tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20257999.post4748127039536129246..comments2024-03-28T09:43:50.919+02:00Comments on Life in Israel: why not use the same segulah?Rafi G.http://www.blogger.com/profile/00699851287106903971noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20257999.post-65564948548186607482008-09-04T13:47:00.000+03:002008-09-04T13:47:00.000+03:00Rafi,I didn't say anything. I raised it as a possi...Rafi,<BR/><BR/>I didn't say anything. I raised it as a possibility (hence the question mark). Even if she is not Jewish, I doubt the media would mention it.<BR/><BR/>Rationalist,<BR/><BR/>My gut is to agree with you, but YeshivaWorldNews cites witnesses that it worked in California (or more accurately, that the ceremony was performed, and the desired result happened - <I>post hoc, ergo propter hoc</I>).Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20257999.post-78857139167155739682008-09-03T20:43:00.000+03:002008-09-03T20:43:00.000+03:00Could be that similar superstitions are based on t...<I>Could be that similar superstitions are based on the segula.</I><BR/><BR/>Isn't it considerably more likely that the segulah is based on these superstitions?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20257999.post-76036919563544611342008-09-03T18:05:00.000+03:002008-09-03T18:05:00.000+03:00yoni - while I have not paid such close attention ...yoni - while I have not paid such close attention to the details of the case, I have not heard she is not Jewish. <BR/>Are you stating that as a fact I missed or just suggesting it?Rafi G.https://www.blogger.com/profile/00699851287106903971noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20257999.post-6565760091638515442008-09-03T16:58:00.000+03:002008-09-03T16:58:00.000+03:00Anon,Could be that similar superstitions are based...Anon,<BR/><BR/>Could be that similar superstitions are based on the segula.<BR/><BR/>Rafi,<BR/>Is Rose's mother (Marie) even Jewish? If not, it may explain why there may be no point even trying the segulah (or why rabbonim don't want to get involved, or both) - it may only work for <I>yidden</I>.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20257999.post-14142752092597200572008-09-03T15:07:00.000+03:002008-09-03T15:07:00.000+03:00(from straightdope.com)http://tiny.cc/f2VcL "Radf...(from straightdope.com)<BR/>http://tiny.cc/f2VcL <BR/>"Radford's Encyclopaedia of Superstition, by E. and M.A. Radford (1947),...Huck "happened to think how they always put quicksilver in loaves of bread and float them off because they always go right to the drownd carcass and stop there." Radford says this superstition is British in origin and cites a contemporary (1940s) case where it actually worked!"Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20257999.post-80625170268205882762008-09-03T14:54:00.000+03:002008-09-03T14:54:00.000+03:00The "segula" is from Huckleberry fin, bu...The "segula" is from Huckleberry fin, but there the bread has quicksilver(mercury) on it instead of a candle.<BR/>In Huck Finn, I believe it was a moving stream.<BR/><BR/>Apparently the belief is much older than Huck Finn.<BR/>Here's from http://www.answers.com/topic/drowning-2<BR/>In popular belief, there are several ways of finding the bodies of drowned people. One is to float a loaf of bread, loaded with a quantity of mercury, across the pond or river, and it will stop over, or near to, the place where the body lies (N&Q 6s:8 (1883), 367, 435-6), a method which goes back at least to the 1580s. Another way of locating the corpse is to fire a gun across the water, which will bring the body to the surface. Sailors believed that the concussion of the shot bursts the gall bladder of the drowned body and thereby makes it float (Denham Tracts, 1895: ii. 72). A variation on this principle was to fill bottles with gunpowder and contrive to explode them under water (N&Q 5s:9 (1878), 478). A number of other long-standing beliefs existed about drowned bodies. It was thought that a body found floating on the water cannot have been drowned but must have been a murder victim, already dead before being placed in the water, on the premise that drowned bodies sink. N&Q (167 (1934), 297, 336-7; 168 (1935), 214) cites a court-case of 1699 in which this belief is cited as evidence. Corpses were, however, believed to rise on the ninth day after drowning (when their gall bladder broke), and it was also maintained that males floated face up, while females floated face down. Thomas Browne devotes a chapter of his Pseudoxia Epidemica (6th edn. (1672), book 4, chapter 6) to refuting these notions.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20257999.post-54226359708283356762008-09-03T14:31:00.000+03:002008-09-03T14:31:00.000+03:00I don't believe the grandfather killed the girl. I...I don't believe the grandfather killed the girl. I think he sold her. He said he killed her just to throw them off track.rockofgalileehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07939653236475167491noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20257999.post-18154613283173607842008-09-03T14:07:00.000+03:002008-09-03T14:07:00.000+03:00Maybe it only works on a calm body of water.Maybe it only works on a calm body of water.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20257999.post-17585852527647124642008-09-03T12:05:00.000+03:002008-09-03T12:05:00.000+03:00Great question!Great question!mother in israelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13715046177293916034noreply@blogger.com