Jewish Fairy Tales
All stories from Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends by Gertrude Landa (1919).
The Giant of the Flood
Noah herds animals onto the ark. He tells them that, if they cannot lie down, they cannot board the ark.
He wants a unicorn. A giant offers to find one in exchange for passage. Noah says the giant is a demon.
The giant finds a unicorn. It is large, but it can lie down on the ground, so Noah ties it to the ark by its horn so it can swim alongside.
When the flood starts, the giant waits until the water is high, and then jumps on the unicorn's back. He says he will eat all the food Noah tries to give the unicorn.
Noah makes a deal with the giant that he will feed him, and in return he will serve Noah's descendants.
The animals have a troubling journey. The phoenix doesn't bother Noah for food, and Noah proclaims that the phoenix will live forever.
The giant tells Noah that he will never again have to put up with humans. Noah reminds him that he will be a servant to the humans, and the giant becomes depressed. He stops eating, and starts shrinking.
The ark lands on an island. Noah commands the giant to do hard labor, and he gets even smaller.
Noah takes the giant out to plant things. They plant grapes, which Noah says can be turned into wine, and the giant sacrifices a sheep, a lion, a pig, and a monkey in honor of it, saying that drinking a little will make a person harmless like a sheep, drinking a bit more will make him strong like a lion, more still will make him a piggish beast, and too much will make him a silly monkey.
Later, the giant loses a tooth and Abraham carves it into a chair.
The giant then threatens the Israelites by picking up a mountain to crush them with. The mountain fell apart, landing around his neck and trapping him. Moses stabs him in the ankle with a sword and kills him.
The Beggar King
King Hagag removes parts from the Holy Book that he dislikes.
He goes hunting. The deer he hunts is faster than his horse, but gets caught by its antlers on a tree by a river. He undresses and swims across the river to get the deer, but he finds that the deer has turned into a young genie, who says he's there to teach the king a lesson. The genie swims back to the king's horse and dresses in the king's clothes, tricking the other hunters that he is the king.
The king cries in the forest until a woodcutter finds him. He tells the woodcutter he is the king, but the woodcutter doesn't believe him, and offers him clothes if the king will carry his sticks.
The king bothers the woodcutter, so the woodcutter shoos him away. He finds his way to the palace, and the guards also shoo him away. He sleeps on the street, and the next morning, he sees the genie riding through the city, to the delight of the populace.
The king tries to get a job as a laborer, but he is incompetent, and he eventually becomes the guide for a group of blind beggars.
The genie announces that all beggars who come to the palace will get a feast. The king and his group of beggars go. The "King" talks to each beggar separately. The king shows remorse for his actions, and the genie allows him to resume his place on the throne. The king protests, but the genie insists and promises to take care of the blind beggars. The king proves to be a kind and just ruler.
The Quarrel of the Cat and Dog
At first, the cat and dog were good friends. When winter fell, food grew scarce, and they both became irritable.
The cat suggests that they start hunting separately, to be better able to find enough food. The dog is sad, but he agrees to make the cat happy. The cat decides to go live in Adam's house (of Adam and Eve), where she will eat mice. The cat tells the dog that they can never see each other again. Once again, the dog is sad, but the cat is not troubled. Adam is happy to allow the cat to eat the mice in his house.
The dog has a hard time hunting, and eventuallhy meets a wolf who gives him food, but also asks him to defend their cave from wild animals. The dog nearly dies, and he leaves the wolf.
He wanders again, and runs into a monkey, who tells him to go away and throws coconuts at him.
Finally, the dog finds some sheep. who give him food in return for him keeping watch in the night for wolves. He acciendtally scares many of the sheep right into the group of wolves, and he decieds that he'll never talk to animals again.
Eventually, he runs into Adam, who saves him from wild animals and insists that he stay in his house. The cat takes offense, and despite Adam's pleading, she constantly attacked the dog.
The Water-Babe
The Pharaoh's daughter finds baby Moses floating in the Nile. She takes him home and raises him. Everyone at the palace loves him, except for the Pharaoh's advisers, who disliked the Pharaoh befriending Moses.
Moses's adoptive mother threw a banquet for his third birthday. Moses asked the Pharaoh what the party was for, and he stole the Pharaoh's crown. The royal advisor was insistent that Moses was an evil spirit who wants to steal the royal crown, but a different adviser sides with the Pharaoh's wife and daughter and says that Moses is just a normal child. The Pharaoh sides with the first adviser, and orders that Moses be tried.
At the trial, the second adviser asks that the judges give Moses a choice between jewels and fire; if he chooses the jewels, he iay be a demon, but if he chooses the fire, he is a normal child. His mother is desperate for him to grab the fire, and the second adviser gives her his magic staff, supposedly handed down to him from Adam, which he says will make Moses do whatever she wants. Moses grabs the coals, and then, feeling the burn of the fire, sticks his still-hot hand in his mouth, burning his tongue. His mother asks for the magic staff, for protection, but the adviser says that only soeone who can read the magic word written on the staff can have it, and that one day, it will belong to Moses.
Years later, Moses flees Egypt. he ends up married to the daughter of the adviser, who had also left Egypt and become a Hebrew. The adviser leaves the stick outside, where Moses finds it and uses it to rescue the Hebrews who are enslaved in Egypt.
From Shepherd Boy to King
A shepherd boy stands in a field. (lots of flowery description) One day, he hears a voice telling him he will be the King. He does not see a source of the voice.
He climbs a tall hill with a large, bare tree (telephone pole?) on top. The hill is bare and quiet.
The tree turns out to be made of horn, not wood. The boy concludes that it is a magic hill. He cannot dig a hole in the hill; it seems to have a skin. He sits down to rest, and then the hill stands up. The boy figure out it is actually a giant unicorn (same as the Noah story? unclear).
He decides to wait for the unicorn to lie back down so he can get off. He hears a lion roar in the distance, but the lion is tiny compared to the unicorn. The unicorn lowers its head, and the boy slides off, landing right next to the lion. He prepares to stab it, when a deer shows up and offers him a ride. The deer takes him back to his village. When he becomes king, he writes the story into a Psalm.
The Magic Palace
Ibrahim, the most acclaimed man in the city, became poor. He didn't tell anyone, but his family was starving and wasting away. His wife tells him to get a job, and he says no one will hire him when he is wearing such ragged clothes. She talks to their neighbors, and borrows a cloak for him. He leaves the city, so that no one in town will know that he is poor and in need of work, and just outside the city, he is approached by a man seeking guidance. The man offers to let Ibrahim sell him as a slave, giving him a scroll of building blueprints as proof of his skills. Ibrahim is impressed, and compliments the designs. The man tells him to take him to a noble man in need of a new building, as they will listen to Ibrahim. Ibrahim agrees, and they go back to the city, eventually finding a jeweler who needs a new house. The jeweler agrees to the plans shown to him, and he buys the builder from Ibrahim.
The jeweler tells the builder that he will be a free man if he builds the house, and tells him that he will find workmen. The builder replies that he doesn't need workmen, and that the house will be done tomorrow. The jweler takes him to the site, and decides to watch all night, but he eventually falls alseep. The jeweler and Ibrahim both have strange dreams of the buidling being constructed.
In the morning, the jeweler and Ibrahim go to the newly built house, which is large and magnificent. The builder invites them in, and then disappears.
Ibrahim says that the builder was the Prophet Elijah, who comes back to Earth to help worthy people who are in a bad place. The jeweler holds a banquet in the palace for all the residents of the city.
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