Summer Reading Program
Congratulations on your decision to enroll at John Brown University. In coming to JBU, you’re joining a learning community in which students learn not only from professors and books but from each other. Moreover, professors are not simply dispensers of knowledge but fellow learners who continually explore new ideas and perspectives.
One important feature of a learning community is the discussion of good books. Thus, your first step in joining the JBU community is the Summer Reading Program featuring The Chosen—a story of two Jewish teenagers in New York City struggling to come to terms with their religious traditions, their friendship, and their calling in the world.
The book’s main character, Danny Saunders, is the son of the prominent leader of a conservative Jewish sect. Danny’s brilliant mind sparks within him a curiosity about new ideas that extends far beyond his narrow community. His interest in becoming a psychologist puts him on a collision course with his domineering father, who expects his son to follow in his footsteps as a rabbi. Moreover, Danny’s friendship with Reuven Malter, a member of a different Jewish community, forces him to confront new ideas and perspectives. Although The Chosen is a book about a Jewish community, it addresses topics that affect us at a Christian college—issues such as faith and doubt, the purpose of education, God’s will for our lives, and the meaning of community.
You should read this book before you join us for Orientation Week in August. During that week, you and your peers will discuss this book with a JBU professor or upper-level student. Also, during your fall semester you will be enrolled in a class entitled the Gateway Seminar in Christian Scholarship. Your professor for this course will assume that you have read The Chosen and may use the text as a starting point for discussions and projects in the course.
To help you get the most out of this book and relate it to your upcoming college experience, we have developed some brief introductory material about the book and discussion questions (PDF). Your book discussion during Orientation Week will involve these questions.
I hope you enjoy the book, and I look forward to meeting you in August.
Sincerely,
Dr. Rick Ostrander
Academic Dean