Customer Reviews

The Conversion of the Jews (Short Stories Series)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

I felt that this story illustrated creative thematic continuity. The plot is precisely orchestrated. The symbolism is clear and allegoric. Both Old and New Testament allusions flow between the lines. The theme is intense and unified. The setting is literal, yet transcends figurative meanings.

The narrator's point of view is dramatic. The theme is both illustrative and moving. The style is connotative of much deeper meanings. The diction is creatively suggestive. The characters are plausible and consistent.

I think this is a masterpiece! The conclusion is strong and symbolic. Throughout the story, Roth saturates and consistently reinforces his theme in a satire of religious hypocrisy. I give you ten stars for this one! **********

Patty Stroe

Even the Chosen are not immune from the blessings of the trickster who reminds us that there are more things in heaven and earth than we dream of. Shalom!!

The Conversion of the Jews is one of the best short stories I have ever read. I'm not Jewish, so what a miracle to find Roth's Itzie confronting the rabbi in the same way I was confronting nuns with similarly confrontational questions - and at about the same age. (There wasn't any hitting involved, but parents were called.)

From a simply technical perspective, Roth keeps the energy of the story going ever higher (appropriately enough) until.... Well, you'll just have to read the story. I first ran across this story in a battered copy of `Best Short Stories of 1959' which had been abandoned at some summer house. I don't remember any other stories in the book.

Whether you are Itzie, `always with the questions,' or Blotnik, for whom things are either `Good for the Jews or Bad for the Jews,' there is one take-away message from `The Conversion of the Jews' we can all agree on: You should never hit anybody about God.

A smart-alecky adolescent wants to prove that if God is almighty as Jews claim, He could have impregnated Mary with Jesus. Thus, in his mind, and apparently from the author's perspective, the Jews are to blame for inter-religious strife arising from their bigoted refusal to give creedence to fundamental Christian precepts.

The Gentiles who read the story consider it a noble proclamation for religious tolerance. But the blood that spilled in the two thousand years since the death of Jesus has been the blood of Jews, hideously, brutally murdered by Christians believing they were doing the word of their lord. Roth attempts to create a totally false impression that he alone among the Jews is sufficiently wise and broad-minded to preach respect for tenets of other religions. But in fact it has always been a first principle of Judaism that any religion teaching belief in one God and charity and requiring just dealings among mankind is a valid religion. {These are the laws that the Jews' God imposed on the sons of Noah.) Christianity, by contrast, historically has deemed itself the one true faith, and many non-believers suffered awful deaths as a result.

Roth wrote this story to broaden his readership beyond the small population of Jews in America -- who would find his charicatures of themeslves funny--so that he could sell his work to wider audiences. For Roth, the royalties he sought justified his trashing the truths about his people and supplying ammunition to those who would ridicule my brothers and sisters. I detest him.