Since it first hit the streets of New York in the late 1970s, hip-hop has been putting truth to music. Many of the original rap and hip-hop pioneers wrote songs about growing up in tough places. Their music was an urban form of "street poetry" that, despite its quick popularity, many music critics simply dismissed as a crude fad. How wrong they were! Today, we know that the truth, spoken through hip-hop verses, is more popular than ever.

Jews have been in the hip-hop scene since the beginning, often as song producers or record-company execs. Now, they are grabbing the mic and making their own rhymes.

Jewish artists, such as Brimstone127 and Matisyahu, are putting a new spin on the genre, singing about Judaism's influence in their lives. While the stories these artists tell have a slightly different rhythm, one fact remains the same: Their music uses authentic tones to describe the challenges that many people face.

"There can be a lot of deception in rap and hip-hop," says Seth Schere, lead MC of Brimstone127, "particularly because a lot of rappers today are portraying a message that they aren't really living, with all this violence and drugs. But truth is what motivates us to speak. We're out there, and if we tell stories, they're based on true events or something that could really happen."

Hasidic superstar Matisyahu agrees, "People respond to truth." Thanks to a unique style of Judaism-tinged lyrics meshed with impressive reggae beats, Matisyahu's authenticity and genuine "flow" (lyrical style) have taken him around the world on sold-out tours. "I've had a lot of people tell me that my music is really cool," says Matisyahu, "but even cooler is that I am a religious Jew who lives what he sings about. When musicians get across the truth of their experience, that's when they really shine."

Besides sharing a Jewish beat, Brimstone127 and Matisyahu share another important similarity that distinguishes them from many of their peers: their rap is clean.

Brimstone127 makes a point not to use curse words, which add shock value to the music, but no real meaning. Besides, Schere adds, "I have an 8-year-old daughter, and one day, she came home singing a really gross song that she heard on the radio. It really freaked me out."

Matisyahu also questions the value of obscenity. "As I became religious," he relates, "I started to question a lot of cultural norms that I had accepted in the past and look at them more deeply. One of those things was language. Cursing is the type of thing that people do without thinking. Once I took myself out of that environment, it became unnatural to curse. Now, when I hear curse words, I can actually sense the coarseness. I'm not cursing in my real life, so it wouldn't be true to do it on record."

Does this signal a new trend away from swearing in mainstream hip-hop? Probably not. As long as vulgarity sells, people will attempt to profit from it. But as hip-hop expands and becomes more inclusive, the space for alternative, honest, and respectful ways to tell stories also grows.

"There's already enough filth out there; we have to show people living in a different way now," says Schere. "You don't have to curse to get an audience excited and sell records." All you need to do...is tell the truth.