The yeshivish choke is something I have noticed for year, this is when the person davening for the amud (he must be yeshivish) does a fake cry in the middle of a word, it comes out as if he were crying in the middle of the word and hence I call it the yeshivish choke.
The yeshivish choke is so important because we are already in the month of Ellul, a time to practice your fake crying so you can sound and look more frum when you get called up to do some sort of davening. I find it unnerving that all these people are crying one minute during their davening and the next minute they are speaking with clarity as if nothing happened.
I almost feel that all the rabbis in yeshiva used to cry and pound their fists because they were trying to beg forgiveness for the entire yeshivas sins – that would have taken years. Or were they just trying to rouse us yeshiva guys out of our food-less stupor to try and do teshuva now so we could be redeemed. I’m reminded of the way the roch yeshivas brother used to wake us up on Yom Kippor – he would bust open doors screaming in this campfire ghost story voice – “Do Teshuva Now or you’l never be redeemed.” I would roll back over because the only time we could actually sleep late was the high holidays because the Rabbis didn’t want to disrupt their shtender pounding (the mechitza was tall don’t worry) and yeshivish choking to wake us up.
I heard the yeshivish choke during eicha this year and I heard it in Palo Alto when one of the seed boys (I should do a satire on the seed boys, the name sounds so wrong) decided to try his hand at the impassioned kabalas shabbos choke – I believe it may have been at the end of the one of the Hashem Melechs.
haha the only entity that could possibly top the yeshivish choke would be the machmir moan: it’s like a choke, except more dramatic and fervent. good on ya, hesh…keep ’em coming.
“campfire ghost story voice” lol
I hate the choke!
Do the Rabbis really think that anyone believes that they really are crying? I mean one second CHOKE next second RIGHT on tune. I’ve heard real crying on yamim noraim and it’s quiet and unobtrusive the choke is just a joke.
Years ago I used to go to a shul with a very prominent rabbi who did the yeshivish choke as well. A lot. He was such a good and sincere person who did so much for so many that even if he sounded overdramatic and fake to my 8 year old ears I believed he really was crying to Hashem. My mother didn’t. I think in the end I was right…
I can’t stand that stupid fake choke/cry thing!!!!!
Have you ever seen people raising their hands to heaven and krecht and then cut off and start looking around but their hands r still raised? Classic.
Hey, there are plenty of people who really do mean it, so let’s not brand any and EVERY ‘krechtz’ as a fake and pathetic attempt to sound holy.
But yes, I have come to be skeptical about the average UKC (Unidentified Krechtzing Chazzan) because unfortunately it does happen more often than I’d like to believe.
I think many guys who find themselves by the amud, feel like their obligated to groan and yelp a bit. It’s simply kavod ha’tzibur. It like “How can I just daven here for the amud so nonchalantly? Even if I don’t mean it, I better at least sound like I do for everybody elses sake”
So most people feel like they should fake during davening because of peer pressure? That’s very healthy.
Your right it’s not healthy, but it’s not as bad as ‘putting on an act so people will think I’m holy’.
Not saying it’s ok, just trying to pinpoint the problem.
In Ger (a while back), there was actually a rule ‘no crying by selichos’ which applied even to individuals, and not only the chazzan.
Do they really think God is that easily fooled?
its not about god
I think we may have found the problem…
“The” problem, or just another reason to rip on the ultra-o again?
This is not an ultra-o problem. This problem has been around since bayis I. The prophets speak about it plenty.
A heart truly broken by repentance? Wonderful and all too rare.
An attention hoor advertising his false piety? A stink in the nostrils of the Almighty.
What the hell is a seed boy?
I don’t know, but I hope Heshy tells us. What springs to mind just shouldn’t be thought.
it springs to mine too – kind of the same way golden flow milk just doesn’t sound too appetizing
I once worked for a children’s clothing company and one of their clients was the S & M children’s store…
What do they sell, junior size gimp masks?
pardon my ignorance but what the hell is a gimp mask?
http://images.mirror.co.uk/upl/m4/jul2009/2/0/news-image-2-481761701.jpg
Ew ew ew ew ew. WTF is wrong with people???
Hey, don’t knock it till you’ve tried it, sweetheart.
Like “The Yellow River, by I.P. Freely”.
SEED is a program run by Torah Umesorah.It involves sending a group of yeshivah bochurim to an out of town community for several weeks during the summer.They set up a “mini yeshiva ” there, and study with members of the community.
THAK YOU
Glad you cleared that up. I thought it was a group of yeshiva bochurim who regularly wake up stuck the their sheets in their dorm rooms.
It’s open to double entrende. Like the Homowack…:)
Single entendre and proud of it.
Not just yeshivish. I sometimes daven at Karlin-Stolin if I happen to be on 16th Ave around mincha/maariv time, because I was introduced there by a Karliner friend (lives elsewhere now). I commented on all the shouting, and boy, they must have a lot of emotion going. He says something like “some are expressing emotions, some are just faking it.”
The hallmark of Stoliner davenen is the shouting of most of the prose (Amidah excepted, of course).
I used to live down the block from them! They were so loud I could hear them all the way from the boarding house I was living at!
I have been a Baal Tefilla for 10 years, and have never done the fake cry/kvetch. I don’t treat davening at the omud as a performance, and if I were to do the fake cry, I would feel as if I have disrespected the Davening and myself. It would not be a true reflection of who I am and what I want to convey as a shliach tzibbur.
What I don’t underdstand is how all these old folks from di heim are unable to saw the letter W when conversing (Vat do you vant??!!), but when it comes to davening they totally own it! “Shoichei-wein a-wa-wa-wa-d mo-ro-wo-wo-wo-woim v’kodo-wo-wo-wo-woish sh’mo-wo-wo-woi”
Are you sephardic by any chance? They all hate the “w” thing (besides Shweky who has to do it himself for his parnassa).
Acharei hapo’alot, halevavot…
Not if you do it just to fit in.
How do you know?