Friday, March 14, 2008

A Bit of Purim Torah, English-Teacher Style

I don't know when the idea of "Purim Torah" originated (I'm equally sure some reader is going to enlighten me), but it lead me to think of some of the things in my own field that could use a little humor to lighten things up.

What if people really listened to us when we said "Improve your vocabulary"? The following might be the result.

SUBTLE SUPPLANTERS OF SERIOUS SAYINGS

1. Similar sire; similar scion.

2. Precipitancy creates prodigality.

3. Tenants of vitreous abodes ought to hurl no lithoidal fragments.

4. It is not proper for mendicants to be indicative of preferences.

5. Compute not your immature gallinacenas prior to their being produced.

6. It is fruitless to become lachrymose over scattered lacteal fluid.

7. Cleave gramineous manner for fodder during the period that the orb of the day is refulgent.

8. A feline posseses the power to contemplate a monarch.

9. Pulchritude does not extend below the surface of the derma.

10. Failure to be present causes the vital organ to become more enamored.

11. Every article which coruscates is not fashioned from aureate metal.

12. Freedom from guile or fraud constitutes the most excellent principle of procedure.

13. Each canine passes through his period of preeminence.

14. Consolidated you and I maintain ourselves erect; separated we defer to the law of gravity.

15. You cannot estimate the value of the contents of a bound, printed narrative or record from its exterior vesture.

16. Folks deficient in ordinary judgment scurryingly enter areas of which celestial beings dread to set foot.

17. Liquid relish for the female anserine fowl is the individual condiment for the male.

18. A feathered creature clasped in the manual members is equal in value to a brace in the bosky growth.

19. The individual of the Class Aves, arriving before the appointed time, seizes the invertibrate animal of the Group Vernes.

20. Socially oriented individuals tend to congregate in gregariously homogenius groups.

21. One may address a member of the Equidae family toward acqueous liquid, but one is incapable of compelling him to quaff.

22. Forever refrain from enumerating the dental projections of a bequested member of the Equidae family.

23. One Pyrus Malus per diem restrains the arrival of the Hipppocratic apostle.

24. Fondness for notes of exchange constitutes the tuberous structure of all satanically-inspired principles.

25. Supposing one primarily fails to be victorious, bend further efforts in that direction.

26. Be adorned with the pedal encasement that gives comfort.

27. Prudence and sagacity are the worthier condiments of intrepid courage.

28. He who expresses merriment in finality expresses merriment excelling either in equal quality.

29. A scrutinzed vessel never exceeds 212 degrees Fahrenheit.

30. A rotating lithoidal fragment never accrues lichen.

Hmmm, maybe we should use this as a sobriety test on Purim. Anyone who can make sense of this is definitely not drunk!

5 comments:

Bas~Melech said...

That was... inspired. :-D

Anonymous said...

Phenomenal!

Bas~Melech said...

OK, I've finally actually READ the post, and two are still giving me trouble: #27 and 8. I understand the words but I can't seem to put my finger on where I've heard the like before...

Can I save a copy of this for future reference? Who knows, someday I may teach vocabulary to people who can read...

ProfK said...

Bas-Melech,
#8--A cat may look at a king. E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898. An insolent remark of insubordination, meaning, “I am as good as you”, or “Are you too mighty to be spoken to or looked at?” Also used by Lewis Carroll in Alice Through the Looking Glass.

#27--Caution is preferable to rash bravery. Discretion is the better part of valor. Said by Falstaff in King Henry the Fourth, Part One, by William Shakespeare.

Students who can read? What a unique idea.

Bas~Melech said...

Well, that doth ensure the lucidity of myriad (um) things, for Lo! I had not heretofore been cognizant of those maxims.

How very illiterate of me.

:-P