The Messianic Jews of Ethiopia's Gambella region are Evangelical Christian Zionists who adhere to various Jewish practices and understand their faith as authentically emulating the faith of the first followers of Jesus Christ. Drawing on over a year of ethnographic research in this region, Yotam Gidron traces here the rise and evolution of Christian Zionist and Messianic Jewish faiths amongst Nuer communities in the Ethiopia-South Sudan borderlands. This study approaches processes of religious change from the perspective of believers, examining their pursuits of knowledge and transnational connectivity. In doing so, Gidron considers everyday dilemmas concerning spiritual mediation and truth, as they emerged in relation to church genealogies, Christian literacy, modes of prayer and praise, bloodlines, cattle, and the constitution of various human and divine relationships. As a result, he offers timely insights on spiritual and political life at the global margins, and on contemporary African attitudes towards Israel and the Middle East.

‘This book is a fascinating and well-presented study of Messianic Christianity among the Nuer of Gambella town, and its many engaging insights deserve a broad readership in the anthropology of Christianity, the history of religion in Ethiopia, and the nascent study of Messianic Protestantism.’

Jörg Haustein - University of Cambridge

‘Nuer Messianic Judaism produces a multi-layered analysis that accounts for a plurality of economic, political and cultural dynamics contributing to the constitution and transformation of religious formations and identities in an under researched region of Ethiopia.’

Diego Maria Malara - University of Glasgow