A young khokhem told his grandmother that he was going to become a doctor of philosophy. The bubbe smiled proudly: “Wonderful. But what kind of disea… - Leo Rosten

It has been said that the basic principle of Jewish ethics lies in the idea of mandatory mitzvas. Said Eleazar ben Simeon: “The world is judged by the majority of its people [and] an individual by the majority of his deeds. Happy is he who performs a good deed: that may tip the scale for him and the world [italics mine].” Israel Zangwill called the mitzvas the Jews’ “sacred sociology.

Chutzpa is that quality enshrined in a man who, having killed his mother and father, throws himself on the mercy of the court because he is an orphan.

In the Catskills, it is claimed that an ingenious gentleman crossbred a Guernsey with a Holstein — to get a Goldstein.