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Moses: The Dramatic Story of the Man to Whom God Gave the Ten Commandments
Moses brought a testament of faith, a love of justice & a hatred of tyranny to the world. His story has inspired movements of national liberation. Asch portrays him with vigor, insight & sympathy as a leader who struggled with implacable enemies, rebellious followers & personal failings to bring his people to a land of promise. Asch weaves a tapestry of superbly realized oriental color & movement. Egypt comes alive under his pen. The opulence & intrigue of Pharoah's court is contrasted with the poverty & oppression of the slaves who worked to build & maintain the empire. Every episode provides & an excitingly instructive example. We meet Moses as a young prince, rebelling under palace discipline, aware of rumors concerning his birth, drawn to the Hebrews, but afraid to reach out to them. We see him struggling with halting speech & a violent temper. Finally, he finds his true family & makes the decision to cast his lot with Israel. One day in the desert, God speaks to him out of a bush that burns but isn't consumed & commands him to deliver Israel to freedom. A great trek begins. This work of historical exactitude & sustained inspiration meets the challenge of Moses with a scope & authority worthy of that sublime figure.
"In 1936, the novelist & critic Ludwig Lewisohn was asked to name the world’s ten greatest living Jews. The resulting list, which ran in The NY Times, included Albert Einstein, Sigmund Freud, Martin Buber & Louis Brandeis. Lewisohn deemed only one writer great enough to be included in this illustrious company: Sholem Asch."—Ellen Umansky, Tablet Magazine
"In 1936, the novelist & critic Ludwig Lewisohn was asked to name the world’s ten greatest living Jews. The resulting list, which ran in The NY Times, included Albert Einstein, Sigmund Freud, Martin Buber & Louis Brandeis. Lewisohn deemed only one writer great enough to be included in this illustrious company: Sholem Asch."—Ellen Umansky, Tablet Magazine
- GenresFictionChristian Fiction
505 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 1951
28 people are currently reading
129 people want to read
About the author
Sholem Asch
259 books36 followersPolish-American writer Sholem Asch (also written Shalom Ash, Yiddish: שלום אַש, Polish: Szalom Asz) sought to reconcile Judaism and Christianity in his controversial novels, such as
The Nazarene
(1939).
Sholem Asch composed dramas and essays in the language.
Frajda Malka bore Asch and nine other children to Moszek Asz, a cattle-dealer and innkeeper. Asch received tradition and as a young man followed, obtained a more liberal education at Włocławek, and supported with letters for the illiterate townspeople. He moved to Warsaw and met and married Mathilde Shapiro, the daughter of Menahem Mendel Shapiro. The Haskalah or Hebrew enlightenment initially influenced Asch, but Isaac Leib Peretz convinced him to switch.
Plot of God of Vengeance , his drama of 1907 features a lesbian relationship in a brothel.
He traveled to Palestine in 1908 and to the United States in 1910.
His Kiddush ha-Shem in 1919 in the earliest historical modern literature concerns the anti-Semitic uprising of Khmelnytsky in mid-17th century Ukraine.
He sat out World War I in the United States and a naturalized as a citizen in 1920. He returned.
People celebrated a 12-volume set of his collected works, published in his own lifetime in the early 1920s.
When people performed God of Vengeance , the highly esteemed play, on Broadway in 1923, authorities arrested and successfully prosecuted the entire cast on obscenity charges despite the fact that people in Europe already translated it into German, Russian, Hebrew, Italian, Czech, and Norwegian.
Farn Mabul ( Before the Flood , translated as Three Cities ), his trilogy of 1929 to 1931, describes early 20th century life in Saint Petersburg, Warsaw, and Moscow.
In 1932, the republic awarded the decoration of Polonia Restituta, and the club of poets, essayists, and novelists (PEN) elected him honorary president.
He later moved to France and visited Palestine again in 1936. Dos Gezang fun Tol ( The Song of the Valley ) about the halutzim or Zionist pioneers in Palestine reflects his visit of 1936 to that region.
He set his Bayrn Opgrunt (1937), translated as The Precipice , in Germany during the hyperinflation of the 1920s.
He settled in the United States in 1938.
He, however, later offended sensibilities with The Apostle , and Mary , parts of his trilogy, which in 1939 to 1949 dealt with subjects of New Testament. The Forward , leading language newspaper of New York, dropped him and openly attacked him for promotion.
Asch spent most his last two years in Bat Yam near Tel Aviv, Israel but died in London. His house in Bat Yam now houses his namesake museum. Yale University holds the bulk of his library, which contains rare books and manuscripts, including some of his own works.
Sholem Asch composed dramas and essays in the language.
Frajda Malka bore Asch and nine other children to Moszek Asz, a cattle-dealer and innkeeper. Asch received tradition and as a young man followed, obtained a more liberal education at Włocławek, and supported with letters for the illiterate townspeople. He moved to Warsaw and met and married Mathilde Shapiro, the daughter of Menahem Mendel Shapiro. The Haskalah or Hebrew enlightenment initially influenced Asch, but Isaac Leib Peretz convinced him to switch.
Plot of God of Vengeance , his drama of 1907 features a lesbian relationship in a brothel.
He traveled to Palestine in 1908 and to the United States in 1910.
His Kiddush ha-Shem in 1919 in the earliest historical modern literature concerns the anti-Semitic uprising of Khmelnytsky in mid-17th century Ukraine.
He sat out World War I in the United States and a naturalized as a citizen in 1920. He returned.
People celebrated a 12-volume set of his collected works, published in his own lifetime in the early 1920s.
When people performed God of Vengeance , the highly esteemed play, on Broadway in 1923, authorities arrested and successfully prosecuted the entire cast on obscenity charges despite the fact that people in Europe already translated it into German, Russian, Hebrew, Italian, Czech, and Norwegian.
Farn Mabul ( Before the Flood , translated as Three Cities ), his trilogy of 1929 to 1931, describes early 20th century life in Saint Petersburg, Warsaw, and Moscow.
In 1932, the republic awarded the decoration of Polonia Restituta, and the club of poets, essayists, and novelists (PEN) elected him honorary president.
He later moved to France and visited Palestine again in 1936. Dos Gezang fun Tol ( The Song of the Valley ) about the halutzim or Zionist pioneers in Palestine reflects his visit of 1936 to that region.
He set his Bayrn Opgrunt (1937), translated as The Precipice , in Germany during the hyperinflation of the 1920s.
He settled in the United States in 1938.
He, however, later offended sensibilities with The Apostle , and Mary , parts of his trilogy, which in 1939 to 1949 dealt with subjects of New Testament. The Forward , leading language newspaper of New York, dropped him and openly attacked him for promotion.
Asch spent most his last two years in Bat Yam near Tel Aviv, Israel but died in London. His house in Bat Yam now houses his namesake museum. Yale University holds the bulk of his library, which contains rare books and manuscripts, including some of his own works.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
September 8, 2019
In this narrative Sholem Asch documents the Biblical epic of Moses, at no time departing from the Biblical truths but also seeking to amplify these truths in order to take the reader into the narrative making it come alive as a portrait of human nobility against a backdrop of oriental colour.
The book takes us from Moses' upbringing in the royal palace where he slowly unfolds the mystery of his birth, and identifies with the suffering of his own people- Israel.
His exile in Midian, the ten plagues and the exodus are all put into an engaging and highly exciting narrative.
The insidious work of Korach, the rebellions of the Israelites in the desert, and the receiving of the Law are all put together in a magnificent masterstore. The dialogue is both poetic and powerful, note the colloquy of Balaam with his long suffering ass.
What really stands out is the description of the evil sorcerer Balaam, where we conjure up a picture of the villain in the likeness of liquidated Arab Nazi mass murderer Ahmed Yassin.
when can just picture Balaam as Yassin.
And the description of how the Midinianite women enticed the men of Israel to sin is vivid and powerful.
Altogether this bring s the story to life and makes for a compelling classic masterpiece.
The book takes us from Moses' upbringing in the royal palace where he slowly unfolds the mystery of his birth, and identifies with the suffering of his own people- Israel.
His exile in Midian, the ten plagues and the exodus are all put into an engaging and highly exciting narrative.
The insidious work of Korach, the rebellions of the Israelites in the desert, and the receiving of the Law are all put together in a magnificent masterstore. The dialogue is both poetic and powerful, note the colloquy of Balaam with his long suffering ass.
What really stands out is the description of the evil sorcerer Balaam, where we conjure up a picture of the villain in the likeness of liquidated Arab Nazi mass murderer Ahmed Yassin.
when can just picture Balaam as Yassin.
And the description of how the Midinianite women enticed the men of Israel to sin is vivid and powerful.
Altogether this bring s the story to life and makes for a compelling classic masterpiece.
March 11, 2014
Starting in college, around the time of switching from a history to a religious studies major, I began to pick up and read fictions dealing with religious themes. By the time I moved to Manhattan I was getting into the works of Sholem Asch, a Jewish writer who dealt with figures going back to Moses and Isaiah and forward to Yeshua, Mary and Saul of Tarsus--all Jews, but the later ones more associated with the early Christian movement. All of the books were, in my opinion, masterful--and respectful--representations.
May 12, 2021
This is a story about Moses and the exodus. It is filled with the narrative and the people and conflict. It also contains much explanation of the ideas and meaning behind the events, that the law is what was important and especially the mandate to love each other and love the stranger as we were all once strangers. There is much imagination here and it's quite beautiful in places. The repetitiveness of the story is still there, the list of plagues and every time the "Why did we leave?" complaint comes up, though I suppose there is no licence to omit parts when you're writing a full novel on the story. Asch is a brilliant writer I think. He fills this and the prior book I read of his with intimate details of his biblical characters. I've no idea how accurate any of it is and I assume he's studied many sources, he was a very learned man. He shows Moses as humble, flawed, unsure, though very moved by injustice. When reading any dialogue of Moses talking to the Israelites I couldn't help hearing it in the voice of Charleton Heston in The Ten Commandments ... but that was ok.
September 1, 2018
It was befitting to finish reading this book a week before we read in the torah of Moshes' dying and the holiday of Rosh Hashanah, which marks the begining of life renewed.
Ashes book is monumental! A firm tribute to his literary flow of words that keep the reader feeling as (s)he, too, is standing right next to Moshe.
I highly recommend reading this book like I did. Give yourself time to sit and dwell amongst Moshe, ones ancestary and ones relationshio to G-d.
Ashes book is monumental! A firm tribute to his literary flow of words that keep the reader feeling as (s)he, too, is standing right next to Moshe.
I highly recommend reading this book like I did. Give yourself time to sit and dwell amongst Moshe, ones ancestary and ones relationshio to G-d.
October 29, 2018
This was a very tough read. Moses was very dedicated,but in the end, subject to human emotions. A lot of the time in the wilderness, according to this book, was spent camped at one place for 19 years.
January 21, 2018
Reverently fictionalized and biblically based account of life of Moses from birth to death after leading Israelites to edge of promised land. Written in 1951 with much detail. I bogged down on occasion but generally was enthralled with this presentation of trials and tribulations which Moses faced but consistently overcame through unwavering faith in one God, Jehovah.
September 24, 2020
Creative presentation indeed...feels real!
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews