Reviews on Miryam:

Regina Berlinghof wrote about Mary Magdalene and Jesus

A NOVEL ABOUT A GREAT LOVE AND MANY HUMAN WEAKNESSES.

The blurb warns: "This novel could offend the religious feelings of some readers." It is a love story concerning Mary Magdalene and Jesus. The plot has been freely invented. If Regina Berlinghof issues the 550 pp book with this "Warning", she has good reason to do so. For in her book Jesus becomes an ordinary human being, has an intensive love affair with the beautiful Miryam, has a child with her, does not die on the cross, but is sent into exile in Babylon with the beloved woman. His son disappears, one might say, into nothingness. This Jesus does not become the founder of the new religion. He remains a carpenter, like his ancestors. The religion is disseminated in the country by his disciples, the same disciples who betrayed their master because he wanted to leave them for the sake of a woman. That is, roughly speaking, the plot of Regina Berlinghof's book.

Yes, she admits that she has read Luise Rinser's "Mirjam".

But her book, structure, imagination, detailed development of the events used as facts are worlds apart from Rinser's book, and the same goes for her style.

Whatever your attitude to religion: The books makes very pleasant reading, long passages can be read without halting, its style is simple, easy to understand, and sometimes goes into graphic human detail right down to the description of sexual relations. No question: If you have known Jesus so far only as the Messiah, the prophet, the bringer of salvation, as a sexless figure of light, free of all temptations and "sins" of this world, you will find it difficult to imagine a man who, let us say it bluntly, also wants to live as a man.

That may not be easy for some people. But aren't there many people who have asked themselves, at least secretly, such and similar questions?

Jesus and Miryam naked swimming in the cooling waters of a river?

Religion or religions? Yes, Regina Berlinghof describes much of the Israelite Religion, of its customs and rites, which have survived till today, tells about the Ark of the Covenant, of the High Priests, the Torah.

Apart from these more profound matters, this is a book, written by a person, who knows the country and its people, and who knows every inch of it.

Anyone who has been on holidays in Israel for a longer period of time and has travelled around the country will be fascinated by the description of the tracks and paths which today cut through the country as asphalt ribbons alongside electrical power lines. Regina Berlinghof's descriptions put the clock for all this back into the time of just under 2000 years ago. Towns have since acquired quite different contours. Jericho, Caesarea, Tiberias, and Jerusalem of course. The description of the deserts, of the Sea Gennesaret (Kinneret), of the way of life at that time, is equally detailed and fascinating.

Is this high-brow literature? Let the High Priests of literary cricitism decide that, perhaps Marcel Reich-Ranicki and others. Is it sentimental kitsch? That would certainly be going too far, even if one or two readers may dismiss the novel in such terms. One thing is certain, we read "Miryam" with great pleasure, in spite of the odd long-winded passage, when she becomes profound.