The Chosen
motional scenes from Chaim Potok's The Chosen is when Reuven goes with Danny Saunders to talk to his father. Danny has a great mind and wants to use it to study psychology, not become a Hasidic tzaddik. The two go into Reb Saunders' study to explain to him what is going to happen, and before Danny can bring it up, his father does. Reb Saunders explains to the two friends that he already known that Reuven is going to go for his smicha and Danny, who is in line to become the next tzaddik of his people, will not. This relates to the motif of "Individuality" and the theme of "Danny's choice of going with the family dynasty or to what his heart leads him." The most developing character from the novel is Reuven Malter. One of the ways that he developes in the novel is in hus understanding of friendship. His friendship with Dfanny Saunders is encouraged by his father, but he is wary of it at first because Danny is a Hasid, and regards regular Orthodox Jews as apikorsim because of t!he teachings of his father. Reuven goes from not being able to have a civil conversation with Danny to becoming his best friend wi
Another way that Reuven grows is that he learns to appreciate different people and their ideas. He blows on the fly, first softly, and then more harshly, and the fly is free and safe from the danger of the spider. A third way in which Reuven grows, though the book doesn't really talk about it a great deal, is in his appreciation of life, or cha'im in Hebrew. He starts out hating Hasidim because it's the "pious" thing to do, even though his father (who I see as the Atticus Finch of this novel) keeps telling him that it's okay to disagree with ideas, but hating a person because of them is intolerable. One example of this, one that I missed the first time I read the book in 7th grade is the paragraph at the end of chapter nine where Reuven is sitting on his porch and sees a fly trapped in a spider's web with the arachnid builder approaching. By the end of the book, Reuven Malter is a very changed character. Through his friendship with Danny, studies with Reb Saunders, brief crush on Danny's sister (who was never given a name), and time spent in the Hasidic community, he learns that Hasids are people too with their own ideas and beliefs that are as valuable as his. th whom he spens all of his free time, studies Talmud and goes to college. He learns why they think, act, speak, and dress the way that they do and comes to grips with the f!act that he doesn't have a monopoly on virtue. This is a metaphor to Danny being trapped in the "filmy, almost invisible strands of the web" (1!65) that is a metaphor for the Hasidic clan that has Danny somewhat captured and expected to become a tzaddik. When his eye is out of order he can't read, and indeed does remark that it's very difficult to live without reading, especially with a voracious appetite for learning such as his. Very subtly throughout the book he uses this for the purposes of renforcing his points, foreshadowing, and to make the book a better read when you've read it previously and know the outcome. His father almost dies twice and he talks about how difficult it is to live all alone in silence (which is a metaphor alluding to Danny's everyday life) for the month while his father is in the hospital. Reuven truly grows because he leans, as his father says, what it is to be a friend. He sees Reb Saunders and his father feeling the suffering of the six million dead, Saunders by crying and being silent, David Malter by working for the creation of a Jewish state and being a leader in the movement, in! addition to teaching at a yeshiva and adult education classes.
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Acceptance Essays
