Jewish Messianic Thoughts in an Age of Despair

Kenneth Seeskin received his BA from Northwestern University in 1968 and his Ph.D. from Yale University in 1972. He joined the faculty of Northwestern in 1972 and has taught there ever since. He is the author of seven books and numerous articles, editor of The Cambridge Companion to Maimonides and co-editor of The Cambridge Guide to Jewish History, Culture, and Religion. In 2001, he won the Koret Jewish Book Award for Searching for a Distant God and, in 2011, the National Jewish Book Award for The Cambridge Guide to Jewish History, Culture, and Religion. In 2009, Seeskin was named Philip M. and Ethel Klutznick Professor of Jewish Civilization.

• 1. Messianism and mythology; 2. Maimonedes and the idea of a deflationary Messiah; 3. Internalism: the Messiah within; 4. Infinite deferral; 5. History and rationality; 6. History and irrationality; 7. Redemption.