Culture In Chaim Potok's The Chosen

When one gets ready in the morning, what clothes they choose to wear, and whom they choose for friends are all decided by one underlining factor; culture. Different cultures create laws of life in which its followers think they need to abide by. Certain cultures, however, can be intimidating if a person is not familiar with it; it can even be intimidating to someone who is apart of this culture. Chaim Potok’s The Chosen showcases the building of a friendship that will try to outlast all the troubles; it is about deciding whether or not cultures will destroy the friendship without intervening in the fate. The theme for The Chosen is that the strands of culture can make or break one’s happiness and friendship with others, as seen through Danny …show more content…
Danny breaks away from the suggestions that David Malter has been giving him, and decides that he wants to read Sigmund Freud, a debateable topic in his culture. He thinks that Freud will be simple, although Reuven is very much against it, but Danny realizes that he was terribly wrong. “That was the week Danny began to read Freud in German…it was difficult for him at first… not only was the language still a problem but also the terminology...and he was breaking his head on it” (Potok 256). Danny spends a lot of time in the library to figure out how to read Freud; even going as far as learning German so he could read the original books that had not been translated (Potok 227). Danny begun to distance himself from everyone because he is trying to desperately understand the way of Freud and how to read him. Everyone has something that they have a love/hate relationship with, and sometimes it is to the point where it becomes an obsession. Danny has one with Sigmund Freud and his writings about psychology. “By Thursday, Danny’s side of the table was piled high with books, and he was looking thoroughly unhappy… the whole thing was ridiculous and impossible [Danny said]; he wasn’t getting anywhere” (Potok 257). Freud has become the ultimate obsession in Danny’s life and he is determined to understand the readings. He becomes almost addicted to Freud, even though most of his writings …show more content…
The friendship that Danny and Reuven have is one of a kind- and it developed in the most strangest of ways. However, sometimes when there is a friend who is so easily enticed by knowledge, it is difficult for the friendship to always strive all the time. “The evenings that I might have spent with Danny I spent at student council or committee meetings...we never got around to discussing what he was reading in Freud” (Potok 265). Their friendship never fades on its own. It experiences ups and downs and there are definitely times when it seems like they do not have anything in common anymore, and times when their cultures are just too different for each other. It is never because the two grow apart, or they never have time for each other- it’s always due to their cultures. As a Hasidic, there are beliefs that are not shared with everyone else in the Judaism community. There are differences that not everyone agrees on, just like in any culture or religion. For Hasidic Jews and Orthodox Jews, it was Zionism. For Danny and Reuven, it was Reb Saunders. “Danny sat among them, silent, his face tight. His eyes caught mine, held, then looked slowly away... it seemed so incredible to me, so outrageously absurd. Not Freud but Zionism had finally shattered our friendship” (Potok 333). Finding out that David Malter was a direct representative for Zionism made Reb Saunders decide that his son was not to speak to