[Avodah] The Rambam and Eliyahu haNavi

[Micha Berger]

On Thu, Jun 23, 2011 at 02:41:01PM -0400, Zev Sero wrote:
> Wrong.  Why are you starting in the middle of the inyan, with "veyesh"?
> What has he just said *before* he qualifies it with "veyesh"?  He has
> just said that we *do* know a navi, whom Malachi calls "Eliyahu", will
> definitely come at some time before the War of Gog and Magog...

So then really start at the beginning:
    "Vekhein kol kayotze ba'eilu hadevarim be'inyan hamashiach
    meshalim heim...
    Yeira'eh mipeshutan shelidivei hanevi'im...
    milchemes gog umagog,
    vesheqodem gog umagog yaamod navi leyasheir Yisrael...
    shene'emar 'Hinei Anokhi sholeiach lakhem es Eilyah...'"

Then we have the bit I quoted, and then
    Vekhol eilu hadevarim vekhayotzei
    bahen lo yeida adam hei'ach yihyu....

IOW, the whole bit about "veheishiv leiv avos is within the list
prefaced and concluded with disclaimers just as much as the phrase
about when.

Also, while the Teimanim put a new halakhah before "veyeish min
hachakhamim she'omerim sheqodem bi'as hamashiach", in our editions,
it's all one item. It is just the last detail in the description
that begins "yaamod navi leyasheir Yisrael", stating that some
chackhamim say this (based on "lifnei ba yom Hashem").

...
> able to identify something or someone as Moshiach ben Yosef.  The very
> fact that we pray every day that the Tzemach David, i.e. MbY...

What's your source for identifying the two? I would have thought tzemach
david is beis David, not beis Yoseif.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Good decisions come from experience;
micha at aishdas.org        Experience comes from bad decisions.
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