RT Review
T1 Review: The Prophet of the Andes: An Unlikely Journey to the Promised Land, by Graciela Mochkofsky, translator by Lisa Dillman
JF Nova religio
VO 26
IS 4
SP 137
OP 138
A1 Robinson, Ira 1951-
LA English
PB University of Californiarnia Press
YR 2023
UL https://ixtheo.de/Record/1851348883
AB Judaic tradition understands that the biblical patriarch Abraham came to the realization that only one God exists entirely on his own. As Maimonides (12th c.) expressed it:[Abraham] began to search for knowledge while he was yet young, reflecting day and night.…He had no teacher, nor anyone to inform him, being…among foolish idolaters…and he would worship along with them; but his mind searched to gain understanding until he grasped the way of truth, knowing…that there is one God.Something quite similar happened to the main protagonist in Graciela Mochkofsky’s book, The Prophet of the Andes. Segundo Villanueva, a carpenter from provincial Peru, grew up in a Roman Catholic society and followed the rituals and traditions of the church until his somewhat chance encounter with a Bible, found at the bottom of his late father’s trunk. This encounter led him to an intellectual voyage of discovery that ultimately brought him to convert to Orthodox Judaism. Taking the name of Zerubbabel Tzidkiya, he and a number of his followers moved to Israel.
K1 Rezension
DO 10.1525/nr.2023.26.4.137