thanks
hey heshy, thanks for running the cartoon from my ‘kvetch as kvetch can’ book. the ‘subject’ of a bris was one i really knew i had to handle in the book. it was tough, having gone through one myself, that thankfully i don’t remember, and having witnessed as my two son’s were ‘initiated,’ i knew i had to tackle it. i think if we could have, we would have fought back. probably better than the one i rejected with a circus clown as the moyel, the caption: circuscision…
best,
ken
Ken,
I bought your book because of Heshy’s first post promoting it, and because of the cartoon with the Yeshivish guy fantasizing. I have to say, I was very disappointed. While a sparing few jokes (pages 48, 49, 50) were original and funny, most were either cliched (29 23 21 12 39 41 43 47 68 71 74 77 78 87 93 92), corny (44 40 33 19 16 11 54 59 58 66 69 89 94), stupid/nonsensical (80 83 60 62 55 28 22 20 18 17 13 35 37 38 73 76) , or just outright copies of old Jewish jokes (67 27 34 53 88). The remaining 5-10 jokes, while original, were just not very funny.
Maybe you should read this site more often to bone up on some good jokes for your next book. Heshy’s pretty funny, and so are some guest posters, like TelzAngel.
Foreskins are not thrown away they get sold and use
I know someone who would eat a foreskin sandwich. My friend found a box of human foreskins on amazon.com and ordered them. He literally put ten infant foreskins on bread and ate it.