Here is a sampling of what informed readers have concluded:

I not only read your book [The Hidden Shakespeare] and found it very impressive and convincing
but the additional evidence you have been accumulating [now in this book] makes your argument
even more persuasive.... Shakespeare [is] ... probably a genius of Jewish descent, a Marrano,
intimately familiar with Jewish materials who might have wanted to promote the honor of Jews
and Judaism.


-- Rabbi Emanuel Rackman
* (see Rabbi Rackman's biography below)
Chancellor, Bar-Ilan University, Israel



Although Shakespearean scholars will no doubt dispute many of Basch's conclusions, even those
who disagree will find his focus on Judaic elements in Shakespeare's work useful, especially since
this subject has not elsewhere been dealt with in such abundance nor so thoroughly analyzed.


-- Dr. Marc B. Shapiro
Center for Judaic Studies
University of Connecticut

Shakespeare: America's Teacher
by Professor Paul Eidelberg (Bar-Ilan University)
Date: Tue, 15 Aug 2000

Colonial America was nurtured on two books: the Bible and Shakespeare. And now, thanks to
the extraordinary erudition of David Basch, we know that Shakespeare was a disguised Jew!
That's right, a Jew when it was fatal to be known as a Jew in the England of Shakespeare's
time.

Of David Basch's [three] books on the greatest Poet and student of Character in the
Western world,the most remarkable is THE SHAKESPEARE CODES: THE SONNETS
DECIPHERED, published by Revelatory Press, . . . I cannot too strongly recommend
this work, one of the most significant books of our time.

Having studied under Professor Leo Strauss at the University of Chicago, the greatest political
philosopher of the 20th century, who revealed the esoteric teachings of Plato and other writers,
I was well-prepared to appreciate the esoteric teachings of William Shakespeare. I had already
read Mr. Basch's book on the Merchant of Venice. But I must confess that the ingenuity
and painstaking scholarship he displays in THE SHAKESPEARE CODES would rank him
among the highest of> Strauss's thousands of disciples -- America's most distinguished
savants.

Prof. Paul Eidelberg
Political Scientist


* Note:

Rabbi Emanuel Rackman, a former practicing attorney and Orthodox pulpit Rabbi
from New York City, established and headed the Judaic Studies program at the
City University of New York and later assumed the post of Chancellor of
Bar Ilan University, one of Israel's largest. Below is an exerpt from an article on
Rabbi Rackman published in Midstream magazine, June/July 1995, (page-33):

                 EMANUEL RACKMAN: THEOCENTRIC HUMANIST
                          by Milton R. Konvitz

       (MILTON R. KONVITZ is Professor Emeritas of Law and of
        Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University. He is
        also chairman of of the Midstream editorial board.)

    In May 1977, the Jewish Faculty Association of the City University
of New York paid tribute to Rabbi Dr. Emanuel Rackman as he assumed the
presidency of Bar-Ilan University, for Rabbi Rackman had served for
years as professor of Judaic Studies and had played a leading role in
expanding and strengthening Judaic Studies at CUNY. In the fall of 1990
Bar-Ilan paid tribute to Rackman, who was then, as he now is,
chancellor, on the occasion of his 80th birthday. In 1995, in his 85th
year, Ktav Publishing House very appropriately has published Rackman's
Modern Halakhah for Our Time, that may be the consummate point, the
summit; the crown jewel of his long, distinguished career that had in it
many summits, many high points.
     Ordained by the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary (an afliliate
of Yeshiva University), and with a law degree and a Ph.D. in political
science from Columbia, Rackman was rabbi of the prestigious Congregation
Shaaray Tefila of Far Rockaway and of the Fifth Avenue Synagogue, professor
of political philosophy and jurisprudence and provost at Yeshiva, and
successively, as mentioned, president (1977-1985) and chancellor (since 1985)
of Bar-Ilan University. Under his leadership the university has tripled the
size of its student body, and it has grown from a small institution to one
of the major institutions of Israel and of the Jewish world.
     Rackman has been president of the New York Board of Rabbis, president
of the Rabbinical Council of America, and in World War II he was chairman
of the commision on Jewish chaplaincy in the United States Armed Forces. He
has been a devoted, active Zionist and has served as a member of the
Executive of the Jewish Agency. For many years Rabbi Rackman has written
a widely-read column for the weekly (New York) Jewish Week.
     Publication in 1995 of Modern Halakhah for Our Time confirms the
suggestion of Psalm 90 that the years of the octogenarian may be a
time of strength; it may be a time of reaping, a season of harvest; and its
publication also confirms the fact that, notwithstanding his many notable
executive activities, Rabbi Rackman has always been preeminently
the teacher.
     ...