I am no expert, but it's my understanding that Judaism did not start off as a monotheistic religion. There was a male god and a female god (I think her name was Asherah) and then the editing began in an epically historic act of male chauvinism.

As far as being chosen, the topic reminds me a lot of Carl Jung's idea of synchronicity. For a people with such a tiny, tiny population, it's a crazy coincidence that the contributions to humankind are beyond remarkable — all throughout history. And it's not even possible to define what it means to be Jewish; for most, religion has little to do with it. Maybe Jews should have been called the Mysterious People.

The persecution of Jews is not difficult to explain, though it defies logic. Author Raul Hilberg did a great job of tracing the roots of antisemitism and how it grew into a never-ending movement.