The Talmud, writes Simon Holloway, is replete with jokes and wordplay, and mentions rabbis using humor to maintain their students’ attention. But the rabbis were also wary of excessive mirth:

A famous maxim has it that one of the ways in which the Torah is acquired is through a reduction of merriment, and Rabbi Shimon ben Yoḥai rules that one is forbidden to fill one’s mouth with laughter in this world. . . .

An aversion to mockery may have underlined the reason behind a prohibition of theaters and circuses, and may have also been the reason behind Rabbi Zeira’s not laughing at Rabbi Yirmiyah’s terrible joke in Tractate Niddah—although it really is a terrible joke. Rabbi Akiva . . . once remarked that levity brings one to lewdness, and that references to “mirth” in the Torah are all references to idolatry. Since he himself employs humor as a pedagogical tool, it may be that he had in mind this distinction between mockery and other legitimate forms of making fun.

Indeed, the different motivations of those who attempt to make others laugh is important, with parodying scholars being universally condemned. Rabbi Yirmiyah, whose tasteless attempt at humor . . . was the subject of no small amount of controversy, . . . was even thrown out of the academy for one of his terrible jokes.

Analyzing the recent direct Iranian attack on Israel, and Israel’s security situation more generally, Michael Oren looks to the 2015 agreement to restrain Iran’s nuclear program. That, and President Biden’s efforts to resurrect the deal after Donald Trump left it, are in his view the source of the current crisis:

Of the original motivations for the deal—blocking Iran’s path to the bomb and transforming Iran into a peaceful nation—neither remained. All Biden was left with was the ability to kick the can down the road and to uphold Barack Obama’s singular foreign-policy achievement.

In order to achieve that result, the administration has repeatedly refused to punish Iran for its malign actions:

Historians will survey this inexplicable record and wonder how the United States not only allowed Iran repeatedly to assault its citizens, soldiers, and allies but consistently rewarded it for doing so. They may well conclude that in a desperate effort to avoid getting dragged into a regional Middle Eastern war, the U.S. might well have precipitated one.

While America’s friends in the Middle East, especially Israel, have every reason to feel grateful for the vital assistance they received in intercepting Iran’s missile and drone onslaught, they might also ask what the U.S. can now do differently to deter Iran from further aggression. . . . Tehran will see this weekend’s direct attack on Israel as a victory—their own—for their ability to continue threatening Israel and destabilizing the Middle East with impunity.

Israel, of course, must respond differently. Our target cannot simply be the Iranian proxies that surround our country and that have waged war on us since October 7, but, as the Saudis call it, “the head of the snake.”