‘Ben Hacane Liber qui dicitur Pelia’: Egidio da Viterbo’s Kabbalistic Excerpts

The article surveys the complex history of Egidio da Viterbo's aquisition, translation, repeated reading and extraction of the Kabbalistic book bearing the title "Sefer ha-Peli'ah" (The Book of Wonder), which harbours a quite definite messianic agenda. On the basis of the study of all the relevant manuscripts, both in Hebrew and Latin, the interest of a Christian Kabbalist for a Jewish esoteric book is presented in detail on the background of Cardinal Egidio's political and eccelsiological ideas. The venomous anti-Christian passages, far from excaping Egidio's attention, are carefully commented and isolated: their aggressiveness does not counterweight, in Egidio's eyes, the vital importance he attributed to this text in uncovering the imminent end of the world and the instauration of a universal monarchy under Charles V, preparing the second coming of the Messiah.