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Title: Yosl Rakover Talks to God (Vintage International) by Zvi Kolitz, Carol Brown Janeway ISBN: 0375708405 Publisher: Vintage Books Pub. Date: 10 October, 2000 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.33
Rating: 4
Summary: Powerful philosophical work about man's relationship to God.
Comment: In 1946, Zvi Kolitz, who was a journalist and an ardent Zionist, wrote a short work of fiction in Yiddish. It was called "Yosl Rakover Talks to God." Kolitz put himself in the shoes of a man who was about to meet his death in the conflagration of the Warsaw Ghetto. Before he dies, Yosl confronts God and pours out his anguish and his testament of faith.
Over the years, this short manuscript passed through many hands, and a myth grew up around it. Many people insisted that it was an authentic document written by someone who really lived in the Warsaw Ghetto. Zvi Kolitz was disassociated from the work that he had written.
The story itself is touching and very meaningful. Yosl says that no matter what hardships and pain God sends his way, he is proud to be a Jew, and his belief in God is unwavering. He realizes that, for some reason, God has decided to turn his face away from his people. Therefore, the Nazis and their cohorts had few obstacles to overcome in their mission to rid Europe of its Jewish population. Yosl takes the liberty of chastising God for putting the Jewish people through so much suffering. This work is filled with compassion, anguish, deep feeling and a determination to remaining a proud and committed Jew. "Yosl Rakover Talks to God" cannot fail to move anyone who has strong feelings about the Holocaust and man's relationship to God.
Following the story is an illuminating essay by Paul Badde, explaining the many twists and turns that this manuscript took since its original publication, and he provides some insights into the life and philosophy of Zvi Kolitz. Although very brief, this little volume is moving and thought-provoking.
Rating: 3
Summary: Disappointing
Comment: I must say, this book was a disappointment to me. I kind of feel like the kid who said, "But the emperor isn't wearing any clothes!", while everyone else is raving about the beauty of his clothing. I had relatives who were killed during the holocaust, but still... I really loved the movie 'Europa, Europa' and I loved 'Man's Search for Meaning', but this book didn't hold a candle to them - IMHO.
Rating: 4
Summary: A Statement of a Theology of the Holocaust
Comment: In 1946, a writer named Zvi Kolitz published a story in Yiddish in an Argentenian Jewish newspaper. Although the story was clearly subtitled as "a story" and bore the name of its author, it soon assumed a life of its own. "Yosl Rakover" became published over the years in some sources as a first-person account by a martyr who died in the Warsaw Ghetto uprising.
The story is best known for its protagonists reflections on a "God who hides his face."Yosl continues his belief in God and in the Torah while he confronts God with the senseless, undeserved suffering endured by the Ghetto Resistance and by those who suffered and died in the Holocaust.
In this book, we have the text of Kolitz's story together with a lengthy essay by Paul Badde which addresses the history of the story and its author.
I found most fascinating about this book,however,the two essays by Emmanuel Levinas, the great French philosopher, and Leon Wieseltier. In their different ways the two essays discuss and comment on Kolitz's tale and take issue with each other.
Levinas' essay, rirst published in 1955, recognizes the fictional character of the account. He sees the book as creating an internal (rather than a transcendent) concept of God emphasizing the importance of human ethics. This is consistent with the rest of Levinas's philosphy, but it may not capture the essence of Kolitz's.
In his essay, Wiesentheler takes issue with Levinas's reading and takes issue as well with the theistic approach of Kolitz's story. I find this a courageous approach. Modern readers may well have difficulty with Koolitz' rendering of the Holocaust because of the difficulty they have in finding God through the face of sheer evil. Every reader will need to face this question for him or herself.
A thoughtful book raising difficult concerns.
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Title: Fateless by Imre Kertesz, Christopher Wilson, Katharina Wilson ISBN: 0810110490 Publisher: Hydra Books Pub. Date: October, 1992 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East by Michael B. Oren ISBN: 0195151747 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: June, 2002 List Price(USD): $30.00 |
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Title: Kaddish for a Child Not Born by Imre Kertesz, Katarina Wilson, Christopher Wilson ISBN: 0810111616 Publisher: Hydra Books Pub. Date: October, 1999 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: From Time Immemorial: The Origins of the Arab-Jewish Conflict over Palestine by Joan Peters ISBN: 0963624202 Publisher: J K A P Pubns Pub. Date: 01 February, 2001 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
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Title: Man's Quest For God by Abraham J. Heschel ISBN: 0943358485 Publisher: Aurora Press Pub. Date: February, 1998 List Price(USD): $16.95 |
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