Daniel Stuhlman researched the answer to this question in the February 1997 issue of his "Librarian's Lobby" <http://home.earthlink.net/~ddstuhlman/crc2.htm>. Apparently, the story is of unknown origin.
There is a similar story about two brothers who lived on opposite sides of a hill. One was childless and the other was blessed with many children. Both brothers were extremely jealous of each other. The childless brother was jealous of his sibling because for him, the harvest was extremely easy with such a big family to help. The brother who was blessed with many children was jealous of his sibling because he had only one mouth to feed and certainly had plenty of harvest left over. Each night, the two brothers would sneak over the hill to each other's barns and steal some of their brothers' barley. This continued on for many many months. One night, the two brothers met on top of the hill. When they realized what was going on, they began fighting and eventually beat the living you-know-what out of each other. This, according to legend, is the place where God chose to build the Keneset. Messages and opinions expressed on Hasafran are those of the individual author and are not necessarily endorsed by the Association of Jewish Libraries (AJL) =========================================================== Submissions for Ha-Safran, send to: Hasafran @ lists.acs.ohio-state.edu SUBscribing, SIGNOFF commands send to: Listproc @ lists.acs.ohio-state.edu Questions, problems, complaints, compliments;-) send to: galron.1 @ osu.edu Ha-Safran Archives: Current: http://www.mail-archive.com/hasafran%40lists.acs.ohio-state.edu/maillist.html History: http://www.mail-archive.com/hasafran%40lists.acs.ohio-state.edu/history.html AJL HomePage http://www.JewishLibraries.org
