Hello I'm Kirstie Young and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive.

For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

The program was originally broadcast in 1988 and the presenter was Sue Lawley. My castaway this week is a broadcaster, writer and a man of God.

To most people he's best known as a contributor to the Today programme on Radio 4, but he's also

popular as an author of spiritual works and cookery books. His popularity belies his

learning for although many people have come to know more about his faith through

his chatty and infectious style, he is a notable scholar and an important

public figure in the Jewish community.

He is the radio rabbi, Lionel Blue.

Rabbi Blue, have you always had the ability to entertain, to make people giggle?

No, actually, Sue, I was a very, very heavy child and I had very little sense of humour, and really humour came to me with religion.

I remember exactly when it happened.

I was up at Oxford, it was a very grey day,

I'd had an unsuccessful love affair and I was feeling very gray inside.

And it was raining so I took shelter in the doorway and the door opened I found myself in the Quaker

meeting and I thought to myself what's a Yiddishaboy like me doing in a place like this and then the various people got up and they all started testifying and I thought they were dotty and then when I went out, I found myself giving away things. And suddenly I found

myself really light and souffleish. You know, it had done a minor domestic miracle. So I thought

there must be something in all this you see. So I went

on a sort of synagogue or church crawl in it all over Oxford and it did the trick and it turned

me from a very heavy person into a much much lighter

person something I had never expected from religion. I knew all your answers were

going to be funny stories. I could feel it coming on. It has to be said your thoughts for the day are often less spiritual

...