After months of negotiation with the authorities, a Talmudist from Odessa was finally granted permission to visit Moscow.

He boarded the train and found an empty seat. At the next stop, a young man got on and sat next to him. The scholar looked at the young man and he thought: This fellow doesn’t look like a peasant, so if he is no peasant he probably comes from this district. If he comes from this district, then he must be Jewish because this is, after all, a Jewish district.

But on the other hand, since he is a Jew, where could he be going? I’m the only Jew in our district who has permission to travel to Moscow.

Ahh, wait! Just outside Moscow there is a little village called Samvet, and Jews don’t need special permission to go to Samvet. But why would he travel to Samvet? He is surely going to visit one of the Jewish families there. But how many Jewish families are there in Samvet? Aha, only two – the Bernsteins and the Steinbergs. But since the Bernsteins are a terrible family, so such a nice looking fellow like him, he must be visiting the Steinbergs.

But why is he going to the Steinbergs in Samvet? The Steinbergs have only daughters, two of them, so maybe he’s their son-in-law. But if he is, then which daughter did he marry? They say that Sarah Steinberg married a nice lawyer from Budapest, and Esther married a businessman from Zhitomer, so it must be Sarah’s husband. Which means that his name is Alexander Cohen, if I’m not mistaken.

But if he came from Budapest, with all the anti-Semitism they have there, he must have changed his name.

What’s the Hungarian equivalent of Cohen? It is Kovacs. But since they allowed him to change his name, he must have special status to change it. What could it be? Must be a doctorate from the University. Nothing less would do.

At this point, therefore, the scholar of Talmud turns to the young man and says, “And how do you do, Dr. Kovacs?”

“Very well, thank you, sir, for asking.” answered the startled co-passenger. “But how is it that you know my name although we have never met, or so it seems to me?”

Replied the Talmudist, “It was obvious.”

Ein Jude wird im kommunistischen Polen verhört: “Sie haben Verwandte im Ausland?”
“Nein”
“Was heißt: “Nein”? Wer ist David Cohn in Tel Aviv?”
“Das ist mein Bruder”
“Wer ist Chaia Goldbaum in Haifa?”
“Das ist meine Schwester”
“Zum Donnerwetter, ich frage nun nochmals: Haben Sie Verwandte im Ausland, ja oder nein?”
“Nein, Bestimmt nicht! Von der ganzen Familie bin ich der einzige, der im Ausland lebt.”

The only cow in a small town in Poland stopped giving milk. The people did some research and found that they could buy a cow from Moscow for 2,000 rubles, or one from Minsk for 1,000 rubles. Being frugal, they bought the cow from Minsk.
The cow was wonderful. It produced lots of milk all the time, and the people were amazed and very happy. They decided to acquire a bull to mate with the cow and produce more cows like it. Then they would never have to worry about the milk supply again.
They bought a bull and put it in the pasture with their beloved cow. However, whenever the bull came close to the cow, the cow would move away. No matter what approach the bull tried, the cow would move away from the bull and he could not succeed in his quest.
The people were very upset and decided to ask their wise rabbi, what to do. They told the rabbi what was happening. “Whenever the bull approaches our cow, she moves away. If he approaches from the back, she moves forward.
When he approaches her from the front, she backs off. An approach from the side and she just walks away to the other side.”
The rabbi thought about this for a minute and asked, “Did you buy this cow from Minsk?”
The people were dumbfounded, since they had never mentioned where they had gotten the cow. “You are truly a wise rabbi,” they said.
“How did you know we got the cow from Minsk?”
The rabbi answered sadly, “My wife is from Minsk.”