An unconvincing and offensive riot act.
An attack on ancient and modern Israel and those who lay claim to it.
In his debut book, Brown aims to answer a question: “If Israel was the chosen nation, what exactly was it chosen to do?” The author soon turns to aggressive appeals for his readers to understand his version of the truth, employing a gross misunderstanding of Judaism and broad racism along the way, despite his claim that “this…information is in NO WISE (sic) meant to be what is considered anti-Semitic.” Brown then tries to prove why Israelites are likely not those of the Jewish faith; he determines that Jews have no claim to the historical idea and modern incarnation of Israel. In a chapter titled “Will the real Israel Please stand up?,” he somewhat incoherently discusses biblical writings on slavery and spends a great deal of time in misguided, hurtful conversations regarding skin color and so-called “mud people.” Brown decides that ancient Israelites were not as fair-skinned as some people imagine them to have been; a reasonable assertion colored by him referring to Africans and African-Americans as “an appalling people” and “a difficult bunch.” Most of his statements are cyclical, apropos of nothing, or insensitive. There doesn’t seem to be a real conclusion, either; besides the bizarre conflation of racism and anti-Semitism—“Judaism [is] not all it’s cracked up to be”—the reasoning mostly revolves around a repetitive refrain: “Why does the identity of Israel matter? Truth liberates and truth always matters.” But whose truth is it? This brand of zeal will only appeal to like-minded readers; even if targeted groups weren’t offended, the writing is rarely strong enough to persuade. The weak, often inadequately cited research is frequently drawn from biblical passages, and at one point, he quotes Wikipedia—not a specific article or footnote, either; just Wikipedia. Amid the emoticons and all-caps phrases, the broiling convictions have trouble solidifying.
An unconvincing and offensive riot act.Pub Date: Aug. 24, 2013
ISBN: 978-1492107262
Page Count: 264
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Nov. 8, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
This a book of earlier, philosophical essays concerned with the essential "absurdity" of life and the concept that- to overcome the strong tendency to suicide in every thoughtful man-one must accept life on its own terms with its values of revolt, liberty and passion. A dreary thesis- derived from and distorting the beliefs of the founders of existentialism, Jaspers, Heldegger and Kierkegaard, etc., the point of view seems peculiarly outmoded. It is based on the experience of war and the resistance, liberally laced with Andre Gide's excessive intellectualism. The younger existentialists such as Sartre and Camus, with their gift for the terse novel or intense drama, seem to have omitted from their philosophy all the deep religiosity which permeates the work of the great existentialist thinkers. This contributes to a basic lack of vitality in themselves, in these essays, and ten years after the war Camus seems unaware that the life force has healed old wounds... Largely for avant garde aesthetes and his special coterie.
Pub Date: Sept. 26, 1955
ISBN: 0679733736
Page Count: 228
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1955
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.
A teacher and scholar of Buddhism offers a formally varied account of the available rewards of solitude.
“As Mother Ayahuasca takes me in her arms, I realize that last night I vomited up my attachment to Buddhism. In passing out, I died. In coming to, I was, so to speak, reborn. I no longer have to fight these battles, I repeat to myself. I am no longer a combatant in the dharma wars. It feels as if the course of my life has shifted onto another vector, like a train shunted off its familiar track onto a new trajectory.” Readers of Batchelor’s previous books (Secular Buddhism: Imagining the Dharma in an Uncertain World, 2017, etc.) will recognize in this passage the culmination of his decadeslong shift away from the religious commitments of Buddhism toward an ecumenical and homegrown philosophy of life. Writing in a variety of modes—memoir, history, collage, essay, biography, and meditation instruction—the author doesn’t argue for his approach to solitude as much as offer it for contemplation. Essentially, Batchelor implies that if you read what Buddha said here and what Montaigne said there, and if you consider something the author has noticed, and if you reflect on your own experience, you have the possibility to improve the quality of your life. For introspective readers, it’s easy to hear in this approach a direct response to Pascal’s claim that “all of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Batchelor wants to relieve us of this inability by offering his example of how to do just that. “Solitude is an art. Mental training is needed to refine and stabilize it,” he writes. “When you practice solitude, you dedicate yourself to the care of the soul.” Whatever a soul is, the author goes a long way toward soothing it.
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-300-25093-0
Page Count: 200
Publisher: Yale Univ.
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
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