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On this page you can find all the posts that contain examples of tkhines - prayers or supplications often delivered spontaneously, klogenishn - lamentations of mourning women, many of them recorded by ethnographers, and opshprekhenishn - incantations used to ward off an evil eye.
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To learn more about tkhines and other forms of spontaneous prayer, check out the work of my friend and ritual-collaborator, Rabbi Noam Lerman at spontaneousprayer.com
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Children lament their mother in Brestetshke
'Examples of laments by children', collected by Moyshe Melman in Brestetshke (Beresteczko, Berestetchka, Brestetshke, ברסטצ'ק,...
feldmesterin
Jun 9, 20242 min read
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A woman's lament for her husband
This klogenish (lament) is one of several collected by the YIVO ethnographic commission in the 1920s and 30s. The full collection can be...
feldmesterin
Jun 6, 20243 min read
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"Today it is customary to go to the cemetery with an elderly Jewess"
I'm getting ready today to teach my final class on this online course with JTS, in which we will be taking a closer look at the...
feldmesterin
Nov 28, 20233 min read
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Inviting the dead to our parties - a post for Hoshanah Rabbah
In the summer of 2018, my little sister Viv got married. Our mother died when she was 2 and I was 4, and I was incredibly honoured when ...
feldmesterin
Oct 5, 20236 min read
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"Incantations must not be taught to anyone"
Translation of an excerpt from Abraham Rechtman, Yidishe Etnografye un Folklor, p. 289-298. Rav Yokhanan had the habit of coming to sit...
feldmesterin
Jan 1, 202311 min read
348 views
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Woman soul
This week I've been teaching an online workshop at Yiddish New York about Ashkenazi Jewish women's customs and practices. For the past...
feldmesterin
Dec 27, 20222 min read
179 views
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How to make soul candles for Yom Kippur
In many shtetlekh (small towns) of Eastern Europe, it was common for the female heads of household to pay feldmesterins to measure the...
feldmesterin
Oct 4, 20225 min read
585 views
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How to measure a cemetery in Elul
According to the feldmesterins observed by S. Weissenberg, cemetery measuring was stepped up after the first selihah, being carried out...
feldmesterin
Sep 18, 20224 min read
534 views
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And the Jewish women ... they knew how to go to war with Satan
The following text is an excerpt from A.S. Zaks' 'Khoreve Veltn' – Ruined Worlds – describing Jewish customs in the month of Elul - the...
feldmesterin
Sep 12, 20224 min read
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Leybeshekhe the 'Cemetery Jewess' of Kremenits
Among the professions listed in this memorial book from Kremenets, Ukraine, between "goose plucker" and "mechanic", is "cemetery zogerke"...
feldmesterin
May 16, 20223 min read
428 views
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Gitele the pious gabete of Koriv
This is an excerpt from the memoirs of Rabbi Tuviah Gutman Rapoport, published in the memorial book of Koriv, Poland Here he remembers...
feldmesterin
May 2, 20224 min read
415 views
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Double, Double, Mi un Tsores ...
According to the ethnographic study I posted recently, Yom Kippur candles made with threads that had been used to measure graves were...
feldmesterin
Sep 12, 20212 min read
276 views
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An ayin-hore incantation, to exercise an evil eye from a child
From the memorial book of the town of Pruzhany, Poland, recorded by A Fayvushinsky.The text has very little punctuation (I've added a bit...
feldmesterin
Jan 14, 20212 min read
250 views
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Das Feld un das Keywermessen - S. Weissenberg
This is a translation of a 1906 German study of Feld (cemetery) and Keywer (grave - from the Hebrew and Yiddish קבֿר) measuring by...
feldmesterin
May 31, 20205 min read
613 views
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A tkhine for making Yom Kippur candles - extract from Mendele Moykher Sforim's 'Shloyme Reb Khayims'
In this extract from his 1899-1912 unfinished autobiographical novel, Shloyme Reb Khayims, Mendele describes his mother, Sore - who we...
feldmesterin
May 31, 20204 min read
598 views
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Mestn Feld - a memory from Pruzhany (Pruzhene), Poland
This short description of the practise is found in the Yizker Bukh 'Pinkes fun der shtot Pruzhene' - a memorial book written by former...
feldmesterin
May 31, 20201 min read
157 views
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Feld-mestn by Morris Rosenfeld
Yiddish Poet Morris Rosenfeld, best known for his poems describing the hardships of Jewish immigrants in the US, wrote the following poem...
feldmesterin
May 25, 20201 min read
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