Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots Author: | Language: English | ISBN:
B00793O0E8 | Format: EPUB
Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots Description
In this captivating memoir, Deborah Feldman takes listeners on an eye-opening journey into Orthodox Jewish culture. Raised in the suffocating world of Brooklyn's Satmar Hasidim, Feldman was told what to read and who she was allowed to talk to. Married off at 17, she suffered from anxiety and was shamed by an inability to please her older husband. But after giving birth to a son at age 19, Feldman realized it was time to tear up her roots and make her own path in life.
- Audible Audio Edition
- Listening Length: 10 hours and 31 minutes
- Program Type: Audiobook
- Version: Unabridged
- Publisher: Recorded Books
- Audible.com Release Date: February 14, 2012
- Whispersync for Voice: Ready
- Language: English
- ASIN: B00793O0E8
I start with this title, because after reading many of the reviews below, it seems that most people have not, and there is a not so subtle battle ensuing as people are defending their belief system against those that offend it. The reviews below remind me of those surrounding "The God Delusion" by Richard Dawkins, which simply became a battleground of athiests vs believers. Take most reviews and ratings with a grain of salt.
About the book:
WHAT I LIKED
1) This is a rare glimpse into the Satmar world, unique among books because a)The author is the rare person who got out b) She had the courage to write about it c) Has the decent enough English skills to do so (Yiddish is the first language for Satmar Jews)
2)It exposes the darker side of the Satmar sect, where religion is more a matter of appearances that true spiritual growth. It shows religious hypocrisy at its worst.
WHAT I DIDN'T LIKE
1) While the book is most certainly authentic in a general sense, I wonder about how much exaggeration there might be. The author is passionate and clearly has a very personal agenda. It remains a question how much the author allowed her emotions to stretch the truth at times. The incredulous murder story, (since debunked?) certainly lends some credence to these doubts.
2) The book seemed to delve into detail when such detail was boring, but often devoted only a short paragraph to matters that begged for more. Overall, there was too much on her childhood, not enough on the story of how she left.
3) While impressive for an ex-Hasid, it is not written particularly well.
First, I actually read the book. Secondly, I am a Roman Catholic, but I do have Jewish ancestry, which is what inspired me to read this book.
The author is very young and sometimes her writing seems amateur and immature. Other times, she seems to contradict herself, almost as if she is still having trouble parting with her faith; she probably is. Her upbringing, culture, and faith are her foundation and questions, parting with, and being highly critical of that foundation would make most wobble a bit and appear to make contradictions, especially at the age of 24.
That being said, she does a good job introducing the reader to a world and culture usually closed to outsiders; the world of the Satmar. Some of her claims seem unbelievable and far-fetched, such as a story about a man that kills his boy when he catches him masturbating. What makes this story even more unbelievable is her claim that the Jewish emergency service helped him cover-up the killing of his child and dispose of the body. This story is obviously not true. The author doesn't claim to have witnessed this event, but instead, she claims that her husband was told about this, from another source. I can see how someone raised in a culture that shuns televisions, the English language, newspapers, and just about any form of media, could easily be led to believe such a story. It is possible that the author made up this story to embellish the book, but it is more likely that she was told this story, by someone she trusted, and she was gullible enough to believe it.
This story is about a culture that turned insular, in an effort to survive and became repressive and oppressive.
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