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What Marc Maron’s comedy special taught me about laughter and Tisha B’Av
(JTA) — I’ve been teaching a virtual class on Jewish humor through our partner site, My Jewish Learning. I share classic jokes and bits and then discuss what they say about both the Jews who tell them and the Jewish audiences that enjoy them.
We have a lot of fun, and I think I’ve made the case for how a classic Jewish joke can be as revealing and meaningful as any other classic Jewish text. But I do wonder if I am complicit in a worldview that sees humor as the sum total of Jewish identity. The Pew Research Center found that 42% of Jewish Americans associate being Jewish with having a sense of humor — twice as many who said the same thing about observing Jewish law.
Have we all become Tim Whatley, the dentist on “Seinfeld” who Jerry suspects has converted to Judaism just to be able to tell Jewish jokes?
I am having these doubts on the eve of Tisha B’Av, the annual fast that mourns the destruction of the Temples in Jerusalem and other historical calamities. Leading up to the fast day, observant Jews take on many of the rituals of mourning the dead. It’s a grim period, and I’ve always bristled at a custom that demands I perform grief at the height of summer.
The unrelenting sadness of the period must have gotten to the sages of the Talmud. They tell the story of the elders who look down on the Temple Mount after it has been ransacked by the Romans, and see a fox scamper out of what had been the Holy of Holies, the inner sanctum of the Temple. They begin weeping, but Rabbi Akiva laughs instead.
They want to know why he’s laughing, and Akiva explains. On one level, he understands the absurd irony — the cosmic joke — of what they are witnessing: While the Torah says that any non-priest who approaches the Holy of Holies shall die (Numbers 1:51), the fox violates the space unscathed.
But Akiva is also laughing because the scene of destruction fulfills a prophecy: that Jerusalem won’t be restored to the Jews until after it is reduced to rubble. The other sages are comforted.
Miriam Zami, in a deep analysis of the story, says Akiva “resists the notion that the only future is a bleak one.” Laughing and recalling God’s promise to restore Jerusalem is “an act of healing, protesting Roman power and protesting the notion of a fundamentally meaningless existence.”
That’s the kind of laughter that scholars of Jewish humor have long celebrated: “laughter through tears,” the “laughter of defiance.” As the Yiddish scholar Ruth Wisse wrote in her study of Jewish humor, “Both mystic and comedian aspire to get the better of a world they are powerless to reform.”
I worry, though, that humor can offer an undeserved escape from grim reality — perhaps healthy in small doses, but delusional when it becomes a way of being in the world. When we celebrate the genius of Jewish humor are we mocking those who suffered without its comforts? To paraphrase the German philosopher Theodor Adorno, is making comedy after Auschwitz barbaric?
Like Akiva’s buddies, however, I found some comfort in the latest HBO special by veteran comedian Marc Maron. Now 59, Maron has long been a “comic’s comic” but found wider fame in recent years on the strength of a popular podcast and his roles in the Netflix series “GLOW” and his eponymous sitcom on IFC. His style is dyspeptic and confessional, and Jewish to a degree that seems to surprise even him: “There’s part of me that just wants to keep poking the Jew thing,” he says at one point in the new special.
“From Bleak to Dark” is Maron’s first special since the death, in 2020, of his partner, the filmmaker Lynn Shelton. He is one of a number of comedians who have been exploring their personal grief in their comedy; as New York Times critic Jason Zinoman pointed out in a recent essay, “These new shows illustrate how grief, precisely because it’s usually handled with solemnity, jargon and unsaid thoughts, is ripe territory for stand-up.”
The very first words of Maron’s special would fit right into the key text of the Tisha B’Av liturgy, known as “Lamentations“: “I don’t want to be negative,” he says, “but I don’t think anything’s ever gonna get better ever again. I don’t want to bum anybody out but I think this is pretty much the way it’s gonna be for however long it takes us to polish this planet off.”
He’s talking about global warming, but he eventually shifts to talking about Shelton’s death. At first he wonders how he can discuss his loss on stage,tims and then imagines a sad one-man show called “Marc Maron: Kaddish, A Prayer for the Dead,” and even chants the opening words of the prayer.
But Maron is not one to take comfort in Jewish ritual. “I’m not religious. I’m Jewish,” he explains, as if the second sentence makes the first one self-evident.
As for comedy, he says, “I’m a guy who talks about his life. So I wasn’t clear how that was gonna go. How am I going to talk about [Shelton]? You know, is that ever going to happen? Is there a way to bring humor to that?”
There is, and it came to him on the night the doctors took Shelton off of life support. At first, he is not sure he wants to be there, but his friends convince him that he would regret it if he didn’t say goodbye. “So I walk in there and really see her and she’s gone,” he relates. “And I was able to touch her forehead and tell her I love her and cry for a few minutes.” And then, because he is at heart a comedian, he thinks of a joke: As he walks away from her hospital bed, he thinks, “Selfie?”
“When I wrote that joke, or when I came up with it, it made me feel so happy,” he says.
Maron knows he is not the only person in the theater, or watching at home, who is grieving, and his words are solace for them as much as for himself. In another famous Talmud story about laughter, Elijah the Prophet and a Rabbi Baroka come across two men in the marketplace. The two explain that they are jesters. “When we see a person who is sad, we cheer him up,” they explain. “Likewise, when we see two people quarreling, we try to make peace between them.”
Says Elijah, “These two have a share in the World to Come,” which is a prophet’s way of saying they have a free pass to Heaven.
I don’t know if Maron knows the passage, or the one about Akiva, but his special feels like essential viewing on the eve of Tisha B’Av, when Jews are asked to hold onto hope and embrace life despite a tragic history.
“I find that humor that comes from real darkness is really the best because it disarms it,” he explains. “It’s elevating the spirit. It’s why I got into comedy, because I’ve watched comics and they would take things that were complicated or horrifying and simplify them and sort of make you see them in a different way and have a laugh. And I think it’s a beautiful thing and necessary.”
And then, because he is a comedian and Jew, he can’t resist a joke: “I believe there were probably some hilarious people in Auschwitz.”
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The post What Marc Maron’s comedy special taught me about laughter and Tisha B’Av appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Syria’s Sharaa Says Talks With Israel Could Yield Results ‘In Coming Days’
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa speaks at the opening ceremony of the 62nd Damascus International Fair, the first edition held since the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, in Damascus, Syria, Aug. 27, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi
Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa said on Wednesday that ongoing negotiations with Israel to reach a security pact could lead to results “in the coming days.”
He told reporters in Damascus the security pact was a “necessity” and that it would need to respect Syria’s airspace and territorial unity and be monitored by the United Nations.
Syria and Israel are in talks to reach an agreement that Damascus hopes will secure a halt to Israeli airstrikes and the withdrawal of Israeli troops who have pushed into southern Syria.
Reuters reported this week that Washington was pressuring Syria to reach a deal before world leaders gather next week for the UN General Assembly in New York.
But Sharaa, in a briefing with journalists including Reuters ahead of his expected trip to New York to attend the meeting, denied the US was putting any pressure on Syria and said instead that it was playing a mediating role.
He said Israel had carried out more than 1,000 strikes on Syria and conducted more than 400 ground incursions since Dec. 8, when the rebel offensive he led toppled former Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad.
Sharaa said Israel’s actions were contradicting the stated American policy of a stable and unified Syria, which he said was “very dangerous.”
He said Damascus was seeking a deal similar to a 1974 disengagement agreement between Israel and Syria that created a demilitarized zone between the two countries.
He said Syria sought the withdrawal of Israeli troops but that Israel wanted to remain at strategic locations it seized after Dec. 8, including Mount Hermon. Israeli ministers have publicly said Israel intends to keep control of the sites.
He said if the security pact succeeds, other agreements could be reached. He did not provide details, but said a peace agreement or normalization deal like the US-mediated Abraham Accords, under which several Muslim-majority countries agreed to normalize diplomatic ties with Israel, was not currently on the table.
He also said it was too early to discuss the fate of the Golan Heights because it was “a big deal.”
Reuters reported this week that Israel had ruled out handing back the zone, which Donald Trump unilaterally recognized as Israeli during his first term as US president.
“It’s a difficult case – you have negotiations between a Damascene and a Jew,” Sharaa told reporters, smiling.
SECURITY PACT DERAILED IN JULY
Sharaa also said Syria and Israel had been just “four to five days” away from reaching the basis of a security pact in July, but that developments in the southern province of Sweida had derailed those discussions.
Syrian troops were deployed to Sweida in July to quell fighting between Druze armed factions and Bedouin fighters. But the violence worsened, with Syrian forces accused of execution-style killings and Israel striking southern Syria, the defense ministry in Damascus and near the presidential palace.
Sharaa on Wednesday described the strikes near the presidential palace as “not a message, but a declaration of war,” and said Syria had still refrained from responding militarily to preserve the negotiations.
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Anti-Israel Activists Gear Up to ‘Flood’ UN General Assembly
US Capitol Police and NYPD officers clash with anti-Israel demonstrators, on the day Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses a joint meeting of Congress, on Capitol Hill, in Washington, DC, July 24, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Umit Bektas
Anti-Israel groups are planning a wave of raucous protests in New York City during the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) over the next several days, prompting concerns that the demonstrations could descend into antisemitic rhetoric and intimidation.
A coalition of anti-Israel activists is organizing the protests in and around UN headquarters to coincide with speeches from Middle Eastern leaders and appearances by US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The demonstrations are expected to draw large crowds and feature prominent pro-Palestinian voices, some of whom have been criticized for trafficking in antisemitic tropes, in addition to calling for the destruction of Israe.
Organizers of the demonstrations have promoted the coordinated events on social media as an opportunity to pressure world leaders to hold Israel accountable for its military campaign against Hamas in Gaza, with some messaging framed in sharply hostile terms.
On Sunday, for example, activists shouted at Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon.
“Zionism is terrorism. All you guys are terrorists committing ethnic cleansing and genocide in Gaza and Palestine. Shame on you, Zionist animals,” they shouted.
BREAKING: PRO-PALESTINE PROTESTORS CONFRONT “ISRAELI” AMBASSADOR DANNY DANON AT THE UNITED NATIONS
1/5 pic.twitter.com/4G1VYEMGzV
— Within Our Lifetime (@WOLPalestine) September 14, 2025
The Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM), warned on its website that the scale and tone of the planned demonstrations risk crossing the line from political protest into hate speech, arguing that anti-Israel activists are attempting to hijack the UN gathering to spread antisemitism and delegitimize the Jewish state’s right to exist.
Outside the UN last week, masked protesters belonging to the activist group INDECLINE kicked a realistic replica of Netanyahu’s decapitated head as though it were a soccer ball.
US activist group plays soccer with Bibi’s mock decapitated HEAD right outside NYC UN HQ
Peep shot at 00:40
Footage posted by INDECLINE collective just as UN General Assembly about to kick off
‘Following the game, ball was donated to Palestinian Genocide Museum’ pic.twitter.com/TQ84sgZhKr
— RT (@RT_com) September 9, 2025
Within Our Lifetime (WOL), a radical anti-Israel activist group, has vowed to “flood” the UNGA on behalf of the pro-Palestine movement.
WOL, one of the most prolific anti-Israel activist groups, came under immense fire after it organized a protest against an exhibition to honor the victims of the Oct. 7 massacre at the Nova Music Festival in southern Israel. During the event, the group chanted “resistance is justified when people are occupied!” and “Israel, go to hell!”
“We will be there to confront them with the truth: Their silence and inaction enable genocide. The world cannot continue as if Gaza does not exist,” WOL said of its planned demonstrations in New York. “This is the time to make our voices impossible to ignore. Come to New York by any means necessary, to stand, to march, to demand the UN act and end the siege.”
Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) and Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM), two other anti-Israel organizations that have helped organize widespread demonstrations against the Jewish state during the war in Gaza, also announced they are planning a march from Times Square to the UN headquarters on Friday.
“The time is now for each and every UN member state to uphold their duty under international law: sanction Israel and end the genocide,” the groups said in a statement.
JVP, an organization that purports to fight for “Palestinian liberation,” has positioned itself as a staunch adversary of the Jewish state. The group argued in a 2021 booklet that Jews should not write Hebrew liturgy because hearing the language would be “deeply traumatizing” to Palestinians. JVP has repeatedly defended the Oct. 7 massacre of roughly 1,200 people in southern Israel by Hamas as a justified “resistance.” Chapters of the organization have urged other self-described “progressives” to throw their support behind Hamas and other terrorist groups against Israel
Similarly, PYM, another radical anti-Israel group, has repeatedly defended terrorism and violence against the Jewish state. PYM has organized many anti-Israel protests in the two years following the Oct. 7 attacks in the Jewish state. Recently, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK) called for a federal investigation into the organization after Aisha Nizar, one of the group’s leaders, urged supporters to sabotage the US supply chain for the F-35 fighter jet, one of the most advanced US military assets and a critical component of Israel’s defense.
The UN General Assembly has historically been a flashpoint for heated debate over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Previous gatherings have seen dueling demonstrations outside the Manhattan venue, with pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian groups both seeking to influence the international spotlight.
While warning about the demonstrations, CAM noted it recently launched a new mobile app, Report It, that allows users worldwide to quickly and securely report antisemitic incidents in real time.
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Nina Davidson Presses Universities to Back Words With Action as Jewish Students Return to Campus Amid Antisemitism Crisis
Nina Davidson on The Algemeiner’s ‘J100’ podcast. Photo: Screenshot
Philanthropist Nina Davidson, who served on the board of Barnard College, has called on universities to pair tough rhetoric on combatting antisemitism with enforcement as Jewish students returned to campuses for the new academic year.
“Years ago, The Algemeiner had published a list ranking the most antisemitic colleges in the country. And number one was Columbia,” Davidson recalled on a recent episode of The Algemeiner‘s “J100” podcast. “As a board member and as someone who was representing the institution, it really upset me … At the board meeting, I brought it up and I said, ‘What are we going to do about this?’”
Host David Cohen, chief executive officer of The Algemeiner, explained he had revisited Davidson’s remarks while she was being honored for her work at The Algemeiner‘s 8th annual J100 gala, held in October 2021, noting their continued relevance.
“It could have been the same speech in 2025,” he said, underscoring how longstanding concerns about campus antisemitism, while having intensified in the aftermath of Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, are not new.
Davidson argued that universities already possess the tools to protect students – codes of conduct, time-place-manner rules, and consequences for threats or targeted harassment – but too often fail to apply them evenly. “Statements are not enough,” she said, arguing that institutions need to enforce their rules and set a precedent that there will be consequences for individuals who refuse to follow them.
She also said that stakeholders – alumni, parents, and donors – are reassessing their relationships with schools that, in their view, have not safeguarded Jewish students. While supportive of open debate, Davidson distinguished between protest and intimidation, calling for leadership that protects expression while ensuring campus safety.
The episode surveyed specific pressure points that administrators will face this fall: repeat anti-Israel encampments, disruptions of Jewish programming, and the challenge of distinguishing political speech from conduct that violates university rules. “Unless schools draw those lines now,” Davidson warned, “they’ll be scrambling once the next crisis hits.”
Cohen closed by framing the discussion as a test of institutional credibility, asking whether universities will “turn policy into protection” in real time. Davidson agreed, pointing to students who “need to know the rules aren’t just on paper.”
The full conversation is available on The Algemeiner’s “J100” podcast.