Revayah: Jewish Stories

I was hoping for the option to listen to the stories in chronological order but there isn’t an option I could find for that in the app- is there an order? I don’t know enough to know- I think it would be great to have that option.

I really regret this purchase. I signed up for a year of access, and the experience has been disappointing from the start. The stories are boring and narrated in a male British accent that cannot be changed. There are no visuals at all, and the overall presentation feels outdated. The biggest issue is organization. The stories are completely out of order—a random collection of Bible stories with no way to follow them chronologically for actual Bible study. There’s no context, no introductions to characters, and no sense of narrative flow. It feels like watching a TV series completely out of order—jumping into season 5, episode 3, with no idea what’s going on. Many stories seem to start out of nowhere, which makes them confusing and hard to follow. If you’re already very familiar with the Old Testament and just want to cherry-pick well-known stories, this might be tolerable. But if you’re looking to learn or study, it’s frustrating and ineffective. On top of that, signing up automatically enrolls you in a “premium membership” that charges $89/month after the free trial. This was not made clear and feels shady. I emailed them to cancel within 20 hours of purchasing and still haven’t received a response. Poor design, archaic functionality, questionable billing practices. Avoid.

I really wanted to like this, but I can’t. They use Jewish/hebrew terms like Hashem and Moshe Rabeinu, the understanding of which I think it safe to say requires at least a basic knowledge/familiarity with Jewish prayer. However, the narrator doesn’t pronounce the Chet or Chaf and many other sounds as they are supposed to be pronounced. It’s a bit weird and may be actually be automation. Chana isn’t even anglicized to Hanna, it’s ch-Anna With the ch being the same sound as “chips”. Shechem becomes Shay-chem or shechem. The ch again like in chips. Yisrael is yizrail. Penina is pen-nine-ah. It’s really difficult to listen to. “He thought, Chass veshalom…” “she received a brasha “. Etc. it just doesn’t do it for me.