The Chosen

The movie "The Chosen" addresses many of the complexities that have been faced by Jews in the United States as they have had to come to terms with a sense of identity that is very much divided among their ancestral faith, their loyalty to the secular American state that gave them refuge and their own type of Jewish faith - whether Reformed, Conservative or Orthodox. This movie tells the story of two young Jewish Americans during the time of the second World War who find that a shared faith can both unify and divide them as they search to reconcile the reformed Judaism and the Orthodox Judaism of their families.

The history of these particular fictitious characters - like the history of real Jews in America - cannot be told in isolated terms, for the history of differen

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ght have only themselves to rely upon. This is in large part the code of Jewishness that Danny Sauders and his father keep to. Their beliefs and their exclusive definitions of American Jewry are based not only upon a strictly religious covenant with God but also upon a sense of themselves as Jews in a land where Jews have been allowed in - but not exactly welcomed. They came to a land devoid of established prejudices and flourished in an atmosphere of limitless opportunities. They formed important congregations in New York, Newport, and Philadelphia, all true to the religious practices of their old world origins which were Sephardic. They began the formations of Aid Societies, men's clubs and cemeteries (http://www.borisamericanjews.org/comment1.htm). We see in the pairing of these two boys in this movie one of the most important dynamics for Jews who came to America, especially those that came in the 20th century (as opposed to those who had come earlier). For some Jews who came to the United States it became all the more important to them that they retain a strong sense of Jewish identity even as others cast off their "Jewishness" as something that belonged to the Old World and to a time of oppression and violence. For Orth
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Some common words found in the essay are:
Pilgrims World, Jews Sauders, Israel Beginning, American Jewishness, Jews America, Jews Reuven, Jews United, American Jewry, War II, Americans American, orthodox jews, world war, jews america, jewish identity, means jew, sense jewish identity, jews holocaust, sense jewish, american jewishness, religious freedom, american jew, world war ii,
Approximate Word count = 1945
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)