Yitro Tal

[bnewman]

The classic folk/prog rock band Jethro Tull is named for an Englishman who was in turn named for the Biblical Yitro, Moshe's father-in-law.  And Yitro had some important advice for Moshe about learning to delegate.  Naturally that advice needed to be worked into a Jethro Tull parody, but what to do with "Tull"? — there is no "uh" sound in Hebrew.  But the soft "a" of "tal", is pretty close, and "tal" is dew, one of two kinds of precipitation which occur in the Holy Land and also figure prominently in the Jewish imagination.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman
ttto: "Jack in the Green" by Ian Anderson

listen to this song

/ C - DA- - / C G -A- - /

 

Have you seen the wilderness bloom

After the rains have come and gone?

And have you seen it shimmering pale

Bedecked with dew at the break of dawn?

 

People need G!d's presence that way

Sometimes a trickle, sometimes a flood

When rain like this is all you can get

You may end up with a lot of mud

 

/: Bm E Bm E / A G - - (-) :/

 

Take my advice, Moshe, when did G!d ever say:

Do this alone!  Oh?

How long can you do this thing, trying so hard to wring

Water from stones?  Oh?

 

/ D E D E - / A - - - /

 

Not for much longer!  Share the load --

That's the only sensible way!

 

You know a time is coming, Moshe

When you and your people will have to part

The rain will pass, but the dew will remain

Droplets welling up in every heart

 

The flood of G!d you've been given, Moshe

Is more than most folks need in their lives

Rain may make the wilderness bloom

But it's by the dew that it survives