Passing Phrase - www.learnhebrew.org.il

Avoda Sizifit

Literally: Sisyphean work
Idiomatically: Work without purpose

This phrase is a bit unusual in that it is based not on Biblical or Talmudic text but on a Greek legend. Sisyphus was the king of Ephyra, who was punished for his conceit by being forced to roll a large boulder up a hill, only to watch it roll down, over and over again. In Hebrew, the phrase is also used to just mean very hard and/or annoying work. But in truth, if you can accomplish something, then technically it isn’t Sisyphean. "Lefi Victor Frankel, (Haadam Mechapes Mashmaut), hadavar haayom vehanorah she’efshar la’asot leben adman hu legalot shehavoda shlo he avoda sizifit" - According to Viktor Frankl (Man’s Search for Meaning), the cruelest thing you can do to a man, is to show him that his work is without purpose.

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