"This book about the Messianic Old Testament prophecies in the Light of Rabbinical Writings has already seen five Hebrew editions in Israel. It is the first study written in modern Hebrew by a gentile scholar. ... The writer is stepping into the lion's den of the Rabbis and into the fiery furnace of the liberal theologians. But he hopes that others will follow him and promote a similar dialogue in the spirit of tolerance and spiritual democracy." (back cover of book)
"The Author Risto Santala was born on 18th of May 1929. He studied at the University of Helsinki and was ordained as a minister in the Finnish Lutheran Church in 1953. At the University of Jerusalem he attended 1959-60 a Greek Seminar and also one on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Afterwards he passed a course in classical and spoken Arabic. Rev. Santala has written over twenty books. The best known are his studies on "The Messiah in the Old and in the New Testament in the Light of Rabbinical Writings". He wrote them in modern Hebrew. These two books and the study "Paul The Man and the Teacher in the Light of Jewish Sources", have been published e.g. in English, Finnish, Estonian, Chinese and Russian. The Author has lectured on this subject 1975-76 at Concordia Theological Seminar in Springrield, Illinois as well as 1980 and 1993 at The Free Theological Academy in Basel, Switzerland. In Jerusalem he worked between 1957-68 as a teacher and pastor in the Hebrew boarding school of the Finnish Mission. 1968 -75 he was principal of the Bible School of Helsinki returning after it to his literary challenges in Israel until the year 1987. After that he was a vicar of Joutjärvi parish in Lahti from where he retired on an active pension in 1992."