Book review: The Essential It's a Wonderful Life by Michael Willian

The third book I read in 2020 is The Essential It's a Wonderful Life: A Scene-by-Scene Guide to the Classic Film by Michael Willian.  "It's a Wonderful Life" is one of our favorite Christmas movies, and this book walks through the film scene by scene, giving behind-the-scenes information and pointing out small mistakes.  There is also an extensive quiz to test your knowledge of the film.

If you enjoy "It's a Wonderful Life," you will enjoy reading this book.

Book review: The Beginning of Politics by Moshe Halbertal and Stephen Holmes

The second book I read in 2020 is The Beginning of Politics: Power in the Biblical Book of Samuel by Moshe Halbertal and Stephen Holmes.  Halbertal and Holmes address First and Second Samuel (and the first two chapters of First Kings) as literature, casting their anonymous author as a proto-Machiavelli, discussing the Israelite monarchy from the perspective of realpolitik.

The authors emphasize the unique quality of kingship in Israel: unlike virtually all other societies of the time, the origin of the monarchy isn't shrouded in myth; neither is it divinely ordained.  On the contrary, the book of Samuel presents a society that did not have a king and presents a mundane and historical account of how it came to have one, actually against the advice of the deity.

"In the Samuel narrative, both the shift away from the political theology of the Book of Judges and the initial appearance of monarchy in Israel are presented as events occurring in human history. They do not belong to the mythic past. The biblical king, enthroned before our eyes, is a thoroughly human being, not a God. He is not a pillar of the cosmic order. He plays a negligible and wholly dispensable role in religious ritual, does not convey divine commands to his people, does not maintain the order of nature, and is not the prime lawgiver." 

Halbertal and Holmes's assertion is that the very concept of politics was birthed when the people went to Samuel and demanded a king.  Surrounded by societies which declared that "the king is a God" and rejecting Judges's assertion, mostly explicitly stated by Gideon that "God is the king," the Israelites invent a third concept: "the king is not a God."  This revolutionary statement, no less than the Roman's rejection of Tarquin and invention of a res publica, laid the foundation for the modern world.

The author of Samuel presents an honest, demythologized account of the beginning of the monarchy which depicts, in Halbertal and Holmes's minds, the necessary evils endemic to all politics, particularly the reversal of means and ends: sovereign power is necessary as a means to accomplish the end of protecting the nation but ends up being an end in its own right to those desperate to hold on to that sovereign power (Saul) or pass it on undiminished to their chosen heirs (David).