My dad, sisters, and I sat around a big round table in the funeral home director’s office trying our best to focus on what he was saying while we struggled to wrap our heads around what was happening—the reality was that mom was dying, and we needed to make arrangements for her funeral.
“So you’ll bring in some clothes for her to be buried in,” he informed us.
Wait, what? That was a detail that none of us had really thought about. So later that evening, we threw around some ideas. One of her many snarky political t-shirts? Her dad’s work shirt? Her Jewish dog pajamas? Then suddenly, my sister Sami’s face lit up, “Oh my God. I know what we should put her in…the Angry Donald sweatshirt!”
For some background, one summer, my family and I went on a trip to Disney World. While there, my mom bought for herself—out of necessity after one of those sudden and intense Florida rainstorms—a sweatshirt from the gift shop. Of all the sweatshirts she could have chosen, she picked a blue zip-up sweatshirt with a gigantic angry Donald Duck right in the center, his brow furrowed, his beak wide open mid-yell, spit flying out of his mouth. It became one of her favorite articles of clothing. And it was a fitting sweatshirt for her. You see, my mom was an incredibly goofy person. But she also had deeply held convictions and was sometimes irrationally stubborn about her opinions. The result was a person who was equal parts silliness and rage. The “Angry Donald” sweatshirt summed her up perfectly.
The moment my sister suggested it, we all burst out laughing. We laughed and we cried. We laughed until we cried. And then somewhere in that space between laughter and grief, we realized they weren’t separate anymore. The laughter and the tears—they were tangled together, inseparable just like our memories of her.
When we had finally collected ourselves, Sami said, “You know, my therapist was just asking me if in the midst of all of this, we were still laughing and finding moments of joy…I guess we’re doing as okay as we can be.”
As anyone here who has endured a profound loss might understand, it is often when we are in the darkest moments that we laugh the hardest. When our reality seems unbearable, we realize there is nothing else to do but laugh—at the dissociative, bizarre experience of life-altering loss.
So here’s the punchline—this is a sermon about humor and laughter. Yes, I know what you might be thinking, “Really Rabbi? Comedy? That is the topic of your Kol Nidrei sermon…in the same week we marked the year anniversary of October 7th?” Yep. Did it provide a great excuse to watch stand-up comedy specials during work hours? Absolutely. But I promise that’s not why I chose the topic.
There are moments in our lives when we experience such profound tragedy—personally, communally, nationally—that it’s hard to imagine that we will ever laugh again. For many of us, I just described the past year of our lives. But tonight, I am here to say that not only can we laugh, but we must. Humor is a fundamental Jewish value, but it is more than that—it is an existential human need.
There’s a story in the Talmud about a rabbi named Beroka who was walking through the market with Elijah the Prophet (turns out Elijah doesn’t only enjoy attending brises and mooching wine from your Passover seder, he also enjoys an afternoon at the Farmer’s Market!). The rabbi asked Elijah, “Who here is worthy to inherit the world to come?” Elijah pointed to two jesters who were busy entertaining the crowds. “Really?” the rabbi asked. “Those guys, those guys over there making a fool of themselves? They’re going to heaven?” Elijah explained: “Yes—because they create joy and cheer up the depressed and use their sense of humor to bring people together and to make peace.”
This story shows us something essential about who we are as Jews. Humor isn’t just something we do for fun—it’s something we do to survive.
Before there was Alex Edelman, Joan Rivers, or Jerry Seinfeld, there were people like Rabbi Beroka walking through crowded markets asking, “Who here brings the kind of joy that can change a life?” Humor has been, as Dr. Arie Sover puts it, our “psychological weapon.”
Comedy is sacred because it lifts our spirits, helps us foster connections, and pushes us to reimagine and build a more just and peaceful world. That might feel like a tall order for a joke, but I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Jews have been at the forefront of comedy for centuries, and that despite incessant persecution, marginalization, and attempts at annihilation, we are still here. Hey, who knows? Maybe if those Amalekites and Jebusites had loosened up a bit, they’d still be kicking it with us today.
Comedy creates joy and cheers up the depressed.
Humor is one of the greatest forms of catharsis—a moment of release. It’s like the trainers and coaches handing cups of water to marathon runners exhausted and winded. A joke refuels us, gives us just enough strength to put one foot in front of the other even with the miles and obstacles ahead.
When the world feels unbearable, when we feel insignificant and powerless, humor can remind us of our own humanity. Even during the Holocaust, survivor and Jewish entertainer Robert Clary, later known for his roles in shows like Days of Our Lives and Hogan’s Heroes, performed song and dance routines in the camps for other prisoners. While his comedy sadly could not spare their lives, it certainly helped them, if even just for a moment, remember their own humanity.
Throughout Jewish history, despite humiliation and persecution, humor has been a psychological defense and an essential tool, helping us to laugh at the absurdity of hatred and bigotry. Humor has been—and will be—paramount to our survival.
Comedy brings people together.
Comedy isn’t just a momentary relief; it helps us forge deep connections, particularly with those who share our struggles.
In 2015, aspiring comedian Heather McMahan’s father died from pancreatic cancer just a week after his diagnosis. To cope, she turned to Instagram, creating “The Dead Dad Club,” where she shared humor born from her own grief. Her vulnerability and jokes resonated deeply with others who had lost a parent, building community around their shared experience. McMahan not only connected with others but helped them connect with each other over the profound shared reality of loss.
Comedy also confronts taboos, shining a light on issues like infertility, abortion, racism, sexual assault, domestic abuse, mental health, and more. Comedy says, “These don’t have to be a source of shame.” If it’s mentionable, it’s manageable.
Of course, there is a dark side to comedy as well. Comedy can harm, especially when jokes about marginalized experiences come from outside of those communities. There is certainly comedy out there that belittles the marginalized, punching down instead of fostering connection or validation. But when comedians who have lived these challenges share their experiences on stage, their humor reassures viewers that their pain is real—and that it’s okay to laugh at the absurdity of injustice.
Comedy makes peace.
Humor gives us strength when we’re barely holding it together. In the hardest moments, it lets us breathe, gives us a break from the heaviness, and reminds us that we’re still human. But here’s what’s incredible about humor—it doesn’t just help us survive. It helps us see things differently.
In those moments of laughter—when we’re cracking up so hard we’re crying—we’re not just finding relief. We’re seeing the world in a new way. Humor opens a small space where we can step back, look at our pain, and say, “Wait, this doesn’t have to be the whole story.” It gives us the courage to challenge the way things are, to name what’s absurd or unfair, and to imagine a world that could be different—a world that’s more joyful, more just, more kind.
That’s the real power of laughter—it doesn’t just offer a momentary escape. It reminds us that even in our hardest moments, we have the strength to not only endure but to transform. Humor shows us the cracks in the walls, and it’s through those cracks that the light gets in.
There is an adage that tragedy plus time equals comedy. This belief that we need space between us and the trauma before we can laugh about it. But what if humor can be a tool we use to navigate and process our trauma in the moment?
In 2012, stand-up comedian Tig Notaro stepped onto a stage and did something remarkable. She opened with the words, “I have cancer, how are you?”—and in that moment, she shattered the boundary between comedy and tragedy. It wasn’t just about making a joke to cope; it was about confronting the hardest parts of life head-on, using humor to process the trauma she was actively living through.
But what’s profound here is that she didn’t just use humor to survive. She used it to invite others into her vulnerability and reshape the way we think about illness, trauma, and even life itself. Her humor wasn’t an escape from reality—it was a way to change the way she and we experience that reality. Humor can be a way of working through the moment, not detaching from it. It allows us to live in the pain and transform it.
Humor, when used this way, does more than help us process personal pain. It has the power to expose the absurdity of the world—the injustices, the stereotypes, the systems that hold us back. Really great comedy doesn’t just make us laugh; it forces us to question what’s wrong and to imagine what could be different.
That’s what Notaro did in her special Boyish Girl Interrupted. In one of the most powerful moments, she actually took off her shirt on stage, revealing the scars from her double mastectomy. She didn’t pause or explain—she just kept performing. By embracing her own discomfort in such a public way, she wasn’t just talking about her body—she was challenging us to rethink how we see illness, gender, and vulnerability. It was a moment of reimagining the world, not just surviving in it.
So what am I asking us to do? I am certainly not suggesting that we all become professional comedians. Because let’s be honest, most of us couldn’t hack it. Let’s keep our day jobs.
But I do want us to give ourselves permission to laugh and to embrace what I’m calling a comedic mindset. And what does that mindset look like? Here is a rabbi’s understanding of how to think like a comedian in three easy steps.
Step 1: Observe.
Comedians have a gift for seeing things others don’t. They notice the absurdities, the little ironies, the contradictions in everyday life. The blast of the shofar is our call to wake up and observe the world around us with clarity. It pushes us to notice what’s wrong—what’s backward, what’s unjust, what’s harmful.
Step 2: Name it.
It’s not enough to just observe. Comedians take what they’ve noticed and shine a light on it. They point to the absurdity and say, “Look at this! This is ridiculous, right?” When we name what’s wrong, we begin to shift the shame from those who are suffering onto the broken systems or harmful norms that cause the pain.
Step 3: Reimagine it.
Once we see and name what’s wrong, humor helps us dream of something better. It pushes us to ask, “What if?” Humor stretches our minds, allows us to get creative, and invites us to imagine the world not as it is but as it could be.
Observe it. Name it. Reimagine it.
Laughter is a part of our lineage as Jews, stretching as far back as the Torah itself. The very first Jewish person to be given a name by God in the Torah is Isaac—a name meaning “one who laughs” or simply “laughter.”
That laughter began long before his birth. When Sarah overhears that she is going to have a baby at the age of 75, she laughs not from a place of joy or jubilation but from disbelief, frustration, even anger. But when Issac is born, she declares in delight, “God has brought me laughter.”
In the year 5785, may our laughter of frustration, disbelief, and anger transform to laughter of delight, even if it is just momentary. Even in the darkest moments, may we laugh through our tears, and may that laughter transform into something bigger—something joyful, something healing, something that reminds us that light can always find its way through.
