Fighting with God: Jews and Their Music

Author: Chen Mingdao
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2007-03-21
Features: Of God and Man Struggle uses its poignant poetic language and highly condensed prose style to "quietly narrate" the special fate of the Jews and their music. As a Chinese scholar writing on the history of Jewish music, the author sets aside the "music technical analysis that may be intimidating," and instead groups Jewish music into the history and customs of the Jewish nation, filled with suffering and miracles. The long lineage of prophets, saints, priests, seers, kings, heroes, and poets of the Jewish nation, along with their heart-wrenching tragic stories, are enveloped in the polyphonic atmosphere of sorrow and joy in the change of songs. As a result, bones dissolve into moonlight, blood breaks down into evening clouds, and the endless demise of life is pressed together into the dawn of the heavens opening. Academia retreats from the examples, and professionalism rises in the narration, leaving only the soul chasing the ebb and flow of Jewish history and Jewish life tides.