Fun fact: According to the Talmud (tract. Berakoth, folio 55a) expecting the fulfillment of prayer by drawing it out is like sitting on the toilet and straining too hard to take a dump. (seriously) In the latter case, one is likely to get hemorrhoids while in the former, one is merely wasting his time. In one humorous passage in particular, it states: one statement refers to one who stays long and strains himself, the other to one who stays long without straining himself. This may be illustrated by what a certain matron said to Rabbi Judah b. R. Ilai: Your face is [red] like that of pig-breeders and usurers, to which he replied: On my faith, both [occupations] are forbidden me, but there are twenty-four privies between my lodging and the Beth ha-Midrash, and when I go there I test myself in all of them. Jewish humor. There ya go.
Posted on: Sat, 23 Nov 2013 03:01:53 +0000