Shabbat shalom everyone. Dunno about you but I need it :)

I ran into bit of Jewish love magic of "he loves me, he loves me not" variety documented Yitzhak ben Yitzhak in Chinon, France around 1250. It starts with gematria (numeric values of of the bride and groom's names), math, numerology, and then an astrological look up table. (1/3)

@adnesadeh.bsky.social In the mail today.

One of the Baal Shem Tov's house protection rituals includes reciting certain Psalms after burying quicksilver (mercury) in small jars, sealed in wax, under your doorposts and corners of the house. Check out these small British jars and their description. I wonder if they served a similar purpose?

Was listening to Rafe Neis @postrafelite.bsky.social on the Frankely Judaic podcast. Great discussion about talmudic rabbi's understanding of species and generation including the idea that Adne Sadeh and sirens as being the wild/land and water versions of humans. soundcloud.com/user-7807164...

My art submission to The Altneu synagogue gallery got rejected. All good. Was fun submitting and I appreciate them putting out an open call. The call is open until the 10th in case anyone wants submit. www.instagram.com/p/DWO-ipZjvIm/

Just for fun, I'm doing a series of digital collages called Chanukat HaBayit ("dedication of the house") using images from a protection (shemirah) for a house from Rabbi Israel Ba’al Shem Tov described in Shivhei ha-Besht]. Just playing around with styles. This first one's a bit wild :)

Got my copy. Great fun. Kinda a John Constantine: Hellblazer vibe. First graphic novel is a bit overstuffed with activity and a bit under character-developed but has me excited for the next installment. Great job! @golempress.bsky.social

Hunters of Sheydim! There's a new Jewish mythology themed comic out from Golem Press. It's "a supernatural action-horror graphic novel rooted in Jewish mysticism, ancient tradition, and modern conspiracy." Looks fun. Check it out. www.golem-press.com

The Passover Haggadah is built on fours, including four questions, four children, and four cups of wine. But the rabbis of the Talmud considered doing things, such as drinking, in pairs (four= two pairs) an unlucky number that could attract sorcery and demons (shedim). (1/2)

Lol. "In my own city, I am honored for my name; in a place that is not my own city, I am honored for my clothing." Was reading some Elijah stories and ran into this fun quote from Talmud (Shabbat 145b).

Seder prep. Fun seeing some of planning notes and themes from previous years and adding more. I always start the Seder with a question to get us going. This year’s will be “where are you going and what sustains you?”

Reading about Elijah & ran into a fun bit of Talmud about magical/medicinal use of spit. To save a marriage (the husband is a jerk) & at the prompting of Elijah Rabbi Meir "pretended to have a sore in his eye & said: ‘Does anyone know how to cure an eye with a charm?’" The wife then spits in his eye

😂 still excited but also foiled! Got a print copy of Dan Ben-Amos dissertation which is titled “Narrative Forms in The Haggadah.” How Passover appropriate right? Nope! He means “aggadah” (non-legal rabbinic lit). Not “Haggadah” eg Passover seder text. Yay transliteration! Ok, back to Elijah then.

So how did the Israelites know to follow Moses? According to Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer it's because the immortal Serach bat Asher lived among them. She remembered that, 400 years ago, Joseph had promised that God would "deeply remember them."

Leading a Seder this year. Got to get my head in the game.

I've got the day off and am reading @krislindbeck.bsky.social's excellent book "Elijah and the Rabbis." I plan to annoy everyone at the Passover seder's I attend with lots of Eliyahu Hanavi facts. It's her fault I'm obsessed with finding a copy of Dan Ben-Amos dissertation.

Ugh. I desperately want to get a copy of Dan Ben-Amos 1967 Indiana Univ. dissertation “Narrative Forms in the Haggadah: Structural Analysis.” I think ProQuest has it because they bought University Microfilms International who had it. Sigh. Anyone have ProQuest access?

Taught my class on Jewish Ghosts yesterday. Weird timing. It was my father's yahrzeit & I woke to a text that my sis-in-law's father had passed (z''l). Thought about them as we talked about hibbut ha-kever (the beating of the grave) where angels come whack us to shake off the dust of the world.

Teaching this on Sunday at TBE about ghosts in Jewish lore. The class will cover hibbut ha-kever (the beating of the grave) about the experience of the soul in the days after death; Coming out of the Graves, about Jewish ghosts; and Walking Dead, about Jewish revenants (bodies leaving the grave).

New book! "The Baal Shem of Michelstat" by Judeaus, translated by Manfred Kutter. It's a set of stories about Sekl Loeb Wormser 1768–1846, a rabbi and Baal Shem who lived in Michelstat, Germany and was known for cures and amulets and being a vegetarian.

New books! Vera Basch Moreen's "In Queen Esther's Garden: An Anthology of Judeo-Persian Literature" (2000) and Debra Kaplan & Elisheva Carlebach's "A Woman is Responsible for Everything: Jewish Women in Early Modern Europe" (2025).

On Sunday talked demons and divination with a Jewish urban fantasy writer and yesterday talked ba'al shem, cemetery measuring, and dybbuks with a Jewish tv writer. super fun and hopefully useful for them.

Sitting in a coffee shop (for the first time in weeks) reading Devir Kahan's discussion of Hashgacha Partis "Divine Intervention" in prep for my necromancy class. Nothing like a Rambam vs Ramban argument to get the day going :) dafaleph.com/home/2015/11...

When I teach Jewish werewolves tomorrow I want to get everyone out of monster movie territory, so we're starting by reading from H. Leyvik's magnificent Yiddish poem The Wolf. Here's Dara Horn's thoughts about it www.tabletmag.com/sections/art... h/t to @bluma.bsky.social who introduced me to Leyvik

Prepping for tomorrow's Werewolves in Jewish Lore class and ran across the Sefer Ha-Yashar story of Jacob and the wolf. At Jacob's instance, his sons have brought him the beast they claimed killed Joseph. God has opened the wolfs mouth and he claims innocence and that he too has lost a son.

Shabbat shalom everyone. Dunno about you but I need Shabbat extra this week.

The giants, from the Nephalim in Genesis through the rabbinic stories of Og to Joshua, Caleb, and David's battles with the Anakites, play such an outsized and complex role in the Tanakh that it's sometimes amazes that, unlike, shedim, their story just ends. I wonder if God misses them?

There seems to be a moment when, according to Jewish lore, there were no more giants. I know of two candidates for the last giants: Achimen, Sheshal, and Talmi who were allowed to live until the 2nd temple (Sotah 35b, Meam Loez) & the Anakite giant tribes in Gaza, Gat, Ashdod (Joshua). Any others?

Initial-word panel at the beginning of Torah portion Beshalach (בְּשַׁלַּח) inhabited by two tiny creatures. #ParashahPictures BL Or 2696; Torah with Rash's commentary; 14th century; Germany; f.131r

prepping for tomorrow's Jewish Monster and Magic class at Temple Beth Emeth, we're talking about giants, and hoping that the snow doesn't keep folks away (though it probably will). Oh well. That's what Zoom is for.

"Kvittel is a Yiddish word that means a note or a ticket…the piece of paper on which some people write their name and their request or need…Sometimes notes like these were left on the graves of saintly figures who were expected to pray for the people whose names were inscribed on these notes" 1/4

New books! Rabbi Yaakov Goldstein’s The Laws and customs of Mourning and “Mlynov-Muravica Memorial Book” a yizkor book. Very excited.

Mizrach is Hebrew for East, the direction of prayer for Jews in the Diaspora west of Jerusalem. A mizrach is a plaque hung to point out the direction. I own an Alphonse Levy postcard mizrach that I bought, without realizing what it was, as a source for my Joe the Demon trading card. Now to hang it!

22. "Definition of "shekinah" from Webster's Unabridged" @adnesadeh.bsky.social

Ok, here's a first cut on my Centaurs trading card. I was posting a ton about centaurs so thought I'd follow through with the card. (For info on my first two published decks of Jewish Monster and Magic trading cards, check out ko-fi.com/adnesadeh/shop. This card will be in the third deck)

Ok...time for a poll. Are you on team House Spirits? Or Team Spirits of the field?

Yikes. Sorry house spirits, I'm here for the spirits of the fields.

Geller's article "A Horse is a Horse" describes the use of centaurs by Jewish writers Primo Levi, Bernard Malamud, & Moacyr Scliar. Levi, Geller notes, describes man as being a "centaur, a tangle of flesh & mind, of divine breath & dust” & "The Hebrew people…lived this conflict long & painfully” 1/6

Found Jewish centaurs! Genesis Rabbah 23.6 did have it but it was mis-translated. What should have been "there the generations were corrupted and Kinturin (centaurs, from Greek) were created" was translated as "were created in a deformed state" h/t to @deepcuts.blog & Jay Geller's "Horse" article

new YIVO class."FOLKSONG, DEMONS, AND THE EVIL EYE: FOLKLORE OF ASHKENAZ" Take a journey into the richness of Jewish folk life with Itzik Gottesman and explore the music, folktales, rituals, and superstitions of Jewish Eastern Europe. yivo.org/Folklore-of-...

Jewish centaurs? Schwartz' "Mythology of Judaism" has a legend of humans becoming bestial but the source texts in Sefaria don't substantiate it. Sklar, in an essay about the word הימם in Torah (Anah is he who found הימם in the desert. Gen 36:24) picks up trail. seforimblog.com/2025/12/of-c...

Woot! @Columbia came through. They scanned Beatrice Weinreich's 1957 Masters Thesis "The Prophet Elijah in Modern Yiddish Folktales" for me. It's really cool. Hit me up if you want a copy or if you have Adobe Acrobat and can help me get the annoying watermark out of it.

Would like to see these two swap roles. Cherdolaomer! I choose you!

note to self: Cherdolaomer is the king in Genesis who fought a war with giant tribes that dragged in Abraham and Lot. Charmander is a cute, but moody, bi-pedal lizard Pokemon whose tail is on fire.

Fun! My blog post on banim shovavim, half-demons, got quoted recently in Intelexual Media's YouTube video "A Brief History of Sex & Horror." The video is well done and I'm dying over the MS Paint style shout out. Check it out! (h/t to @danispaghetti.bsky.social) www.youtube.com/watch?v=aG_W...

Just noticed my copy of Levy and Zumwalt’s “Ritual Medical Lore of Sephardic Women” has a typo in the book cover title. That should be “Spirits” not “Spirtis” oops :)

Niddah 25b is one of my fave bits in the Talmud. I love the image. It references a huge Og the Giant, riffing off how tall he'd need to stand in the waters of the flood to have his head be at the level of the ark. (there are small versions too, such as the story of his 9 cubit bed (15 feet or so).

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Happy Hanukkah everyone. Thought I'd re-share an article I did for the @jewishreviewbooks.bsky.social a couple of years ago. jewishreviewofbooks.com/uncategorize...