About the Museum
The Museum of Hoaxes is dedicated to promoting knowledge about hoaxes. On our blog we post about dubious-sounding claims — and whatever else strikes our fancy. The site is also home to the Hoaxipedia, the museum's online encyclopedia of hoaxes. Other popular areas of the site include:

• The Hoax Forum
• Top 20 most bizarre experiments of all time
• Top 100 April Fools' Day Hoaxes

Web Hoax Museum

The eight rabbinical scholars interviewed for this article, from institutions like the Jewish Theological Seminary and Yeshiva University, said it’s an urban legend, most likely started because a specific cemetery had a policy against tattoos. Jewish parents and grandparents picked up on it and over time, their distaste for tattoos was presented as scriptural doctrine.

Rabbi Alan Bright, a spokesman for the Jewish Funeral Directors of America, dismissed the cemetery adage as “a load of rubbish,” but he said that tattooing was a no-no. He quotes Deuteronomy 4:15, which commands Jews to take care of their bodies, as evidence. But he noted that Jewish law prohibits many things that secular Jews do without a second thought. “The Torah prohibits anything negative that affects the body,” he said. “Smoking is more of a violation of Jewish law.” As are drinking alcohol in excess and overeating.