Notes
The tales in this small book stem from many springs. They were collected by the author in his travels through Jewish communities on three continents. Handed down from generation to generation, they lived on in the memories of an isolated people, perennially pre- occupied with the deeds and sayings of their sages and prophets. Many of these tales appear here for the first time in the Western world, having survived in faraway settlements of Yemen, Ethiopia and in the ancient quarters of Morocco, having loaned some inner life to the Jewish people kept in isolation and poverty by an inimical world. In spite of their great differences in text and structure, through all these legends runs the invisible thread of a profound spiritual devotion.
