The Messiah Texts

Patai, Raphael

Published by Wayne State University Press

Patai, Raphael.
The Messiah Texts: Jewish Legends of Three Thousand Years.
Wayne State University Press, 1988.
Project MUSE.muse.jhu.edu/book/40430.

For additional information about this book

https://muse.jhu.edu/book/40430

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THE
 THE

RAPHAEL PATAI

w j WAYNE STATE UNIVERSITY PRESS

MB Detroit
Copyright © 1979 by Raphael Patai. All rights are reserved. No part of this
book may be reproduced without formal permission from the publisher.
Manufactured in the United States of America.

Paperback edition published 1988 by Wayne State University Press

Detroit, Michigan 48201.

ISBN-13: 978-0-8143-1850-8 ISBN-10: 0-8143-1850-9

ISBN 978-0-8143-4191-9 (ebook)

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Main entry under tide:

The Messiah texts.

Bibliography: p.
Includes index.
1. Messiah—History of doctrines—sources.
2. Messianic era (Judaism)—History of doctrines—
Sources. I. Patai, Raphael, 1910-
BM615.M43 296.3'3 79-5387
ISBN 0-8143-1652-2 (alk. paper)
ISBN 0-8143-1850-9 (pbk.: alk. paper)
 Dedication

It has come to pass in our days that there arose men in the
four corners of the earth who exerted themselves to bring us
nearer to the Messianic era of peace between Israel and the
nations.
In Europe, Nahum Goldmann worked to achieve recon-
ciliation and peace between the remorseful sons of the Ger-
man Armilus and the surviving children of his victims, the
Jews.
In Africa, Anwar el-Sadat stepped forth and went like a
lion into the Jerusalem den of Daniels to plead for peace
between the embittered sons of Ya'rub and sons of Ya'qub.
In Asia, Menachem Begin fought with his own brethren
to convince them that peace with their neighbors means
more than retaining land conquered with the blood of the
sons of Zion.
In America, Jimmy Carter strove long and hard to bring
about a peace agreement between reluctant Egypt and hesi-
tant Israel.
It is to these men that The Messiah Texts is inscribed.
DR. RAPHAELPATAIisanotedanthropologist,Biblical scholar,
and author. He taught Hebrew at the Hebrew University of
Jerusalem, and has served as Professor of Anthropology at
Fairleigh Dickinson University and Dropsie University, and as
Visiting Professor at the University of Pennsylvania, Princeton,
Columbia, and Ohio State, as well as Director of Research of the
Herzl Institute and Editor of the Herzl Press. He was also
consultant to the department of Social Affairs of the United
Nations Secretariat, and director of the Syria-Lebanon-Jordan
research project of the Human Relations Area Files. Dr. Patai is
the author of twenty-five books, including Hebrew Myths (with
Robert Graves), Man and Temple in Ancient Jewish Myth and
Ritual, Golden River to Golden Road: Society, Culture and Change in
the Middle East, Israel Between East and West, The Kingdom of
Jordan, Tents of Jacob: The Diaspora Yesterday and Today, Myth and
Modern Man, The Arab Mind, The Myth of the Jewish Race (with
Jennifer Patai, revised edition 1988), The Jewish Mind, The Hebrew
Goddess, and Robert Graves and the Hebrew Myths, A Collaboration.