Chosen By God : A Brother's Journey

Rating:
Summary: Everyone is on a journey
Review: This was an educating book regarding the journey of one brother into spiritual enlightenment while the older brother made a journey to human understanding. While we may not all agree that Fundamentalism (regardless of whether it is Jewish, Christian, or Islamic) is the answer, this book may help each of us to understand our relatives and friends that take that road. Worth the read, although the author is a little too close to some of the subject matter to be completely objective.

Rating:
Summary: AN ODYSSEY INTO FUNDAMENTALISM
Review: To understand his brother's flight to the outer fringe of fundamentalist Judaism, Joshua Hammer explores his own soul, and inspires his readers to explore theirs. Chosen by God is a remarkably objective reporting job: one can imagine how difficult it is to be objective about one's own family. It's an odyssey of sorts in which the author travels from Israel to Hassidic enclaves around New York City; from his teen years with his theatrically talented brother, Tony, to later visits with the bearded, dovening Tuvia his brother has become. Along the way the reader is taken into the environment that affected the two boys as they grew up: the divorce of their parents; his father's remarriage to a non-Jew; the loss of their little half-sister to a rare disease. Readers' lives will in no way resemble those of Joshua or Tony (Tuvia) Hammer, but they will gain insight into the ups and downs of their own lives, a better understanding of themselves, and perhaps some understanding of those friends or relatives who abandoned the secular world for fundamentalism. And they'll do so through a compelling story that's almost impossible to lay aside