View a FREE sample

Prologue, Part One, Chapters I - IV

• In the Sanhedrin, the sages debate whether or not pagan or Greek literature can be used by the Jews to read and study.

• At Elisha's sacred circumcision ceremony, his father, newly widowed, acts disrespectfully and rumors spread that he studies Greek and Roman works.
• Elisha and his friend Pappas meet some Roman soldiers who ridicule their Jewish identities and say the Jews should have been eliminated when the Temple was destroyed.

• When Elisha's father, Abuyah, dies, he wishes that Elisha will be wholehearted, not torn in two. This saying plagues his entire life and quest for truth.
• Uncle Amram controls Elisha's life, and under his instruction Elisha begins a three-year period of zealous Jewish teaching, practice, and appearance though Elisha silently questions everything he is taught.

• Elisha becomes apprenticed to Rabbi Joshua, and when his trial period reaches its end he...

(read more Chapter Abstracts)

This section contains 1,525 words (approx. 6 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample