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309. Upstairs at the White House: My Life with the First Ladies

Rating:  ☆☆☆☆

Recommended by:   Katy Fassett

Author:   J.B. West, Mary Lynn Kotz

Genre:  Non Fiction, History, Memoir, Biography

398 pages, published June 21, 2016

Reading Format:  Book

Summary

Upstairs at the White House is a behind the scenes chronicle of the first families during the Roosevelt, Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy and Nixon administrations told by Head Usher J.B. West who served in the White House for 28 years.  West offers fly on the wall observations of the personalities, victories, challenges, and the times of each President he served as well as their wives, and children (as well as houseguests–including friends, relatives, and heads of state).

Quotes 

“The secret was loyalty to the White House and to the Presidency, rather than to whoever happens to be occupying the office for four years, or eight.”

 

“The staff did have a little difficulty adjusting to Mr. Churchill’s way of living. The first thing in the morning, he declined the customary orange juice and called for a drink of Scotch. His staff, a large entourage of aides and a valet, followed suit. The butlers wore a path in the carpet carrying trays laden with brandy to his suite. We got used to his “jumpsuit,” the extraordinary one-piece uniform he wore every day, but the servants never quite got over seeing him naked in his room when they’d go up to serve brandy. It was the jumpsuit or nothing. In his room, Mr. Churchill wore no clothes at all most of the time during the day.”

 

“It took twenty big army trucks, jam-packed to the corners, to move the Roosevelts’ monumental twelve-year collection of possessions out of the White House. We packed night and day, for one entire week.”

 

“The next evening, Fields, his pride hurt, dumped two big splashes of bourbon over the ice and served it to Mrs. Truman. She tasted the drink. Then she beamed. “Now that’s the way we like our old-fashioneds!”

 

“There’s just one thing I draw the line at,” he said, “and that’s any kind of attack on my family. Any man can make mistakes, even if he’s trying with all his heart and mind to do the best thing for his country. But a man’s family ought to be sacred. There was one columnist who wrote some lie about my family when I was in the Senate and instead of writing him a letter I called him on the phone and I said you so-and-so, if you say another word about my family, I’ll come down to your office and shoot you.”

 

“The Trumans did not reserve fancy entertaining only for the great or near-great. They catered also to their old friends, who had never had an appointment with destiny.”

 

“I have but one career, and its name is Ike,” Mrs. Eisenhower once announced.” 

My Take

I found Upstairs at the White House to be a fascinating inside look at the personal lives of five twentieth century Presidents and their families.  The time period covered (World War II through the Vietnam war) was one of the most tumultuous in American history and West offers a unique, unparalleled view of it.  I especially enjoyed his description of Winston Churchill clothing habits while visiting FDR.  For Winston it was either his one piece jumpsuit or nudity as several unassuming members of the White House staff discovered.

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307. Undermajordomo Minor

Rating:  ☆☆☆☆

Recommended by:   Kathy Hewitt

Author:   Patrick deWitt

Genre:  Fiction, Fantasy, Humor

224 pages, published September 8, 2015

Reading Format:  Book

Summary

Lucy (aka Lucien) Minor has been hired to work under the Major Domo in the dilapidated Castle Van Aux which is inhabited by a mysterious Baron who spends his time pining for his Baroness who abandoned him long ago.  While trying to figure out life in the castle and life in general, Lucy meets the beautiful Klara, a poor local girl with whom he falls deeply in love.  Things turn problematic when Adolphus, a brutish soldier, returns to the village and tries to claim Klara.

Quotes 

“I find the constant upkeep of the body woefully fatiguing, don’t you?”

 

“She wasn’t precisely sure what she was walking toward but she wouldn’t have turned around for the world.”

 

“As it happens, I’m chasing after a girl, Father. For it has come to pass that I’ve fallen in love.” Father Raymond leaned in. “In love, you say?” “Just so.” “And what is that like? I’ve often wondered about it.” Lucy said, “It is a glory and a torment.” “Really? Would you not recommend it, then?” “I would recommend it highly. Just to say it’s not for the faint of heart.”

 

“Easier asked than answered,” said Mr. Olderglough. “For our days here are varied, and so our needs are also varied. On the whole, I think you’ll find the workload to be light in that you will surely have ample free time. But then there comes the question of what one does with his free time. I have occasionally felt that this was the most difficult part of the job; indeed, the most difficult part of being alive, wouldn’t you say, boy?”

 

“Let us look within ourselves and search out the dormant warrior.” “Mine is dormant to the point of non-existence, sir.”

 

“We must try again,” said Lucy. “Must we?” Tomas asked. “Of course we must. Otherwise we’ll die here.” Here Tomas spoke gently, and with tranquil understanding. “That’s not how we see it, Lucy.” “How do you see it?” “We’ll live here.”

 

“You always bring God into arguments you know you’re losing, for the liar is lonely, and welcomes all manner of company.”

 

“A man accepts an inferior cup of tea, telling himself it is only a small thing. But what comes next? Do you see?”

 

“Walking away on the springy legs of a foal he thought, How remarkable a thing a lie is. He wondered if it wasn’t man’s finest achievement, and after some consideration, he decided it was.”

 

“And yet he held his tongue, wanting his farewell with Marina to be peaceable, not out of any magnanimity, but so that after Tor ruined her—he felt confident Tor would ruin her—and she was once more alone, she would think of Lucy’s graciousness and feel the long-lingering sting of bitter regret.”

 

“He wandered here and there over rolling hills.

He never saw the ocean but

dreamed of it often enough.” 

My Take

Much like his previous book The Sisters Brothers, Undermajordomo Minor is a peculiar, but fascinating book.  In his twisting of the fable format, Patrick deWitt explores such universal themes as the agony and ecstasy of love, man’s search for meaning, the futility of war, standing up for what you believe, and even sexual perversion (from an extremely bizarre section that came out of nowhere).  While it’s a strange brew of a book that mixes all of this together amidst the backdrop of a small village in 19th Century Europe, I found it to be a quick and compelling read.

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303. Thinking in Bets: Making Smarter Decisions When You Don’t Have All the Facts

Rating:  ☆☆☆☆

Recommended by:

Author:   Annie Duke

Genre:  Non Fiction, Psychology, Self Improvement, Science

288 pages, published February 6, 2018

Reading Format:  Book

Summary

In Thinking in Bets, Annie Duke, a former World Series of Poker champion turned business consultant, lays out the case for treating your decisions as bets and how to improve the odds of making a better decision.  Duke conveys her message with a compelling mix of scientific research, interesting anecdotes from the domains of business, sports, politics, poker and her own personal experience.  She counsels that we should avoid “resulting,” i.e. evaluating a decision only on the basis of the result rather than the process that went into making the decision.  Even the best decision doesn’t result in the best outcome every time. There’s always an element of luck that you can’t control and there is always information that is hidden from view.  Her approach is to ask several questions:  How sure am I?  What are the possible ways things could turn out?  What decision has the highest odds of success?  Did I land in the unlucky 10% on the strategy that works 90% of the time?  Is my success attributable to dumb luck rather than great decision making?

Quotes 

“What makes a decision great is not that it has a great outcome. A great decision is the result of a good process, and that process must include an attempt to accurately represent our own state of knowledge. That state of knowledge, in turn, is some variation of “I’m not sure.”

 

“Thinking in bets starts with recognizing that there are exactly two things that determine how our lives turn out: the quality of our decisions and luck. Learning to recognize the difference between the two is what thinking in bets is all about.”

“Improving decision quality is about increasing our chances of good outcomes, not guaranteeing them.”

 

“In most of our decisions, we are not betting against another person. Rather, we are betting against all the future versions of ourselves that we are not choosing.”

 

“…thinking in bets is not a miracle cure. Thinking in bets won’t make self-serving bias disappear or motivated reasoning vanish into thin air. But it will make those things better. And a little bit better is all we need to transform our lives.”

 

“Certainly, in exchange for losing the fear of taking blame for bad outcomes, you also lose the unadulterated high of claiming good outcomes were 100% skill. That’s a trade you should take. Remember, losing feels about twice as bad as winning feels good; being wrong feels about twice as bad as being right feels good. We are in a better place when we don’t have to live at the edges. Euphoria or misery, with no choices in between, is not a very self-compassionate way to live.”

 

“As Nietzsche points out, regret can do nothing to change what has already happened. We just wallow in remorse about something over which we no longer have any control. But if regret happened before a decision instead of after, the experience of regret might get us to change a choice likely to result in a bad outcome.” 

My Take

Thinking in Bets is a page turner of a book with some valuable content to get you thinking about how you make decisions. Annie Duke has done her homework which is reflected her discussion of the current scientific research.  She is also a strong writer and this book was hard to put down. My biggest takeaway was to try to avoid “resulting,” that is, the tendency to evaluate decisions solely on the basis of the result achieved.  Sometimes we get lucky or unlucky.  We shouldn’t take too much credit with the former and we shouldn’t beat ourselves up too much with the latter.  Appreciating the role of luck and our ingrained biases help us to make better decisions and live with both the positive and negative results of our decisions with greater equanimity.

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295. The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism

Rating:  ☆☆☆☆

Recommended by:   Betty Lipstreu

Author:   Timothy Keller

Genre:  Non Fiction, Theology

293 pages, published February 14, 2008

Reading Format:  Book

Summary

Throughout his life, Tim Keller, a prolific Christian writer and the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City, has encountered many skeptics and doubters who have posed questions to Keller about the existence and nature of God.  Why is there suffering in the world? How could a loving God send people to Hell? Why isn’t Christianity more inclusive? Shouldn’t the Christian God be a god of love? How can one religion be “right” and the rest “wrong”? Why have so many wars been fought in the name of God?  In The Reason for God, Keller addresses these challenges and provides well reasoned, thoughtful and compelling responses.

Quotes 

“If Jesus rose from the dead, then you have to accept all that he said; if he didn’t rise from the dead, then why worry about any of what he said? The issue on which everything hangs is not whether or not you like his teaching but whether or not he rose from the dead.”

 

“The Christian Gospel is that I am so flawed that Jesus had to die for me, yet I am so loved and valued that Jesus was glad to die for me. This leads to deep humility and deep confidence at the same time. It undermines both swaggering and sniveling. I cannot feel superior to anyone, and yet I have nothing to prove to anyone. I do not think more of myself nor less of myself. Instead, I think of myself less.”

 

“The church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints.”

 

“It is not the strength of your faith but the object of your faith that actually saves you. Strong faith in a weak branch is fatally inferior to weak faith in a strong branch.”

 

“If you wait until your motives are pure and unselfish before you do something, you will wait forever.”

 

“When we look at the whole scope of this story line, we see clearly that Christianity is not only about getting one’s individual sins forgiven so we can go to heaven. That is an important means of God’s salvation, but not the final end or purpose of it. The purpose of Jesus’s coming is to put the whole world right, to renew and restore the creation, not to escape it. It is not just to bring personal forgiveness and peace, but also justice and shalom to the world. God created both the body and soul, and the resurrection of Jesus shows that he is going to redeem both body and soul. The work of the Spirit of God is not only to save souls but also to care and cultivate the face of the earth, the material world.”

 

“We modern people think of miracles as the suspension of the natural order, but Jesus meant them to be the restoration of the natural order. The Bible tells us that God did not originally make the world to have disease, hunger, and death in it. Jesus has come to redeem where it is wrong and heal the world where it is broken. His miracles are not just proofs that he has power but also wonderful foretastes of what he is going to do with that power. Jesus’ miracles are not just a challenge to our minds, but a promise to our hearts, that the world we all want is coming.”

 

“To stay away from Christianity because part of the Bible’s teaching is offensive to you assumes that if there is a God he wouldn’t have any views that upset you. Does that belief make sense?”

 

“…the basic premise of religion—that if you live a good life, things will go well for you—is wrong. Jesus was the most morally upright person who ever lived, yet he had a life filled with the experience of poverty, rejection, injustice, and even torture.”

 

“It is not enough for the skeptic, then, to simply dismiss the Christian teaching about the resurrection of Jesus by saying, “It just couldn’t have happened.” He or she must face and answer all these historical questions: Why did Christianity emerge so rapidly, with such power? No other band of messianic followers in that era concluded their leader was raised from the dead—why did this group do so? No group of Jews ever worshipped a human being as God. What led them to do it? Jews did not believe in divine men or individual resurrections. What changed their worldview virtually overnight? How do you account for the hundreds of eyewitnesses to the resurrection who lived on for decades and publicly maintained their testimony, eventually giving their lives for their belief?”

 

“Those who believe they have pleased God by the quality of their devotion and moral goodness naturally feel that they and their group deserve deference and power over others. The God of Jesus and the prophets, however, saves completely by grace. He cannot be manipulated by religious and moral performance–he can only be reached through repentance, through the giving up of power. If we are saved by sheer grace we can only become grateful, willing servants of God and of everyone around us.”

 

“God’s grace does not come to people who morally outperform others, but to those who admit their failure to perform and who acknowledge their need for a Savior.”

 

“The Hebrew word for this perfect, harmonious interdependence among all parts of creation is called shalom. We translate it as “peace,” but the English word is basically negative, referring to the absence of trouble or hostility. The Hebrew word means much more than that. It means absolute wholeness—full, harmonious, joyful, flourishing life.”

 

“There is, then, a great gulf between the understanding that God accepts us because of our efforts and the understanding that God accepts us because of what Jesus has done. Religion operates on the principle “I obey—therefore I am accepted by God.” But the operating principle of the gospel is “I am accepted by God through what Christ has done—therefore I obey.”

 

“The popular concept–that we should each determine our own morality–is based on the belief that the spiritual realm is nothing at all like the rest of the world. Does anyone really believe that? For many years after each of the morning and evening Sunday services I remained in the auditorium for another hour to field questions. Hundreds of people stayed for the give-and-take discussions. One of the most frequent statements I heard was that ‘Every person has to define right and wrong for him- or herself.’ I always responded to the speakers by asking, ‘Is there anyone in the world right now doing things you believe they should stop doing no matter what they personally believe about the correctness of their behavior?’ They would invariable say, ‘Yes, of course.’ Then I would ask, “Doesn’t that mean that you do believe there is some kind of moral reality that is “there” that is not defined by us, that must be abided by regardless of what a person feels or thinks?’ Almost always, the response to that question was silence, either a thoughtful or a grumpy one.”

 

“Certainly we should be very active in seeking God, and Jesus himself called us to ‘ask, seek, knock’ in order to find him. Yet those who enter a relationship with God inevitably look back and recognize that God’s grace had sought them out, breaking them open to new realities.”

 

“Ultimate reality is a community of persons who know and love one another. That is what the universe, God, history, and life is all about. If you favor money, power, and accomplishment over human relationships, you will dash yourself on the rocks of reality […]

[it is] impossible […] to stay fully human if you refuse the cost of forgiveness, the substitutional exchange of love, and the confinements of community.

[…] We believe the world was made by a God who is a community of persons who have loved each other for all eternity. You were made for mutually self-giving, other directed love. Self-centeredness destroys the fabric of what God has made.”

My Take

While I have previously completed several Tim Keller bible studies and liked them, I found this book to be far more compelling.  Keller has an easy to read writing style and is very adept at directly addressing numerous challenges to Christianity.  If you are a Christian with doubts (as so many of us are), I believe this book will strengthen your faith.

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294. The First 1,000 Days: A Crucial Time for Mothers and Children—And the World

Rating:  ☆☆☆1/2

Recommended by:  Darla Schueth

Author:   Roger Thurow

Genre:  Non Fiction, Health, Environment, Food, Public Policy

282 pages, published March 3, 2016

Reading Format:  Book

Summary

The First 1,000 Days refers to the time period of pregnancy and a child’s first two years of life.  During this crucial time, whether or not a pregnant woman and her baby receive proper nutrition, medical care and hygiene can have an enormous impact on the rest of that child’s life, and in turn the social and economic health of the nation in which the child is born.  Author Roger Thurow explores various aspects of this global issue by profiling poor women and children in Uganda, Guatemala, India and Chicago.  Great progress has been made, but as The First 1,000 Days poignantly illustrates, there is still a long way to go.

Quotes 

“The time of your pregnancy and first two years of life will determine the health of your child, the ability to learn in school, to perform a future job. This is the time the brain grows the most.”

 

“Your child can achieve great things.” 

My Take

The First 1,000 Days is a well researched, compelling read.  It is heartbreaking to read about the abject poverty suffered by many people in the world, especially women and babies.  Reading this book really made me appreciate how good we have it in the United States.  Our lives are truly golden. The encouraging news is that progress is being made on several fronts to improve the global health of children.  Access to better nutrition and health care has improved and is continuing to improve.  Hopefully, the next decade will see a dramatic reduction in infant mortality and stunting.

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292. The Door

Rating:  ☆☆☆1/2

Recommended by:   Meris Delli-Bovi

Author:   Magda Szabó

Genre:  Fiction

272 pages, published 1987

Reading Format:  Book

Summary

The Door is a semi-autographical novel by Hungarian writer Magda Szabó who won many national literary awards but was also labeled an “enemy of the people” by the Communist government, was fired from the Ministry of Education, and had her books banned from publication from 1949 to 1956.  The book, which is set in Hungary, focuses on a 20 year relationship between a writer named Magda who hires an housekeeper named Emerence.  Emerence is a singular person, relentlessly efficient, incredibly headstrong and obstinate, extremely private and tied to the old ways.  And yet Emerence is respected by the neighborhood as much as she is feared.   Magda and Emerence develop a deep and connected relationship which is ultimately threatened by Magda’s attempt at kindness which Emerence views as a betrayal.

Quotes 

“Creativity requires a state of grace. So many things are required for it to succeed—stimulus and composure, inner peace and a kind of bitter-sweet excitement.”

 

“God usually ignored us when asked for something, but he invariably granted what we feared.”

 

“I know now, what I didn’t then, that affection can’t always be expressed in calm, orderly, articulate ways; and that one cannot prescribe the form it should take for anyone else.”

 

“She was lonely. Who isn’t lonely, I’d like to know? And that includes people who do have someone but just haven’t noticed.”

 

“If there’s no-one to show pleasure when you come home, then it’s better not to live.”

 

“In my student days, I detested Schopenhauer. Only later did I come to acknowledge the force of his idea that every relationship involving personal feeling laid one open to attack, and the more people I allowed to become close to me, the greater the number of ways in which I was vulnerable.”

 

“Everything has to be done properly, even death.” 

My Take

The Door is a unique book that I enjoyed for the most part.  Set on a single street in mid 20th Century Budapest, the relationship between the two main characters is symbolic of humanity’s struggle to love fully and unconditionally.  Magda and Emerence don’t quite achieve this lofty goal, but the glimpses of its possibility make the struggle worthwhile.

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291. Transcription

Rating:  ☆☆☆

Recommended by:  Clare Telleen

Author:   Kate Atkinson

Genre:  Fiction, Historical Fiction, World War II

352 pages, published September 25, 2018

Reading Format:  Book

Summary

At the beginning of World War II, 18 year old Juliet Armstrong obtains employment with an obscure department of MI5.  Her job is to transcribe the conversations between an undercover MI5 agent and British Fascist sympathizers that he has recruited.  The work is both tedious and terrifying.  After the war has ended, she assumes the events of those years are done and buried.  However, ten years later, now a radio producer at the BBC, Juliet is unexpectedly confronted by figures from her past. Juliet finds herself thrust into the Cold War and begins to understand that her previous actions have consequences.

Quotes 

“Do not equate nationalism with patriotism… Nationalism is the first step on the road to Fascism.”

 

“The world is a comedy to those that think; a tragedy to those that feel,”

 

“[…] but her mother’s death had revealed that there was no metaphor too ostentatious for grief. It was a terrible thing and demanded embellishment.”

 

“The blame generally has to fall somewhere, Miss Armstrong. Women and the Jews tend to be first in line, unfortunately.”

 

“Human nature favors the tribal. Tribalism engenders violence. It was ever thus and so it will ever be.”

 

“Being flippant was harder work than being earnest”

 

“…it had probably been a long enough life. Yet suddenly it all seemed like an illusion, a dream that had happened to someone else. What an odd thing existence was.”

 

“People always said they wanted the truth, but really they were perfectly content with a facsimile.”

 

“But wasn’t artistic endeavor the final refuge of the uncommitted?”

 

“Juliet could still remember when Hitler had seemed like a harmless clown. No one was amused now. (“The clowns are the dangerous ones,” Perry said.)”

 

“She didn’t feel she had the fortitude for all those Tudors, they were so relentlessly busy – all that bedding and beheading.” 

My Take

Transcription is the third book by Kate Atkinson that I have read.  The first two, Life After Life and A God in Ruins, were loosely linked by several shared characters and were engaging reads with compelling characters.  While I enjoyed Transcription, it does not live up to those other books.  There were several times when I was a little bored reading this book and asked myself, “where is this going?”   The failure of the book to provide an interesting answer to that question is the reason I didn’t rate it higher.

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288. SS-GB: Nazi-occupied Britain, 1941

Rating:  ☆☆☆

Recommended by:

Author:   Len Deighton

Genre:  Fiction, Mystery, Thriller, World War II

344 pages, published February 12, 1979

Reading Format:  Book

Summary

SS-GB:  Nazi-occupied Britain, 1941 is a detective story set within an alternative history scenario in which the United Kingdom has surrendered and is occupied by Nazi Germany.  The King is a hostage in the Tower of London, the Queen and Princesses have fled to Australia, Winston Churchill has been executed by a firing squad, Englishmen are being deported to work in German factories, the SS is in charge of Scotland Yard and a secret Resistance force is sabotaging the Germans.  The protagonist of the story, Detective Superintendent Douglas Archer (nicknamed “Archer of the Yard”) is asked to assist SS Standartenführer from Himmler’s personal staff in what seems, at first, to be a routine murder case.  However, things are not as they first appear and Archer finds himself navigating a labyrinth full of intrigue and the highest of stakes.

Quotes 

“You spend too much time listening to what people say.”

 

“A man can get used to yellow fever, thought Douglas, but many of them die in the attempt.”

 

“Thomas Aquinas argued that suicide is a sin because it is an offence against society. By taking one’s own life a man deprives society of something that rightfully belongs to it.”

 

“Pity.  Best pastime a police officer can have, in my opinion. Fishing teaches a man patience; and teaches him a lot about men.”

 

“Perhaps hell is like that; a discordant confusion of anxious souls.”

 

“And yet, after all the reasoning was done, he’d fallen in love with her. There was no denying it; he wanted her in every way. But as a policeman, he distrusted love; too often had he seen the other side of it, the violence, the suffering and despair it could bring.” 

My Take

I liked, but did not love, SS-GB.  Deighton is a decent writer and creates an interesting scenario with his alternative history detective story. However, I found the characters a bit flat and the plot too opaque.

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287. The Crystal Cave

Rating:  ☆☆☆

Recommended by:  Scot Reader

Author:   Mary Stewart

Genre:  Fiction, Fantasy, Mythology

494 pages, published 1970

Reading Format:  Book

Summary

The Crystal Cave takes place in fifth century Britain, a country torn by chaos and division after the Roman withdrawal.  The book tells the story of a young Merlin, the illegitimate child of a South Wales princess who will not reveal to the identity of Merlin’s father, and how he discovers that he possesses incredible psychic gifts which he will use to play a dramatic role in the coming of King Arthur.

Quotes 

“The gods only go with you if you put yourself in their path. And that takes courage.”

 

“Thinking and planning is one side of life; doing is another.  A man cannot be doing all the time.”

 

“I think there is only one. Oh, there are gods everywhere, in the hollow hills, in the wind and the sea, in the very grass we walk on and the air we breathe, and in the bloodstained shadows where men like Belasius wait for them. But I believe there must be one who is God Himself, like the great sea, and all the rest of us, small gods and men and all, like rivers, we all come to Him in the end.”

 

“the god does not speak to those who have no time to listen.” 

My Take

While I have an interest in the Arthurian legend, The Crystal Cave was too long and too focused on Merlin for me to give it a recommendation.  My husband Scot read it as a teenager and in his opinion it is the weakest of Mary Stuart’s trilogy on King Arthur.  There were some interesting parts, but I have to say I much preferred The Mists of Avalon and its take on Arthur.

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285. Why The Jews?

Rating:  ☆☆☆1/2

Recommended by:

Author:   Dennis Prager, Joseph Telushkin

Genre:  Non Fiction, History, Theology, Sociology

272 pages, published August 12, 2003

Reading Format:  Book

Summary

Why have Jews been the object of the most enduring and universal hatred in history? Why did Hitler consider murdering Jews more important than winning World War II? Why has the United Nations devoted more time to tiny Israel than to any other nation on earth?  In Why The Jews, authors Dennis Prager and  Joseph Telushkin answer the question of why the Jews have been persecuted throughout history, from the ancient world to the Holocaust to the current crisis in the Middle East.  The authors also look at the replicating of Nazi antisemitism in the Arab world, the pervasive anti-Zionism/antisemitism on university campuses, the rise of antisemitism in Europe and why the United States and Israel are linked in the minds of anti-Semites.

 

My Take

I am a big fan of Dennis Prager, having listened to him for years and consider him to be one of the wisest people in public life.  In addition to being a nationally syndicated Talk Radio Show Host, a prolific author, the force behind the tremendous website Prager University, he is a serious religious scholar specializing in Judaism.  On his radio show, he often mentions his book Why The Jews.  Having heard a lot about this book, I was very interested in reading it.  I was not disappointed, but I was very saddened at the horrendous treatment of the Jewish people throughout history.  Prager and  Joseph Telushkin offer the following explanations for our world’s history of anti-Semitism:

– 1600 years of Christian hatred of Jews culminated in the Holocaust … Christianity did not create the Holocaust … but without Christian antisemitism, the Holocaust would have been inconceivable.

– Jews, merely by continuing to be Jews, threatened the very legitimacy of Christianity … if Judaism remained valid, then Christianity was invalid … therein, from the days of the founding of Christianity, lie the origins of Christian hatred of Jews … Christianity had no choice but to deny the validity of Judaism.

– the mere existence of Jews is a threat to the prevailing order of the societies in which Jews live … Judaism is an existential threat to the core values and beliefs of others … living with this threat often aroused deep and lasting hatred.

– Jews allegiance to the biblical commandments of God, Torah and Israel have made Jews outsiders who challenge the validity of the non-Jew’s gods, laws, and national allegiance.

– economic factors, the need for scapegoats, resentment of Jewish affluence, ethnic hatred … these have all exacerbated antisemitism but do not explain its genesis.

– any group acting so differently from the majority culture is bound to elicit hostility … by observing Kashrut, a Jew can eat little at a non-Jew’s house … observing the Jewish Sabbath increases the otherness and isolation of Jews.

– Nazi Jew-hatred was an end, not a means to an end … Nazism was a vehicle for antisemitism, not the reverse … Hitler used war as a means of killing Jews on a larger scale than he could do in peacetime.

*** Nazi antisemitism was based on hatred of the Jewish character, not hatred of Jews’ non-Aryan blood … the Nazis hated the challenges to their view of the German world posed by Jews and Jewish values.

 

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