VaYigash - One Simple Fact...

From the moment when the brothers first encountered Joseph as the ruler of Egypt, nothing that had happened made any sense. This powerful foreign official appeared to be totally – and illogically – obsessed with them! Why was he interested in them? Why was he continually accusing them of crimes? Why was he interested in their family? What was his interest in their youngest brother, Benjamin?

The man was a cipher; his motivations were an enigma; his actions a riddle. They couldn’t understand what was happening, or why it was happening.

And then, with two simple words, everything became clear. Joseph tells them, “אני יוסף” – “I am Joseph” – and the mystery is solved. Suddenly, with this one simple fact, all their questions were answered. Everything Joseph had done now made sense and they understood, moreover, how everything he had done had been necessary for the benefit of all of them.

Often in our lives, just one new piece of knowledge can fundamentally change how we perceive and interpret the events around us. Often, until that new datum is revealed, we are not even aware that we are missing it. Yet, the fact that much that happens in our own lives and in the world in general appears pointless and illogical should be an indication that we are missing some key information.

The Chofetz Chaim

The Chofetz Chaim, Rabbi Yisroel Meir Kagan (d. 1933), develops this idea further. He points out that just as it was only after Joseph revealed himself that Joseph’s brothers were finally able to understand the events that they had experienced, so too, only when God will reveal His “identity” to mankind, will the mysteries of history and human events become clear. We will finally understand how every aspect of human existence and every event in world history, even those that seem utterly incomprehensible, was directed by God for our benefit.

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Poster of the Mesorah of the Oral Torah

If you are about my age, this diagram may be familiar to you. It used to be found in many Chabad publications, and I assume that it was originally produced and published by Merkos L'inyonei Chinuch, the Chabad educational organization, as a classroom poster.

It's a great educational tool, laying out the basic mesorah (tradition) of the Torah. Beginning with Sinai and the Written Torah, it works through the Mishna, Talmud, and major poskim (authorities in Jewish law). I remember, as a young boy, that this poster was my first introduction to the existence of such important works as the Rif and Tur. In my experience, as a teacher, most middle-school students, even in good yeshivos, are often not familiar with this basic information.

For some reason, the poster is now very difficult to find. If anyone has any info about it, please let me know.

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Talmudic Indexes

An Index for the Talmud, After 1,500 Years - NYTimes.com

Just came across this. The hyperbole in the article - and also from the publisher - is overblown. This two-volume set is not the major "groundbreaking achievement" it is being made out to be.

Don't get me wrong. The book, HaMafteach by Daniel Retter, is a great idea, and I can easily see myself purchasing it at some point in the future. I hope it sells well. However, the reality is that there already are a number of popular and widely accessible works available that function as Talmudic indexes (and most cover other major sifrei Chazal as well).

For Biblical verses there is the Torah Temimah from R' Baruch Epstein (d. 1941), which cites all the major Talmudic discussions on any verse in the Pentateuch as well as many from other sifrei chazal. (And, of course, there is always the Toldos Aharon, printed in any Mikraos Gedolos. And the comprehensive Torah Shelema from Rav Kasher.)

For biographical and historical information, there is the classic Seder HaDoros by Rav Yechiel Heilprin (d. 1746), which has a detailed chronology of Jewish history from Creation through the 17th century as well as a comprehensive encyclopedia, in alphabetical order, of the Sages of the Mishna and Talmud. It is available in clear, modern prints and should be in every serious Torah library.

For halachic topics, the Rambam's Mishneh Torah (with the Kesef Mishnah) will quickly point you to the relevant talmudic sources (and, with the Shabsai Frankel editions, beyond). Similarly, the Sefer HaChinuch, especially the newer editions of the Minchas Chinuch, will quickly enable you to find the Talmudic references for any mitzva.

For aggada (non-legal material), the best index is the three volume Otzar Ha'agada published by Mossad HaRav Kook. This is a topical index of all aggados, including midrashim and Zohar.

These references are all far more comprehensive than HaMafteach can be; after all, it's just two volumes and the sample page shows that it is not tiny print. However these works are also more specialized than HaMafteach, and, generally speaking, less accessible to a novice student. Perhaps most importantly, few of these works are available in English.

In any event, the above is far from a complete list of the works that "broke the ground" long before the publishing of HaMafteach. HaMafteach is simply a new work, in a more modern and accesible style, in a long line of such works.

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How Did the Jewish Revolt Against the Greeks Begin?

In a previous post, I mentioned that there are only two sources for the story of Chanuka that have any real "canonical" authority in Judaism: the Talmud and the Siddur (Jewish prayer book). Unfortunately, these sources give only a very brief and general description of the events. Many additional details are found scattered in other authoritative sources (including elsewhere in the Talmud, Megillas Taanis, and the major midrashim), but none are given in the context of a complete and detailed narrative.

There are, of course, many additional sources for the history of the period, the most important being the books I and II Maccabees, but these sources have no authoritative position in Jewish tradition. There are also a number of minor midrashim (including the famous Megillas Antiochus) that attempt to present a more complete narrative, but these sources are often contradictory, even on major issues, and frequently do not conform to what we know of the period.

Nevertheless, these minor midrashim appear to preserve a number of important traditions about the period that are probably basically true, even when they contradict the version told in the books of the Maccabees.

One example of this is the story of how the Jewish revolt began. The version that most of us are familiar with comes from I Maccabees, chapter 2 (and is repeated, with minor variations, by Josephus and Yossipon):

And they that were sent from Antiochus, answering, said to Mathathias: Thou art a ruler, and an honourable, and great man in this city, and adorned with sons, and brethren. Therefore, come thou first, and obey the king's commandment, as all nations have done, and the men of Juda, and they that remain in Jerusalem: and thou, and thy sons shall be in the number of the king's friends, and enriched with gold, and silver, and many presents.

Then Mathathias answered, and said with a loud voice: Although all nations obey king Antiochus, so as to depart every man from the service of the law of his fathers, and consent to his commandments: I and my sons, and my brethren will obey the law of our fathers. God be merciful unto us: it is not profitable for us to forsake the law, and the justices of God: We will not hearken to the words of king Antiochus, neither will we sacrifice and transgress the commandments of our law, to go another way.

Now as he left off speaking these words, there came a certain Jew in the sight of all to sacrifice to the idols upon the altar in the city of Modin, according to the king's commandment.

And Mathathias saw, and was grieved, and his reins trembled, and his wrath was kindled according to the judgment of the law, and running upon him he slew him upon the altar:

Moreover the man whom king Antiochus had sent, who compelled them to sacrifice, he slew at the same time, and pulled down the altar, And shewed zeal for the law, as Phinees did by Zamri, the son of Salomi.

And Mathathias cried out in the city with a loud voice, saying: Every one that hath zeal for the law, and maintaineth the testament, let him follow me. So he and his sons fled into the mountains, and left all that they had in the city.

This is the version of the story that most of us were told as children by our teachers. It is a nice, inspiring story, with no moral ambiguity, perfectly suited for young ears. By contrast, however, the accounts of the beginning of the revolt found in the minor midrashim (collected in works such as Otzar Midrashim by Rabbi J. D. Eisenstein) are of a more adult nature, and focus on the Greek desecration of Jewish women (a topic that is completely ignored in the books of the Maccabees).

There are two basic narratives found in these midrashim. The simplest one describes how a Greek violently raped the betrothed daughter of Mattisyahu (or, in the version of this story found in She'iltos d'Rav Achai Gaon, Yochanan Kohen Gadol) upon an open Torah scroll in the presence of her husband-to-be. This horrendous act motivated her family to rise up in revolt against the Greeks.

The other narrative states that, among the various Greek decrees against the Jews, was a "bitter and filthy decree" that every virgin Jewish bride, on the night of her wedding, would be forced to have relations with the local Greek governor (the hegemon) before she could go home to her husband. This decree had been in effect for three years and eight months - during which time the Jews had refrained from marriage - when the daughter of Mattisyahu (or Yochanan Kohen Gadol) got married (despite the decree!). The wedding feast was attended by all the great men of Israel, at which, as one account tells us, the following transpired:

And when they sat for the feast, Hanna, the daughter of Mattisyahu, arose from her bridal palanquin, clapped her hands together, tore off her robe, and stood exposed before all of Israel, and before her father, mother, and father-in-law. When her brothers saw this, they were ashamed, they turned their faces to the ground, tore their clothes, and they got up to kill her. 

She said to them, "Hear me, my brothers and uncles! You are moved to zealotry against me because I stand naked before righteous men without any sinful act, yet handing me over to that uncircumcised one to make sport with me does not arouse your zealotry?!"

"Shouldn't you learn from Simeon and Levi, the brothers of Dinah, who were only two men, yet they were zealous for their sister and killed the entire city of Shechem? They risked their lives for God and He helped them, and they were not shamed. So you, five brothers - Yehuda, Yochanan, Yonasan, Shimon, and Elazar - and over two hundred young men from the youth of the priesthood - place your trust in God and He will help you, as it says (Samuel I 14:6), 'for there is no restraint to God to save by many or by few.'"

She then began to cry, and said, "Master of the World! If You will not have mercy upon us, have mercy upon the sanctity of Your Name which is called upon us! Avenge for us today our vengeance!"

The brothers recognized the truth in their sister's speech and immediately began a plot to assassinate the  governor that night under the guise of delivering their sister to him, thus setting off the rebellion.

This story deserves a great deal of discussion, but it is largely unknown, despite the fact that abbreviated versions of the story are mentioned in numerous halachic works. (The well-known story of Judith is, almost certainly, derived from this incident.) There are a number of possible reasons why this is so, not the least being that the Hasmonean kings probably didn't want the story repeated. The fact that the story isn't really appropriate for young children is also a major factor.

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The Miracles - and Lessons - of Chanuka

While there are a number of historical sources for the events surrounding the Jewish rebellion against the Syrian Greek empire, there are only two sources that can be said to have any kind of canonical authority in Judaism. These sources are the Talmud and the Siddur (Jewish prayer book). The Talmud (Shabbos 21b) states:

מאי חנוכה? דתנו רבנן: בכ"ה בכסליו יומי דחנוכה תמניא אינון, דלא למספד בהון ודלא להתענות בהון. שכשנכנסו יוונים להיכל טמאו כל השמנים שבהיכל, וכשגברה מלכות בית חשמונאי ונצחום, בדקו ולא מצאו אלא פך אחד של שמן שהיה מונח בחותמו של כהן גדול, ולא היה בו אלא להדליק יום אחד, נעשה בו נס והדליקו ממנו שמונה ימים. לשנה אחרת קבעום ועשאום ימים טובים בהלל והודאה

What is [the miracle of] Chanukah? The Rabbis taught (in a braisa from Megilas Taanis): On the 25^th of Kislev, there are eight days of Chanukah, in which we do not eulogize nor fast. For when the Greeks entered the Temple, they rendered all the oils in the Temple tamei, and when the kingdom of the house of Chasmonai (the Hasmoneans) became strong and was victorious over them, they searched and they found only one vessel of oil that had been placed with the seal of the kohein gadol and it only contained enough to light for one day. A miracle happened with it and they lit from it for eight days. The following year they established and made these days into festivals with Hallel and thanksgiving.

The Talmud seems to indicate that the holiday of Chanukah was established in memory of the miracle of the oil. And, as we all know, on Chanukah we light the menorah in memory of this miracle. However, if we look at our second source, the Al HaNisim prayer that is inserted into our prayers on Chanukah, we find something strange. The prayer reads:

[We thank You, God,] for the miracles, the redemptions, the mighty deeds, the salvations, the wondrous deeds, the consolations, and the wars which You performed for our fathers in those days, at this time.

In the days of Mattisyahu, son of Yochanan Kohein Gadol, the Chashmonai, and his sons, when the evil Greek kingdom rose against Your nation Israel to make them forget Your Torah and to remove them from the laws of Your will. You, in Your abundant mercy, stood for them in their time of oppression, You fought their fight, You judged their case, and You avenged their revenge. You delivered the strong into the hands of the weak, the numerous into the hands of the few, the impure into the hands of the pure, the evil into the hands of the righteous, and the wicked into the hands of the students of Your Torah. You made a great and holy name for Yourself in Your world, and You did a great salvation and redemption for Your nation, Israel, as [clear as] this very day. After this Your children came to the Holy of Holies of Your House, and they cleaned Your Temple, purified Your Holy Place, and lit candles in the courtyards of our holiness. And they established these eight days to give thanks and praise to Your great Name.

In the entire prayer, the miracle of the oil is not mentioned. If the miracle of the oil was the primary miracle of Chanukah, which the Talmud seems to indicate, then why don't we mention it in our prayers?

To answer this question we need to first deal with another question, and that is, why was the miracle of the oil necessary at all? One of the famous questions asked about Chanukah is that if the reason we celebrate Chanukah for eight days is because the miracle of the oil lasted eight days, then really we should only celebrate seven days, as the first day was not a miracle since there was already enough oil for one day. There are many answers to this question. One of the answers that some authorities, such as the Meiri, suggest is that the very fact that they were able to find one container of pure oil in the first place was a miracle. The concept of ritual purity was deeply offensive to the Hellenistic mind, especially to those Jews who had abandoned Judaism in favor of Hellenism. It had been no accident that the Greeks had “rendered all the oils impure” (as stated in the poem, Maoz Tzur) but a deliberate act. The Greeks had searched the temple very carefully to render impure all the oil, and finding even one container was itself a miracle.

This, then, raises a question; why did God need to violate the laws of nature to make the oil burn for eight days, when He could have made a "simpler" miracle that the Jews would find eight containers? We know that, in truth, there is no distinction between "nature" and the miraculous; that both are entirely the expression of God's Will. However, in general, God desires that the world follow the natural laws that He established; that, of course, is why He established them. Whenever we find a miracle that violates the laws of nature, this indicates that God wishes to send us a special message that required the violation of His natural laws. What was God's message to us through the miracle of the oil?

All of our sources about the period, historical and traditional, tell us that the Jews of this period had been deeply affected by Greek thought. (The Jews were not unique in this regard.) The influence of Hellenism was not limited only to the outright Hellenizers, who had betrayed their people and had taken a major role in the oppression of their fellow Jews, but was pervasive throughout the culture in various degrees. One of the principles of Greek philosophy, as espoused by Aristotle, is that God does not take an active part in the affairs of the world. This idea had crept into the thoughts of many otherwise loyal Jews. Thus, even after the miraculous war that had just been fought, there were Jews who were unsure if the victories were really the result of Divine intervention, or simply the result of the brilliant strategies and tactics used by the Jewish leaders. The doubts of these Jews were put to rest by the miracle of the oil. Here was an undeniable miracle; one that broke the laws of nature! Obviously, God does intervene in this world, and clearly His hand was behind the entire Jewish victory.

The miracle of the oil had no great historical impact, in of itself. It won no battles, saved no lives, and only those who were directly involved in the temple service would have even been aware that it was happening. Nevertheless, the miracle of the oil was absolutely vital as a justification for the establishment of Chanukah as a Jewish holiday. If there had been only the miracle of the victory of the Jews over the Greeks, there was a risk that Chanukah would have been viewed as nothing more than a patriotic holiday—a sort of Jewish Fourth of July. It might deteriorate to nothing more than a celebration of Jewish military might and patriotism. However, with the miracle of the oil it became clear that Chanukah was not a celebration of military strength but of Divine salvation.

When we light the menorah to fulfill the requirement of pirsumei nisah—to spread knowledge of the miracle, we perform an act commemorating the miracle of the oil, a miracle which cannot be explained away as simply brilliant military leadership, or lucky coincidence.

R' Samson Raphael Hirsch

However, in our prayers we focus exclusively on the miracle of the victory of good over evil. We thank God for saving us from spiritual destruction, that the Torah and its commandments were not forgotten. That God guided the leaders of His people to victory over those who would forbid us from serving Him as we should. In our prayers we do not focus on the miracle of the oil, for in our prayers we express our recognition that there is no real distinction between the open miracle and the hidden miracle, that both are essentially the same. As Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch writes:

The very steadiness, the regularity, of the phenomena of nature is a much clearer, more wonderful manifestation of Divine wisdom and omnipotence than the suspension of these natural laws when God’s miracles were executed. In fact, the purpose of these special acts of God, which interrupted the regular order of nature, was to point to Him as the Lawgiver of these natural laws, lest the thought of Him as Regulator, Master and Lord of the world order be lost through the steady regularity of the natural phenomena. (Hirsch Siddur p. 23)

There are many lessons we learn from Chanukah. We learn that we must be willing to risk our lives for the observance of the God's commandments, we learn of the primary importance of Torah study, and we learn not to judge right and wrong from the standards of numbers and strength. However, perhaps the most basic lesson of Chanukah is to recognize that God's guiding hand is behind all events, even when His presence is not evident; that every aspect of life and history is a miracle.

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Why Jews Love their Money

A fellow from Jerusalem just came to my door raising money for his family. He was a very friendly, talkative fellow. After I gave him my - unfortunately, rather small - donation and he was drinking his coffee provided by my gracious wife, he told me a dvar Torah which he said was his own original insight.

The Talmud (Shabbos 156b) states, "צדקה תציל ממוות" - "Charity saves from death." Why should tzedaka (charity) be specifically associated with saving one from death? My guest explained that we earn money by spending time working for it. So money is time, and time is life! When a person gives his money/time/life to another as tzedaka, he is rewarded - "מדה כנגד מדה" - "measure for measure" - by being granted more life. Thus, tzedaka saves from death.

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Mikeitz - Speak Openly of God

In Parshas Mikeitz, Joseph is brought out of prison and presented before Pharaoh as an interpreter of dreams. This is Joseph's opportunity to make a good impression and, hopefully, get out of prison. In this light, it is noteworthy that throughout his conversation with Pharaoh, Joseph repeatedly speaks of God as the source of his knowledge and, more importantly, as the One who controls the fate of Pharaoh and his nation. Even as a powerless prisoner before the most powerful monarch of the age, in an idolatrous land where the king himself was worshiped as a god, Joseph did not hesitate to openly declare the truth of the one Lord of the Universe.

The Shelah Hakadosh (Rabbi Isaiah Horowitz, d.1626) writes that we learn a great lesson from Joseph that a person should always openly acknowledge his dependence and gratitude to God for all that he has. This is the root of the common Jewish practice to add the phrase, "Im yirtzeh Hashem" - "If God wishes" - to all plans for the future, and, when speaking of past success, to acknowledge that the success came about "b'ezras Hashem" - "with the help of God."

If Joseph, even in the most difficult of circumstances, was willing to openly declare his belief, then we, in our ordinary lives, should certainly not hesitate to do so. And we may well be surprised by the impact that our words will have, just as we find by Joseph of whom Pharaoh declared to his servants, "Can we find another like this? A man with the spirit of God in him?"

(ראה של"ה הקדוש, פרשת מקץ - דרך חיים תוכחת מוסר וגם בשער האותיות אות א' אמת ואמונה)

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"There were no Maccabees!"

One Chanuka, some years ago, I got a phone call from a student's mother who was a bit upset with me. She told me that the previous night her family had hosted a little Chanukah get-together and some of the guests knew very little about Chanuka. So she and her husband decided to display their son's Jewish education and asked him to give an impromptu speech about what he had recently learned about Chanuka. The young man, one of my students at the time (he was in 7th or 8th grade), being put suddenly on the spot, blurted out the one "fact" about Chanuka that he had apparently retained from the last couple weeks worth of lessons on the topic. "There were no Maccabees!" he declared. Of course, this rather shocked his parents, but, not being able to make heads or tails of this statement, the mother tried to shift to a safer topic, dreidel! Where did dreidel come from? "From the Germans!" declared my young student. 

Unsurprisingly, the parents were mortified, as was I, when I heard the story. As I explained to the mother, her son had partially picked up on (and remembered) some of the topics we had discusses in class - those that, in his mind, had "shock value" - without understanding them. I had told the class, at one point, that when we study the period of the Maccabees, we have to realize that the term "Maccabees" is an anachronism and that the people we call "the Maccabees" would not have recognized the term. There was only one man known as "the Maccabee" and that was the famous Judah the Maccabee. The use of the term "Maccabees" to refer to the entire Jewish rebel force that fought the Greeks developed later and primarily in non-Jewish circles.

As for dreidel, well what their son had said was actually correct, sort of. The dreidel game is simply a variant form of a gambling game popular in Europe, especially the German version of the game, and the letters on the side of the dreidel refer to the German/Yiddish terms for what happens when that letter comes up in the game. All of the famous commentaries about the dreidel - including the acronym נס גדול היה שם, "A great miracle happened there" - developed afterwards.

Why the dreidel game became customarily associated with Chanuka remains a mystery. Gambling games in general have become associated with Chanuka, even though there is no basis for this and rabbinic authorities have strongly condemned such activities. However, the dreidel doesn't seem to fall under condemnation even in these sources.

In any case, the incident brought out a point for me that I have yet to fully resolve in my own mind. On the one hand, a teacher has an obligation to teach the truth. This is obvious, of course, but there are times when the truth is complicated and students, especially the less attentive or less mature, may miss crucial pieces and end up even more confused than before. As in this case, the people we call the Maccabees certainly did exist, even though they weren't known by that name at that time. By attempting to give my students a more sophisticated understanding of the past, I had caused one of my students to think that the whole story was a myth. (I'm actually not sure what he thought, that never became clear.)

The problem is that there will always be some students who have difficulty with a level of complexity that the bulk of their peers are capable of handling. So, as a rebbi (a rabbi who teaches Judaic studies), I am forced to choose between leaving the bulk of my students with a simplistic understanding of Judaism that they have really outgrown, or with leaving some of my students with, at best, a confused understanding.

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Why Did the Jews Suffer Under the Greeks?

As Jews, we know that God runs the world, and any suffering which befalls the Jewish people is the result of a failing on our part. Any genuine Torah effort to study history requires that we attempt to get an understanding of the error that led to suffering for the Jewish people. In the case of the Greek shmad, the primary Torah source to explain the suffering is the commentary of the Bach[1] on Tur, Orech Chaim 670:

... בחנוכה עיקר הגזירה היתה על שהתרשלו בעבודה וע"כ היתה הגזירה לבטל מהם העבודה כדתניא בברייתא שגזר עליהן לבטל התמיד ועוד א"ל מצוה אחת יש בידן אם אתם מבטלין אותן מידם כבר הם אבודין ואיזה זה הדלקת מנורה שכתב בה להעלות נר תמיד כל זמן שמדליקין אותן תמיד הם עומדין כו' עמדו וטמאו כל השמנים וכשחזרו בתשובה למסור נפשם על העבודה הושיעם ה' על ידי כהנים עובדי העבודה בבית ה' ע"כ נעשה הנס גם כן בנרות תחת אשר הערו נפשם למות על קיום העבודה...

By Chanukah the decree was primarily because they became lax in serving [HaShem]. Therefore the decree was to take away from them the [Temple] service as it is taught in a beraisa that it was decreed on them to end the korban tamid and further, “He [a heretical Jew] said to them [the Greeks], ‘There is one mitzvah they [the Jews] possess that if you stop them from fulfilling they will immediately be lost, and this is the lighting of the menorah, regarding which it says [in the Torah] ‘to light the lamp continually.’ As long as they light it continually they will persist.’ They rose up and defiled all the oils.” When they repented and were willing to give up their lives for the avodah, then HaShem saved them through the kohanim who perform the avodah of God’s Temple. Therefore a miracle also happened with the candles, because they risked their lives to uphold the avodah.

The Bach teaches us that the reason for the Greek shmad was primarily due to their negligent attitude towards the avodah. The period of time under Greek rule was one in which many Jews were influenced by Greek attitudes of science and materialism. This caused many Jews to devalue the importance of Torah and mitzvos, especially avodah – serving HaShem. The decrees of the Greeks took away from the Jews those things that they themselves had already begun to neglect. When the Jews repented and were moser nefesh – self-sacrificing – for the sake of the avodah, then God gave it back to them. It is important to recognize that the military struggle was only window dressing on the basic spiritual struggle, which is the true story of Chanukah.

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[1] Bayis Chadash. Rav Yoel Sirkes (1561-1640)

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Sources for Dreidel

A friend recently asked me if I had any sources for the custom of playing with a dreidel on Chanuka and what it means. I responded:

See here, from R' Gavriel Zinner:

http://hebrewbooks.org/pdfpager.aspx?req=46444&st=&pgnum=302

The Bnei Yissaschar has some famous pieces on dreidel, one is that the dreidel is spinned from the top while a gragger is spun from below, symbolizing that on Chanukah the yeshua came through hisarusa d'l'eilah and Purim was a hisarusa d'l'sata. Also he connects the letters to the word "גשנה" in Breishis 46:28. I think he also points out that the letters are, b'gematria, "moshiach".

While the custom to play with a dreidel on Chanukah appears to have been well established beforehand, I don't know of any written sources earlier than the 19th century.

The Bnei Yissaschar doesn't mention the story of children playing dreidel to hide that they were learning Torah. This story is also not mentioned in Taamei Minhagim or Sefer Hatodaah (both of whom would almost certainly have mentioned it if they had heard of it and thought it was true). The earliest source I have found for this story is a sefer published in 1918 by a Rev. Hirshovitz in Pittsburg called אוצר כל מנהגי ישרון. (R' Zinner quotes it in his first footnote.) You can see it here:

http://hebrewbooks.org/pdfpager.aspx?req=2604&st=&pgnum=95

He says it in the name of some other sources but I have not been able to identify them reliably.

As far as I can tell, this story began sometime in the second half of the 1800s. It is probably not a coincidence that at that same general time a number of writers (especially from the Mizrachi movement) were engaged in efforts to "romanticize" Jewish history, to give it more appeal to young people and reinforce nationalist sentiment. I suspect that this story grew out of that general tendency.

If anyone has any additional sources, please let me know.

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