A Convert’s Tale

A Convert’s Tale

Author: Tamar Herzig

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2019-12-03

Total Pages: 401

ISBN-13: 0674237536

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Salomone da Sesso was a virtuoso goldsmith in Renaissance Italy. Brought down by a sex scandal, he saved his skin by converting to Catholicism. Tamar Herzig explores Salamone’s world—his Jewish upbringing, his craft and patrons, and homosexuality. In his struggle for rehabilitation, we see how precarious and contested was the meaning of conversion.


Book Synopsis A Convert’s Tale by : Tamar Herzig

Download or read book A Convert’s Tale written by Tamar Herzig and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2019-12-03 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Salomone da Sesso was a virtuoso goldsmith in Renaissance Italy. Brought down by a sex scandal, he saved his skin by converting to Catholicism. Tamar Herzig explores Salamone’s world—his Jewish upbringing, his craft and patrons, and homosexuality. In his struggle for rehabilitation, we see how precarious and contested was the meaning of conversion.


The Convert

The Convert

Author: Deborah Baker

Publisher: Graywolf Press

Published: 2011-05-10

Total Pages: 224

ISBN-13: 1555970281

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*A 2011 National Book Award Finalist* A spellbinding story of renunciation, conversion, and radicalism from Pulitzer Prize-finalist biographer Deborah Baker What drives a young woman raised in a postwar New York City suburb to convert to Islam, abandon her country and Jewish faith, and embrace a life of exile in Pakistan? The Convert tells the story of how Margaret Marcus of Larchmont became Maryam Jameelah of Lahore, one of the most trenchant and celebrated voices of Islam's argument with the West. A cache of Maryam's letters to her parents in the archives of the New York Public Library sends the acclaimed biographer Deborah Baker on her own odyssey into the labyrinthine heart of twentieth-century Islam. Casting a shadow over these letters is the mysterious figure of Mawlana Abul Ala Mawdudi, both Maryam's adoptive father and the man who laid the intellectual foundations for militant Islam. As she assembles the pieces of a singularly perplexing life, Baker finds herself captive to questions raised by Maryam's journey. Is her story just another bleak chapter in a so-called clash of civilizations? Or does it signify something else entirely? And then there's this: Is the life depicted in Maryam's letters home and in her books an honest reflection of the one she lived? Like many compelling and true tales, The Convert is stranger than fiction. It is a gripping account of a life lived on the radical edge and a profound meditation on the cultural conflicts that frustrate mutual understanding.


Book Synopsis The Convert by : Deborah Baker

Download or read book The Convert written by Deborah Baker and published by Graywolf Press. This book was released on 2011-05-10 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: *A 2011 National Book Award Finalist* A spellbinding story of renunciation, conversion, and radicalism from Pulitzer Prize-finalist biographer Deborah Baker What drives a young woman raised in a postwar New York City suburb to convert to Islam, abandon her country and Jewish faith, and embrace a life of exile in Pakistan? The Convert tells the story of how Margaret Marcus of Larchmont became Maryam Jameelah of Lahore, one of the most trenchant and celebrated voices of Islam's argument with the West. A cache of Maryam's letters to her parents in the archives of the New York Public Library sends the acclaimed biographer Deborah Baker on her own odyssey into the labyrinthine heart of twentieth-century Islam. Casting a shadow over these letters is the mysterious figure of Mawlana Abul Ala Mawdudi, both Maryam's adoptive father and the man who laid the intellectual foundations for militant Islam. As she assembles the pieces of a singularly perplexing life, Baker finds herself captive to questions raised by Maryam's journey. Is her story just another bleak chapter in a so-called clash of civilizations? Or does it signify something else entirely? And then there's this: Is the life depicted in Maryam's letters home and in her books an honest reflection of the one she lived? Like many compelling and true tales, The Convert is stranger than fiction. It is a gripping account of a life lived on the radical edge and a profound meditation on the cultural conflicts that frustrate mutual understanding.


Welcome to Islam

Welcome to Islam

Author: Lucy Bushill-Matthews

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2016-11-03

Total Pages: 224

ISBN-13: 1350031399

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Written by a Muslim convert and mother of three, Welcome to Islam captures the occasionally poignant but often humorous reality of being a Muslim in the current climate: as a convert, a working woman, a mother, and as an active member of the local community. Discover what it's really like living life as a Muslim: praying the ritual prayers at work in an office when your boss walks in; going on Hajj with hundreds of Saudi women dressed from head to toe in black; or explaining to your six-year-old daughter, who is looking at the pictures in the newspaper, that the bearded Asian Muslim who is being arrested for terrorism isn't in fact the family friend we all know and love - just someone who looks extremely similar. It is rare to pick up a newspaper or watch the television without encountering a 'Muslim issue' at least once. Lucy Bushill-Matthews' story brings the faith behind the headlines refreshingly to life.


Book Synopsis Welcome to Islam by : Lucy Bushill-Matthews

Download or read book Welcome to Islam written by Lucy Bushill-Matthews and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2016-11-03 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written by a Muslim convert and mother of three, Welcome to Islam captures the occasionally poignant but often humorous reality of being a Muslim in the current climate: as a convert, a working woman, a mother, and as an active member of the local community. Discover what it's really like living life as a Muslim: praying the ritual prayers at work in an office when your boss walks in; going on Hajj with hundreds of Saudi women dressed from head to toe in black; or explaining to your six-year-old daughter, who is looking at the pictures in the newspaper, that the bearded Asian Muslim who is being arrested for terrorism isn't in fact the family friend we all know and love - just someone who looks extremely similar. It is rare to pick up a newspaper or watch the television without encountering a 'Muslim issue' at least once. Lucy Bushill-Matthews' story brings the faith behind the headlines refreshingly to life.


The Convert

The Convert

Author: Stefan Hertmans

Publisher: Pantheon

Published: 2020-02-04

Total Pages: 304

ISBN-13: 1524747092

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Finalist for the 2020 National Jewish Book Awards In this dazzling work of historical fiction, the Man Booker International–long-listed author of War and Turpentine reconstructs the tragic story of a medieval noblewoman who leaves her home and family for the love of a Jewish boy. In eleventh-century France, Vigdis Adelaïs, a young woman from a prosperous Christian family, falls in love with David Todros, a rabbi’s son and yeshiva student. To be together, the couple must flee their city, and Vigdis must renounce her life of privilege and comfort. Pursued by her father’s knights and in constant danger of betrayal, the lovers embark on a dangerous journey to the south of France, only to find their brief happiness destroyed by the vicious wave of anti-Semitism sweeping through Europe with the onset of the First Crusade. What begins as a story of forbidden love evolves into a globe-trotting trek spanning continents, as Vigdis undertakes an epic journey to Cairo and back, enduring the unimaginable in hopes of finding her lost children. Based on two fragments from the Cairo Genizah—a repository of more than three hundred thousand manuscripts and documents stored in the upper chamber of a synagogue in Old Cairo—Stefan Hertmans has pieced together a remarkable work of imagination, re-creating the tragic story of two star-crossed lovers whose steps he retraces almost a millennium later. Blending fact and fiction, and with immense imagination and stylistic ingenuity, Hertmans painstakingly depicts Vigdis’s terrible trials, bringing the Middle Ages to life and illuminating a chaotic world of love and hate.


Book Synopsis The Convert by : Stefan Hertmans

Download or read book The Convert written by Stefan Hertmans and published by Pantheon. This book was released on 2020-02-04 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Finalist for the 2020 National Jewish Book Awards In this dazzling work of historical fiction, the Man Booker International–long-listed author of War and Turpentine reconstructs the tragic story of a medieval noblewoman who leaves her home and family for the love of a Jewish boy. In eleventh-century France, Vigdis Adelaïs, a young woman from a prosperous Christian family, falls in love with David Todros, a rabbi’s son and yeshiva student. To be together, the couple must flee their city, and Vigdis must renounce her life of privilege and comfort. Pursued by her father’s knights and in constant danger of betrayal, the lovers embark on a dangerous journey to the south of France, only to find their brief happiness destroyed by the vicious wave of anti-Semitism sweeping through Europe with the onset of the First Crusade. What begins as a story of forbidden love evolves into a globe-trotting trek spanning continents, as Vigdis undertakes an epic journey to Cairo and back, enduring the unimaginable in hopes of finding her lost children. Based on two fragments from the Cairo Genizah—a repository of more than three hundred thousand manuscripts and documents stored in the upper chamber of a synagogue in Old Cairo—Stefan Hertmans has pieced together a remarkable work of imagination, re-creating the tragic story of two star-crossed lovers whose steps he retraces almost a millennium later. Blending fact and fiction, and with immense imagination and stylistic ingenuity, Hertmans painstakingly depicts Vigdis’s terrible trials, bringing the Middle Ages to life and illuminating a chaotic world of love and hate.


Chosen

Chosen

Author: Donna Steichen

Publisher: Ignatius Press

Published: 2009-09-15

Total Pages: 495

ISBN-13: 1681490897

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The twenty-three men and women who tell their conversion stories in these pages were not drawn to the Church by sound evangelization programs, beautiful buildings and liturgies, or saintly witnesses among the clergy. On the contrary, many of them were attracted to Catholicism in spite of a now decades-long stretch of deficient catechesis, mediocre Masses, and uninspiring leadership. Christ himself led these souls to his Church, concludes editor Donna Steichen, who compiled this consoling collection, and it is the Lord who set them to work replanting his devastated vineyard. "Despite their marked differences in origin, education, and field of service," writes Steichen, "each one makes it clear that it is Christ who did the choosing. They testify that Christ touched their hearts and intervened in their lives in unexpected, sometimes even miraculous, ways."


Book Synopsis Chosen by : Donna Steichen

Download or read book Chosen written by Donna Steichen and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2009-09-15 with total page 495 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The twenty-three men and women who tell their conversion stories in these pages were not drawn to the Church by sound evangelization programs, beautiful buildings and liturgies, or saintly witnesses among the clergy. On the contrary, many of them were attracted to Catholicism in spite of a now decades-long stretch of deficient catechesis, mediocre Masses, and uninspiring leadership. Christ himself led these souls to his Church, concludes editor Donna Steichen, who compiled this consoling collection, and it is the Lord who set them to work replanting his devastated vineyard. "Despite their marked differences in origin, education, and field of service," writes Steichen, "each one makes it clear that it is Christ who did the choosing. They testify that Christ touched their hearts and intervened in their lives in unexpected, sometimes even miraculous, ways."


The Forgetting River

The Forgetting River

Author: Doreen Carvajal

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2013-08-06

Total Pages: 330

ISBN-13: 1594631522

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The unexpected and moving story of an American journalist who works to uncover her family’s long-buried Jewish ancestry in Spain. Raised a Catholic in California, New York Times journalist Doreen Carvajal is shocked when she discovers that her background may actually be connected to conversos from Inquisition-era Spain: Jews who were forced to renounce their faith and convert to Christianity or face torture and death. With vivid childhood memories of Sunday sermons, catechism, and the rosary, Carvajal travels to the centuries-old Andalucian town of Arcos de la Frontera, to investigate her lineage and recover her family’s original religious heritage. In Arcos, Carvajal comes to realize that fear remains a legacy of the Inquisition along with the cryptic messages left by its victims. Back at her childhood home in California, she uncovers papers documenting a family of Carvajals who were burned at the stake in the 16th-century territory of Mexico. Could the author’s family history be linked to the hidden history of Arcos? And could the unfortunate Carvajals have been her ancestors? As she strives to find proof that her family had been forced to convert to Christianity six hundred years ago, Carvajal comes to understand that the past flows like a river through time—and that while the truth might be submerged, it is never truly lost.


Book Synopsis The Forgetting River by : Doreen Carvajal

Download or read book The Forgetting River written by Doreen Carvajal and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2013-08-06 with total page 330 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The unexpected and moving story of an American journalist who works to uncover her family’s long-buried Jewish ancestry in Spain. Raised a Catholic in California, New York Times journalist Doreen Carvajal is shocked when she discovers that her background may actually be connected to conversos from Inquisition-era Spain: Jews who were forced to renounce their faith and convert to Christianity or face torture and death. With vivid childhood memories of Sunday sermons, catechism, and the rosary, Carvajal travels to the centuries-old Andalucian town of Arcos de la Frontera, to investigate her lineage and recover her family’s original religious heritage. In Arcos, Carvajal comes to realize that fear remains a legacy of the Inquisition along with the cryptic messages left by its victims. Back at her childhood home in California, she uncovers papers documenting a family of Carvajals who were burned at the stake in the 16th-century territory of Mexico. Could the author’s family history be linked to the hidden history of Arcos? And could the unfortunate Carvajals have been her ancestors? As she strives to find proof that her family had been forced to convert to Christianity six hundred years ago, Carvajal comes to understand that the past flows like a river through time—and that while the truth might be submerged, it is never truly lost.


Time's Convert

Time's Convert

Author: Deborah Harkness

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2018-09-18

Total Pages: 450

ISBN-13: 0399564527

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From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of A Discovery of Witches and The Black Bird Oracle comes a novel about what it takes to become a vampire—the fourth in the All Souls series. Look for the hit series “A Discovery of Witches,” now streaming on AMC+, Sundance Now, and Shudder! On the battlefields of the American Revolution, Matthew de Clermont meets Marcus MacNeil, a young surgeon from Massachusetts, during a moment of political awakening when it seems that the world is on the brink of a brighter future. When Matthew offers him a chance at immortality and a new life free from the restraints of his puritanical upbringing, Marcus seizes the opportunity to become a vampire. But his transformation is not an easy one and the ancient traditions and responsibilities of the de Clermont family clash with Marcus's deeply held beliefs in liberty, equality, and brotherhood. Fast-forward to contemporary Paris, where Phoebe Taylor--the young employee at Sotheby's whom Marcus has fallen for--is about to embark on her own journey to immortality. Though the modernized version of the process at first seems uncomplicated, the couple discovers that the challenges facing a human who wishes to be a vampire are no less formidable than they were in the eighteenth century. The shadows that Marcus believed he'd escaped centuries ago may return to haunt them both--forever. A passionate love story and a fascinating exploration of the power of tradition and the possibilities not just for change but for revolution, Time's Convert, the fourth books in the All Souls Series channels the supernatural world-building and slow-burning romance that made the previous books instant bestsellers to illuminate a new and vital moment in history, and a love affair that will bridge centuries.


Book Synopsis Time's Convert by : Deborah Harkness

Download or read book Time's Convert written by Deborah Harkness and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2018-09-18 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of A Discovery of Witches and The Black Bird Oracle comes a novel about what it takes to become a vampire—the fourth in the All Souls series. Look for the hit series “A Discovery of Witches,” now streaming on AMC+, Sundance Now, and Shudder! On the battlefields of the American Revolution, Matthew de Clermont meets Marcus MacNeil, a young surgeon from Massachusetts, during a moment of political awakening when it seems that the world is on the brink of a brighter future. When Matthew offers him a chance at immortality and a new life free from the restraints of his puritanical upbringing, Marcus seizes the opportunity to become a vampire. But his transformation is not an easy one and the ancient traditions and responsibilities of the de Clermont family clash with Marcus's deeply held beliefs in liberty, equality, and brotherhood. Fast-forward to contemporary Paris, where Phoebe Taylor--the young employee at Sotheby's whom Marcus has fallen for--is about to embark on her own journey to immortality. Though the modernized version of the process at first seems uncomplicated, the couple discovers that the challenges facing a human who wishes to be a vampire are no less formidable than they were in the eighteenth century. The shadows that Marcus believed he'd escaped centuries ago may return to haunt them both--forever. A passionate love story and a fascinating exploration of the power of tradition and the possibilities not just for change but for revolution, Time's Convert, the fourth books in the All Souls Series channels the supernatural world-building and slow-burning romance that made the previous books instant bestsellers to illuminate a new and vital moment in history, and a love affair that will bridge centuries.


The New Jew

The New Jew

Author: Sally Srok Friedes

Publisher: John Hunt Publishing

Published:

Total Pages: 219

ISBN-13:

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A Catholic woman's memoir of her conversion to Judaism describes her path to finding a home in the New York Jewish community.


Book Synopsis The New Jew by : Sally Srok Friedes

Download or read book The New Jew written by Sally Srok Friedes and published by John Hunt Publishing. This book was released on with total page 219 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Catholic woman's memoir of her conversion to Judaism describes her path to finding a home in the New York Jewish community.


The Most Reluctant Convert

The Most Reluctant Convert

Author: David C. Downing

Publisher: InterVarsity Press

Published: 2004-01-01

Total Pages: 196

ISBN-13: 9780830832712

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An ECPA 2003 Gold Medallion Finalist!Listed inBooklist'sBest Adult Religion Books of the Year in 2002!His books have sold millions, including classics likeMere Christianity, The Screwtape LettersandThe Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.Yet C. S. Lewis was not always a literary giant of Christian faith. How did he leave behind a staunch atheism to become one of the most beloved and renowned Christian authors of our time?Other biographies of Lewis explore his childhood or his dramatic conversion to Christianity. But as David Downing reveals in this fascinating book, the rarely discussed period from Lewis's childhood to his early thirties took him on a tumultuous journey of spiritual and intellectual exploration before he became a "most reluctant convert." It was not despite this journey but precisely because of it that Lewis understood the search for life's ultimate meaning so well and went on to become one of the most compelling authors of the twentieth century. Weaving the people, places and events of Lewis's life together with excerpts from Lewis's own writing, Downing shows how Lewis's spiritual quest can also light the path for other seekers.


Book Synopsis The Most Reluctant Convert by : David C. Downing

Download or read book The Most Reluctant Convert written by David C. Downing and published by InterVarsity Press. This book was released on 2004-01-01 with total page 196 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An ECPA 2003 Gold Medallion Finalist!Listed inBooklist'sBest Adult Religion Books of the Year in 2002!His books have sold millions, including classics likeMere Christianity, The Screwtape LettersandThe Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.Yet C. S. Lewis was not always a literary giant of Christian faith. How did he leave behind a staunch atheism to become one of the most beloved and renowned Christian authors of our time?Other biographies of Lewis explore his childhood or his dramatic conversion to Christianity. But as David Downing reveals in this fascinating book, the rarely discussed period from Lewis's childhood to his early thirties took him on a tumultuous journey of spiritual and intellectual exploration before he became a "most reluctant convert." It was not despite this journey but precisely because of it that Lewis understood the search for life's ultimate meaning so well and went on to become one of the most compelling authors of the twentieth century. Weaving the people, places and events of Lewis's life together with excerpts from Lewis's own writing, Downing shows how Lewis's spiritual quest can also light the path for other seekers.


Night's Bright Darkness

Night's Bright Darkness

Author: Sally Read

Publisher: Ignatius Press

Published: 2016

Total Pages: 148

ISBN-13: 1621641511

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A moving and beautifully written story about a British poet’s conversion from staunch atheism to Catholicism in the space of nine electric months. In 2010, Sally Read was heralded as one of the bright young writers of the British poetry scene. Feminist, atheist and deeply anti-Catholic, she was writing a book about women’s reproduction and sexuality when, during her research, she spoke with a Catholic priest. That mysterious encounter led Read on a dramatic journey of spiritual quest and discovery which ended up at the Vatican itself, where she was received into the Catholic Church in December of that year. This story is one that, unsurprisingly, has the vivid flavor and beauty of poetry. Read relates her encounters with the Father, the Spirit and then the Son, exactly in the way they were given to her—timely, revelatory and compelling. These transforming events throw new light onto the experiences of her past—her father’s death, her work as a psychiatric nurse, her life as a single woman in London, as a mother and as a writer. She reveals how she developed a close intimacy with the new love that erupted into her life, Christ himself, and how she comes to embrace a doctrine she had previously rejected as bigoted and stifling. Sally Read’s story is a testimony to the powerhouse of Christianity: divine love and the life-changing encounter with Christ.


Book Synopsis Night's Bright Darkness by : Sally Read

Download or read book Night's Bright Darkness written by Sally Read and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2016 with total page 148 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A moving and beautifully written story about a British poet’s conversion from staunch atheism to Catholicism in the space of nine electric months. In 2010, Sally Read was heralded as one of the bright young writers of the British poetry scene. Feminist, atheist and deeply anti-Catholic, she was writing a book about women’s reproduction and sexuality when, during her research, she spoke with a Catholic priest. That mysterious encounter led Read on a dramatic journey of spiritual quest and discovery which ended up at the Vatican itself, where she was received into the Catholic Church in December of that year. This story is one that, unsurprisingly, has the vivid flavor and beauty of poetry. Read relates her encounters with the Father, the Spirit and then the Son, exactly in the way they were given to her—timely, revelatory and compelling. These transforming events throw new light onto the experiences of her past—her father’s death, her work as a psychiatric nurse, her life as a single woman in London, as a mother and as a writer. She reveals how she developed a close intimacy with the new love that erupted into her life, Christ himself, and how she comes to embrace a doctrine she had previously rejected as bigoted and stifling. Sally Read’s story is a testimony to the powerhouse of Christianity: divine love and the life-changing encounter with Christ.