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The Chosen

The Chosen

List Price: $6.99
Your Price: $6.99
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: an enduring classic
Review: If you missed this book in your childhood, it's not too late to read it right away. This remains one of my favorite books of all time. I can still remember almost every major scene -- who could forget these two friends meeting over a baseball accident that almost blinded Reuven Malter. Of all the books on relationships between kids, this is my favorite. It's extremely well written, and the way their friendship develops is incredibly touching. Even better, the reader will be taken inside some of the most interesting descriptions of Hasidism and orthodox Jewry to be found anywhere. In fact, when I first read this book, I got interested in Gematria, a Hebrew form of numerology and ended up years later writing a huge research paper on the topic. This book is a bit hard for 8th and 9th graders but strong readers should have no trouble. It's rare that a book this intellectual and this educational be so moving.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A GREAT book
Review: I read this book as a school asignment and when I was handed it by my 10th grade teacher, I groaned. By law, I hate reading school assigned books, but I ablsoutely loved this one. This has got to be one of the best books I have ever read. The way in which Chaim Potok explored the friendship between Reuven and Danny (the main characters) and their relationships with their fathers is wonderful. This was not a book that you read and then you move on. This is a book that changes the way in which you look at your life and the happenings around you. The story will affect your life, feelings, and way of thinking. Go read it and see what I mean!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: I love The Chosen!
Review: This book is very close to me. I was easily able to relate.The religious struggles Reuven and Danny go through are accurate.This book is a window into the Jewish-American culture durring WWII. This book helped me to see that I am not the only Jewish-American teen who has to go through finding a grasp on my religion, making friends, and dealing with parents who have aspirations for you that you just do not want to fulfill. The Chosen served as a guide for me, and it is close to my heart, a must read!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: STILL THE BEST BOOK I'VE EVER READ- but Reuven's not secular
Review: Well, it's been another year, but the Chosen is still the best book I've ever read. I made some errors on my last review, so I'll change them. I did not WRITE the Chosen, I READ it (which is what I meant to say, except that I was too busy applauding Chaim Potok). And I have since found out that the term for one who is born jewish but becomes more religious later is "b'aal teshuvah", not "born-again-jew". (But it kinda works, doesn't it?)

For people who are still confused about all the Jewish terms: LOOK THEM UP! I didn't know much about Judaism before I read it either, so I read through dictionnairies, encyclopedias, etc... NOW I know enough to UNDERSTAND WHAT HE'S TALKING ABOUT. (And aren't books much more FUN that way?)

Reuven is clearly NOT a secular Jew. He is Orthodox. (Modern Orthodox, as it is called now.) No secular Jew goes to synagogue, is instructed in yiddish and hebrew in a yeshiva,(or even goes to a yeshiva) studies talmud, wears a yarmulke and prays with teffilin, ok?

Clearly, Reuven's character is portraying the few thousand orthodox jews who think that the current-day-Israel has the right to exist, despite passages in the Torah that say otherwise. (I think Potok, who is also Orthodox, is one of them too, and the fact that there were enough Orthodox Zionists in the High School show that he was really trying to set these characters apart, even among the orthodox.)

The theme here is not that Danny is more religious than Reuven. It's that BOTH are religious, and that each thinks the other way is wrong.

This often occurs among M.O. (Modern Orthodox) and U.O. (Ultra-orthodox, including Hasidism).

The interesting thing is, according to the HALACHAH (I hope I spelled that right), or "religious laws", they are both "religious".

ex: torah forbids touching face and sides of head with a blade, so hasidism grow beards and "sidelocks" (peyes). However, M.O. use an electric razor (no blade), so technically, they are still fulfilling the commandment.

Every time I read this, more insight is gained. I still say this book, although fictionnal, is a valuable reading material for the secular and reform jews of today who still can't comprehend why "anyone would want to live like that".

This book has impacted my life and I will always be grateful to Chaim Potok for writing it. He is a genius, and I hope he continues to write many more masterpieces of literature.

(I eagerly look forward to the finishing of Asher Lev's story, which Potok is supposedly working on.)

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: tHE bEST bOOK eVER!
Review: The Chosen is a spectacular book and I totally disagree with what someone said as being a total waste of time...Out of a baseball game that nearly became a religious war , two Jewish boys become friends. Danny comes from the strict Hasidic sect that keeps him bound of Orthodoxy. Reuven is brought up by a father patiently aware of the twentieth century. Everything tries to destroy their friendship. But they use Honesty with eachother as a shield. It proves an impenetrable protection. I am 16 years old and studying The Chosen as a literary unit.. I honestly think its one of the best books I've read and I think every teenager and also people of any age should try and read this book..You truely will find this book soul enriching...

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A great book about cultural misunderstandings
Review: I only read this book in 4 days while I was on a road trip and those 4 days could not have been better spent than reading The Chosen. It was superb (the best way to put it).

The book is about a Jewish teenager in the 1940's. He's not a traditional Jew, he's more of a modern world. One day, this kid DOES meet up with a traditional Jew and they eventually become best of friends. Their friendship becomes dampered because the traditional Jewish way of thinking is to never mingle with people who are corrupted, which, of course, is everyone but themselves. It gets even worse because his father is a Rabbi.

I truly enjoyed this book for its beautiful content and a great story. I give it full marks!

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Boring waste of time
Review: This book focused on two Jewish boys, and their tyrant parents. There was not one part that interested me fromt the beginning to the end. This is a colossal waste of time, and unless you are in a hospital bed, I DO NOT reccomend this book. As a student, I have other things to do than read a book that uses Jewish terms that 1% of the population understands. If you HAVE to read this for school, do yourself a favor and buy the Cliff Notes.This book drags on & on, and is WAY too descriptive.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Fathers dealing with their children in a different society
Review: I think that Chaim Potok's novel The Chosen is one of the few novels out today that a young adult can relate to. As a young adult from a different country coming to this society has been not only hard on me but my parents, because I am confronted with different pressures of todays society, while they still believe in their traditional ways of up bringing. I would have never read Mr. Potoks book if it hadn't been for my english teacher telling me to research Chaim Potok For my research paper. I am grateful she did to because this book has expressed my feelings so much that I feel I am one of the characters. I really can relate to Danny Saunders the most because not only do my parents want me to follow my religion carefully, I also want to go into psychology, plus my father and I are not communicating very much!And that is something that has started happening since I was a teenager!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: An all-around good book
Review: I read this book as part of a required reading course in my English honors class. I had been expecting another one of the usual boring books we're required to read, but after the first chapter, I quickly realized that wasn't going to be the case with The Chosen. The character developments, their relationships with each other and the point of view of the American Jewry during World War II; all add up to make this an extremely interesting book. And if you like this one, I would also highly recommend the sequel, The Promise. Both are highly insightful, moving books that should be enjoyed by anyone who likes to read, no matter your age or religion. Defintely five stars!

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: The Chosen
Review: This novel was one of those iffy books. Its theme was really interesting and true to life. The characters' development were intriguing in that you could see how they reached what they were to become. However, I didn't like this book. The theme was very good, but it was something that was already known to me. It didn't have that much an impact on me. But people who don't understand life in the way that is shown in the book would find it very interesting. I would recommend this book to anybody. This book is worth a try. I did not like it all that much, but other people will find it very interesting through its theme and the way the author tried to reach his theme.


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