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108 COMMUNITY MAGAZINE SUBMITTED BY: RALPH COHEN What happened in February 1938 that no bar-misvahs were celebrated in Europe? Last Month’s Riddle: The Scheming Sheik After a long work day David went to the sheik to get paid. The sheik offered David a challenge. He placed three coins on the table, a gold coin valued at $1,000, a silver coin valued at $10 and a copper coin valued at $.01. The sheik explained, “You have one chance. If you say a truthful statement, you will get one of these three coins for your work. If you say a false statement, you get nothing.” Realizing that even if he said a truthful sentence, the sheik would undoubtedly give him the copper coin, David considered the offer for a moment. Finally, he agreed, and said his statement. Grudgingly, the sheik was forced to give David the gold coin. What was David’s statement? SOLUTION: David said: “You will give me neither the copper nor the silver coin.” If the sheik wanted to prove this statement false, he would have to give David either the copper or silver coins – but according to the conditions, David must get nothing for making a false statement. Therefore, the sheik was stuck hav- ing to accept the statement as true. Since David is then entitled to a coin for a true statement, the sheik had no choice but to give him the gold coin because giving him either of the other coins would make the statement false. SOLVED BY: David I. Cohen, Jeffrey Levy, Ralph Cohen Junior Riddle: Shrinking Massa SUBMITTED BY: JACK LEVY A special batch of handmade shmura massa shrinks its length to 1/2 and width to 1/3 each time it is dipped in water. After three dips, its surface was 4 square inches. What was the original length, if the original width was 9 inches? Last Month’s Junior Riddle: Conniving Coins You have ten stacks of ten coins. Nine of the 10 stacks contain coins that are genuine and weigh one ounce each. But one of the stacks contains counterfeit coins that weight 1.1 ounces each but look identical. You also have a scale which returns the number of ounces of the weighed items. Using the scale once, locate the stack with the 1.1 ounce coins. SOLUTION: Prepare one coin from the first stack, two coins from the second stack, three coins from the third, etc. until you have prepared all ten coins from the tenth stack and place these selected coins on the scale. The weight of the scale will be off by anywhere from .1 ounce to one full ounce depending on which pile contained the counterfeits. SOLVED BY: Chagit Saidi, Linda L., Sarah & Margalit Haber, Jen- nifer Massre, Gabe Chehebar, Shaina Tauby, Zalman Cohen, Yehuda Yarmish, Jeffrey Levy, Michael Stein Useless Trivia pounds of massa eaten by Americans throughout the year – not including Passover (Manischewitz). Value of the shmura massa given away by Lubavitch last year. SEND YOUR SOLUTIONS! email: riddles@communitym.com • fax: 718-504-4246 mail: 1616 Ocean Parkway, Brooklyn, NY 11223 Correct submissions received by the 20 th of each month will be featured in the next issue along with your name. Riddle: Party Pooper first man asked the second how his family was doing, the second looked very upset. “Don’t ask,” he sighed. “I don’t know what’s going on lately. My son decided to study in a yeshiva in Israel and to become Orthodox. My married daughter wants to cover her hair. And my wife wants to dip all the dishes and kosher the kitchen. I can’t understand why all these things are happening to me!” The first man, with a look of sympathy, advised, “You should make sure to check your mezuzot!” D. Savdie MEANINGFUL MASSA Q: What did the blind man say when he was handed a piece of massa on Passover? A: “Who wrote this non- sense?” David Dweck EXODUS 2008 Young Abraham once returned home from Hebrew school and his father Eddie asked, “What did you learn today?” Abraham looked at his father, paused and then answered, “The Rabbi told us how Moses led the children of Israel out of Egypt.” “Tell me about it,” encour- aged Eddie. Abraham hesitated for a moment and then said, “Moses was a big strong man and he beat Pharaoh up. Then while he was down, he got all the people together and ran towards the sea. When he got there, he had the Corps of Engineers build a huge pontoon bridge for them to cross. Once they got on the other side, they blew up the bridge while the Egyptians were trying to cross it.” His father was shocked. “Is that what the Rabbi taught you?” he asked in disbelief. “Well…no,” Abraham replied sheepishly. “But you’d never believe the story he did tell us!” David Sutton ERADICATING THE EDICT Once upon a time in a far- away land there lived a king who, one winter, forbade his Jewish subjects from fol- lowing the misvot. It was ordered that anyone who did not comply would be sum- marily executed. With no other choice, the Chief Rabbi of the province issued a decree directing the Jews not to participate in any of the misvot in order to preserve their well-being. Depressed over the situation, the Chief Rabbi began to lobby the king’s ministers to allow him to plead his case to the king to permit the Jews to once again observe the misvot. Finally, after months of lobbying the Rabbi was granted a meeting with the king to present his case. The Rabbi prayed incessantly and fasted for three days in preparation for the meeting and finally one early spring morning the Chief Rabbi appeared before the king. The Rabbi presented elo- quent arguments so compel- ling that the king immediate- ly lifted the ban and declared that Jews may once again practice the misvot. Elated by this success, the Rabbi hurried back home to relate the good news. He burst into his house and called out to his wife, “Sarah, Sarah, I convinced the king, we can keep all of the mis- vot again, we can be Jews again!” His wife glared back at him angrily and said, “You couldn’t wait until after Passover?” Joey Cohen  ”  3.7 Million $45.5 Million