Life Challenges
Reuven Malter is a young man when he gets hit in the eye with a baseball. In The Chosen, two Jewish boys, Danny Saunders and Reuven Malter are brought together in one baseball game. I picked Reuven because this young boy grows up mentally, so fast in this novel. What I liked about Reuven, is his bravery, in the entirety of the novel Reuven pitches to someone who wants to kill him (although unknown at the time), confronts a father who will not talk to his son, and helps a friend deny said father.
Reuven is a young man playing baseball with his friends when he first meets Danny. Reuven is a teenage boy with a mind for mathematics. His father wants to him to become a mathematician, but “I have plans to become rabbi.” Reuven is on the course of modern methods of studying Judaism. Reuven shows an intense desire to pass on the knowledge of the Jewish people.
Reuven ages many years both physically and mentally throughout the novel. After becoming friends with danny, the boy who hit him, he starts studying Hasidic Talmud with Reb Saunders. He learns to accept the different branch of Jewish religion. “Reuven, Reuven, you have grown so much over the years, both of mind and body.” He learns that silence is not silent, but tells much. Danny tells him this throughout the novel but Reuven does not truly find this out until the novel is almost over. Danny is brought up this way, silence, because Reb Saunders feels he needs to repeat his childhood.
Like said in the last paragraph, Reuven changes much. He has a full understanding of the outside world. The millions of Jews that died during WWII in the holocaust came as a shock to American Jews. Reuven’s father is fighting for a Jewish state in Palestine. Reuven must face the fury of Reb Saunders’ ban on Danny’s friendship with Reuven. After a while Reuven then discovers the truth about silence.
I believe that Reuven will live a happy and full life. The maturity difference between the beginning of the novel and the end means that Reuven will ether mature very little over the rest of his life or very much over a little bit of time. Rueven will love his job, teaching the knowledge of Jewish people.
