The Wise Fools Of Chelm Analysis

Once upon a time, according to legend, an angel was given a bag of foolish people and tasked with delivering one fool to each village on the earth. As misfortune would have it, the angel’s bag caught on a mountaintop tree branch and ripped open, and all of the fools in the bag tumbled down into the village of Chelm. In the Jewish tradition, this is the origin story of how the folkloric town of Chelm came to be populated entirely by fools, who are sometimes facetiously referred to as the “wise fools of Chelm.” Unsurprisingly, the town founded by mishap became the folkloric site of many ridiculous tales in which its inhabitants fumble and flounder their way through life.
The roots of the Chelm stories reach back into the Middle Ages, but the

In the book he outlines his theory that “humor expresses in a socially acceptable way the strongest human impulses: sexuality and aggressiveness” (Zik). Freud also wrote a later essay entitled, “Humour,” in which he expands upon the ideas in his book on jokes. In the essay, Freud writes, “Humour is not resigned; it is rebellious. It signifies not only the triumph of the ego but also of the pleasure principle, which is able here to assert itself against the unkindness of the real circumstances” (163). Thus, humor is a way of coping with trauma and the vicissitudes of

In the story, there is an overall sense of “wherever you go, there you are.” No matter where the fool goes -- whether he actually goes anywhere or not -- his assumptions and reasoning go along with him. On his way out of Chelm, the circumstances changed, but his perceptions and assumptions did not. Based on an error or miscalculation, the Chelm fool concludes that the other town is really just like Chelm, and he is satisfied with the explanation. Faced with evidence that might suggest something had gotten mixed up, he clings to his assumption and builds an elaborate fantasy to support it.
This Chelm story is a good example of how anyone might be foolish, overlook an apparent change, and persist in a delusion or error. The story also alludes to the presence and influence of unknown forces or occurrences, as when the mischievous character turns the fool’s boots. Like the fool, we can sense there may be more to the story than we know. In depth psychology, this is akin to acknowledging the existence of the unconscious and its impact upon