Everyone has heard of the battle of Jericho, the one that Joshua fought. An army of Israelites led by Joshua laid siege to the great walled city under strict instructions from God which included the blasting of trumpets on the 7th and final day. As legend has it the walls crumbled and the city was sacked. Scholars have long contested the veracity of this account and believed that no number of trumpets could achieve the fabled effect.....scroll back 50 years to a dig in what used to be known as the land of Canaan where archaeologists unearthed remnants of a walled city and almost 100 crude, bronze age ancestors of todays's euphonium referred to in Hebrew as "Annoyim". Texts recovered at the site seem to indicate that only a minute amount of valve oil was available for all these instruments yet through the grace of God it proved to be sufficient! Acoustic physicists postulate that given the proper frequency and decibel level a clay wall of the type uncovered could have been structurally weakened.
Cue the Chief Rabbinate in Jerusalem......the miracle of the battle was quickly verified and sanctified and a new holiday, Euphoniach, was declared.
This week long celebration culminates on the 7th day (as did the actual siege) with a joyous and extroverted festival of music, wine, and dance. Only the most orthodox of Jews still take part in the controversial 7th day ceremony whereby the men are encouraged to proudly display their genitalia on the outside of their trousers as a symbol of the breaking down of walls, in this case the walls of propriety that strictly constrain the devout Jewish male during the other 364 days of the year.
Euphoniach begins each year at sundown on the 17th day of Tamuz ( early July in the Gregorian calendar). I celebrated my 1st Euphoniach in 5761 yet it seems like only yesterday. I won't say whether or not I participated in the 7th day ceremony but I do remember cursing God when I ran out of sunscreen..." hey asshole....would it have killed you to put a lttle more cream in the tube??!!"
There is much drinking of wine and, strangely, eating of mexican food (chief rabbi Moshe ben Eliazar had a thing for bean burritos) followed by traditional circle dances and in my family, Uncle Mervin's breakdance extravaganza....(he can't pop like he used to but he can sure lock!!).
Sadly the tradition of the euphonium serenade has gone by the wayside as the unfortunate combination of that particular instrument and too much wine often led to fisticuffs and in many families, legal action.
Here in Montreal the first warm rays of the sun are beating down and that can mean only one thing; Euphoniach is right around the corner!
2 comments:
I'm glad my dear Bob has finally seen fit to discuss openly amongst the goyim my most favorite of the jewish traditions. In fact let me disclose that it in no small way played a part in my decision to hang out more with Bob( no pun intended, hehe)pj
...and I'm glad that you, my dear PJ, were so taken with the ways of my people that you chose to be with me based in large part on an arcane ritual...there are all sorts of traditions I haven't told you about yet....stick around for a while!!
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