Shavuot Games
When Moses Climbed Mt. Sinai
A Family Table Game
Shavuot Bingo
You will need a square of
cardboard or poster board for each
player. Rule each card into nine
boxes to look like a bingo card.
Draw Shavuot symbols in each
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Reprinted by permission from "Let's Have A
Party" by Ruth Esrig Brinn.
Search For Names Creates A Mystery
The Krefman/Schebakowsky family
inquiry presented a real challenge.
After checking 11 written sources,
we telephoned two out-of-state
"experts." They also had never
seen these names. The following
material is, therefore, an educated
guess. In Poland, there is a town
named Shuvkov, which was called
Shubkow by the Jewish residents.
(Many Eastern European towns and
villages had Jewish nicknames.)
There are also Polish cities named
Physical characteristics
were the source of some
Jewish names.
Jaffe/Yaffe are . . . taken
from the Hebrew word for
beautiful.
Szabasowka and Zabikow. Any of
these town names may have been
the source of your name.
Schebakowsky, might also have
been derived from the name
Shabad. According to BenZion
Kaganoff, Shabad is an acronym for
Saliah Bet Din, or a high court
bailiff or Shamash. Ski/Sky at the
end of a name usually refers to a
town of origin.
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Moses was up on Mt. Sinai for
40 days days when he received the
Torah. What do you think he took
with him? Things that start with the
same Iptters as Mt. Sinai, perhaps.
Gather everyone into a circle.
The first person says, "When
Moses climed Mt. Sinai, he took a
magic stick (or a mink stole, or a
million sheep, or a magnificent
sweater). The next person must
think of something else that begins
like Mt. Sinai. To make the game
harder, you may want to have each
person repeat what everyone else
has said before.
square. Make each card different.
You can use some of the same
pictures on each card, but put them
into different squares.
Symbols you can use are:
Torah, Star of David, Flower, Torah
Pointer, Synagogue, Prayerbook,
Wine Cup, Map of Israel, Holy Ark,
Ten Commandments, Holy Temple,
Ner Tamid, Sheaves of Wheat, Milk
and Honey.
Draw each symbol on a smaller
card, and put all the small cards
into a shoe box. One person is the
caller. Everyone else has a large
card. The caller picks a small card
from the box, calls out the symbol,
and whoever has that picture on his
card, covers it with a button, a
penny or small cardboard circle.
The winner is the first person to
complete a row of pictures, either
across, down or diagonally.
FRIDAY, MAY 20, 1988
Krefman as a name could have
been taken from Krefeld, a city in
West Germany. Jews lived there
from the year 1617. In 1808 it was
so important that 20 Jewish
communities from Brussels to
Cologne had their seat in Krefeld.
Severe anti-Semitism began in 1927
and one-third of the Jewish people
left by 1937. The remaining 800
were deported by the Nazis in 1939.
Physical characteristics were
the source of some Jewish names.
Jaffe/Yaffe are such names taken
from the Hebrew word for beautiful.
In German/Yiddish, beautiful
became Schoen, Schein,
Shein/Sheiner. Jews in Arab
countries used Hassan and Djamal
as names meaning beautiful and in
Spanish it became Ermosa, in
Italian — Bella, Beilin, Baylin, Beilis,
Belinson.
Kaufman, Koifman, Kramer,
Cramer, Markman are all
Ashkenazic names meaning
merchant in German/Yiddish. In
Hebrew the name became Bakal
and in Italian/Spanish shopkeepers
were named Mercante.
Schreiber/Schreibman are
Ashkenazic names chosen from an
occupation. Someone in your family
was a scribe.
Frumin/Frumkin come from the
German/Yiddish for pious or
Fromme. Furman, Fuhrman,
Furmanov are of a different origin,
however. These names were derived
from the occupation of teamster or
coachman.
Sirota is a Slavic name
meaning orphan. The Encyclopedia
Judaica has an article about a
famous Russian-born cantor,
Gershon Sirota 1874-1943.
The Chassicic movement, a
mystical religious group adopted
Chasid, Chusid and Chusit as
names.
Susskind, Zyskind, Ziskind are
surnames of Ashkenazic origin
meaning literally sweet child in
German/Yiddish. Zysin, Zyskin,
Ziskin and Zislin are also from the
German zise or sweet. Sussman,
Sussmann, Susmanovitz all mean
sweet man.
Bader and Baderman indicate
an ancestor was an owner or
attendant in a bathhouse.
An ancestor in the Berg family
chose their name from the
landscape since it means mountain.
Betty Provizer Starkman is the past president
and founder of the Jewish Genealogical
Society of Michigan.
Declaring Love Through Ruth
Every Shavuot we receive the
Torah anew. We decorate our
houses with flowers and we prepare
our tables with delicacies, using
milk and honey as special treats. In
Israel, many adorn themselves with
floral crowns and carry colorful
baskets of fruit. There is great
excitement in the air. Quietly, we
unroll the scroll of Ruth and, with
great pride, we read of Ruth's
choice to join Naomi and the people
of Israel.
'Ask me not to leave you, for
wherever you will go, I will go.
Wherever you will live, I will live.
Your people will be my people, and
your God will he my God.
Ruth became the mother of
Oved, and Oved fathered Jesse,
and from Jesse came David, The
King of Israel. David, like his
grandmother, was a great lover of
God and of the people of Israel. He,
too, spoke beautiul words of love.
Many of David's psalms are sung
on Shavuot.
From Ruth, we learn to declare
our love, from David we learn to
celebrate it!