The Covenant of Circumcision: New Perspectives on an Ancient Jewish Rite Book

I was hoping to get much more out of this. I'd heard about it in a class on the rise of Modern Orthodox Judaism. The book is written by Samson Raphael Hirsch in the form of a nineteen letter correspondence between two fictional people: a young German Jewish intellectual named Naphtali and a rabbi named Ben Uziel. It begins with Naphtali expressing his doubts and frustrations with Judaism in general and his spiritual life in particular as it was in 19th century Germany. His complaints and arguments are really the critiques the Reform movement first leveled against traditional Judaism. The problem, for me, is that with a few notable exceptions, Naphtali's complaints are better written and more compelling that Ben Uziel's answers. This is a shame because Hirsch is a great writer and a monumental thinker. It's not that the responses lack for poetry or beauty; the problem is more an issue of aim. There's no way that a person like Naphtali would find Ben Uziel's particular arguments compelling as they are mostly reliant or faith and belief in both Torah and the universe as obviously divine.

As an addendum, I must exempt Letters 18 and 19 from this critique. In these, Hirsch delivers a blistering censure of Reform Judaism and a defense for his traditional perspective. Whether the reader finds these compelling or not will depend on many personal beliefs, but surely, these letters are incredibly fascinating from a historical and spiritual perspective alone, as they represent Judaism's first encounters with Modernity.

If you want to become familiar with Hirsch's thought, I'd recommend his magnum opus, Horeb instead.