Please explain the following saying or doing?

Question

1) Raining like cats & dogs. Why they referenced to cats & dogs?
2) Tossing tiny salt across a shoulder. What is the believe in it?
3) Jewish to put tiny stone(s) on the head stone. What is the believe in it?

Answer 1

1. Rain Cats and Dogs

Like many other phrases contained in these pages, the origin of this phrase is unknown. Its first recorded use of the phrase in its modern, familiar form is by Jonathan Swift in Polite Conversation, written circa 1708 and published thirty years later

....The most likely explanation is the simplest. The noise and violence of a storm is the metaphorical equivalent of a cat and dog fight.

2. Superstitions about salt date back to biblical times when salt was a highly prized commodity. It was expensive, crucial in preserving food, and was often used in lieu of currency. So spilling salt was considered an almost sacrilegious offence, and left one perilously exposed to the devil's machinations.

Throwing salt over your shoulder is akin to blessing someone after they've sneezed -- it's a way of keeping the devil at bay while you're in an especially vulnerable moment. Depending on your interpretation, the salt is either intended to blind the devil so he can't witness your error, or keep him from sneaking up on you while you're cleaning up your mess.

3. Jews leave stones on graves the same reason many others leave flowers. To show they've been there, and to show respect for the dead, and show they're still thinking about them. The reason for stones is somewhat debatable, some people say it's because stones or more permanent, or a symbol of being "grounded". Another theory is that since the early Israelites were a desert culture, they wouldn't have been able flowers, obviously, and stones were all that were available.

Answer 2

1) No known origin.. here are some speculations.. take your pick


It comes from mythology. Witches, who often took the form of their familiars - cats, are supposed to have ridden the wind. Dogs and wolves were attendants to Odin, the god of storms and sailors associated them with rain. Well, some evidence would be nice. There doesn't appear to be any to support this notion.


Cats and dogs were supposed to be washed from roofs during heavy weather. This is a widely repeated tale. It got a lease of life with the message "Life in the 1500s", which began circulating on the Internet in 1999. Here's the relevant part of that:

I'll describe their houses a little. You've heard of thatch roofs, well that's all they were. Thick straw, piled high, with no wood underneath. They were the only place for the little animals to get warm. So all the pets; dogs, cats and other small animals, mice, rats, bugs, all lived in the roof. When it rained it became slippery so sometimes the animals would slip and fall off the roof. Thus the saying, "it's raining cats and dogs."

This is nonsense of course. It hardly needs debunking, but, lest there be any doubt...

Dogs lived in thatched roofs? No, of course they didn't. Even accepting that mad idea, for them to have slipped off when it rained they would have needed to be on the outside - hardly the place an animal would head for to shelter from bad weather.


The phrase is supposed to have originated in England in the 17th century when city streets were filthy and heavy rain would occasionally carry along dead animals.

The idea that seeing dead cats and dogs floating by in storms would cause people to coin this phrase is just about believable. People may not have actually thought the animals had come from the sky, but might have made up the phrase to suit the occasion.


Another suggestion is that it comes from a version of the French word, catadoupe, meaning waterfall.

Well, again. No evidence. If the phrase were 'raining cats' or if there also existed a French word, dogadoupe we might be going somewhere with this one. As there isn't let's pass this by.


2) Alomancy - Also Halomancy. Derived from the Greek halo ('salt') and manteia ('divination'), this is a method of divination by interpreting random patterns using salt, of which process little is known, but probably follows similar methods to aleuromancy. It is this ancient divination science that accounts for some of our modern salt related superstitions, including the one about people saying that misfortune is about to fall on the household when the salt cellar is overturned, and the one about throwing a pinch of salt over someone's shoulder for good luck.A form of Alomancy consists on the casting of salt into a fire, and is considered a type of Pyromancy.


3) Unlike people from other religions, Jews do not typically place flowers at gravesites. Instead, they often place stones on the grave or tombstone. The origin of the custom is uncertain, though it may relate to ancient times when a pile of stones was used as a marker. The most common explanation is that placing stones is a symbolic act that indicates someone has come to visit and the deceased has not been forgotten.

Answer 3

It is "raining cats and dogs": Raining unbelievably hard.

Salt over the shoulder: Salt was precious in the ancient world, spilling it was thought to be wasteful and brought bad luck; throwing a pinch over the shoulder was said to be an offering that negated the bad luck.

Stones: When the tradition started, grave monuments were mounds of stones. Visitors added stones to "the mound" to show we are never finished building the monument to the deceased.

Answer 4

1) It is a visual picture. Imagine cats and dogs falling from the sky like rain. The point being that it is raining very very hard.

2) Salt tossing is a superstitious practice to prevent bad luck.

3) I don't know and hope someone else does.

Answer 5

1. That's a tough one, but if cats and dogs are falling from the sky, it's raining pretty hard.
2. Some people personified a conscience. Angel on the right shoulder, devil on the left. Throwing salt over your left shoulder blinded the devil and kept you on the right track.
3. Hindus have the stone on their forehead between their eyes to symbolize their "third-eye" or higher level of consciousness.

Answer 6

This expression came into being after stepping outside in the rain one day and firmly splashing into a large poodle.

Answer 7

1 rain rain rain is it raining today a lot

2 and 3 are false belief systems