Abraham Zacuto: Iberian Rabbi and Astronomer in the Age of Discoveries

It's recording. Okay, hello and welcome to everyone. Thank you so much for joining us here today. I'm excited because we have started a full series that should be going at least through March on Sephardic roots and our heritage and this is kicking us off with a very interesting character. We'll hear more about it. I'm not going to discuss him at all. I want to make sure that you all follow us. that we will be having a whole series in Portuguese with Rabbi Dr. Pereira. So thank you for that. That'll be in January. To kind of give us a taste of what that's going to be, that's going to be November 24th is going to be a Portuguese introduction to the topic. And in addition, we're going to continue our English series starting December 4th. most Wednesdays. The next speaker is going to be Dr. Roger Martinez, and we're excited for that as well. So please do follow us. Please make sure you're on our mailing list. Please help support our programs so we can continue bringing back these quality speakers who I am excited to be hosting. So thank you, Rabbi Pereira, for joining us today. And thank you for being our partner in this series as well. And on that note. Our partners in the series are the Jewish Studies Center of Chabad of Virginia. It's Sammy, who is also the Jewish Unity Through Diversity fiscal sponsor, Reconnectar, the Jeanne Milgram Institute, or Jeanne Milgram herself, as well as our Certificate of Sephardic Ancestry. So I know some of you are aware of that. Those who aren't, please do reach out. Please do follow up. There Many things going on, but we're going to focus now on our history here and Rabbi Abraham Zucuto. So I'm excited again to welcome Rabbi Pereira, who is the Director of Adult Education at Chabad of Virginia, Richmond. And he is the founding director of the RVA, the Jewish Study Center. He has co-authored several books, including Jewish Voices from Portugal and Jewish Ethics from Portugal. He has a long... bio, which I'm not going to repeat each time, but it will come out in various mailings. Needless to say, we very much appreciate your sharing with us. And I won't take away from more of your time, just one more technical detail. Please do put questions or comments in the chat and or Q&A. I will be monitoring if need be. I have permission to interrupt Rabbi Pereira if there's something right there. But otherwise, questions and answers will be at the end. And we will also invite you to open your cameras and or microphones at that point if you want to ask a live question. So just let me know. And I hand it over to you. Thank you very much. Thank you so much. It's absolutely a delight to be with the Institute again. And hopefully this will continue for many, many, many, many years to come. It's wonderful work that you guys are doing. And. And while you were introducing me, I was thinking, I'm going to change my bio because I want the introduction to be very short, because the more people spend time on my introduction, the less time I have to speak. So anyway, so the idea today is to talk about Rabbi Abraham Zakuto. This is an extremely interesting case of someone who managed to excel in both. secular studies, if you want, as a mathematician, as an astronomer, and on Jewish studies. So he's a scholar on both fields, which is something that was not very uncommon in the Sephardic world back then. But be it as it may, he was a quite accomplished scholar. And to put things in perspective, if we want... This is not just a great scholar, but is someone that was riding the wave, as if it were, in a period of extremely intense development in Europe, and at the same time, a period of great catastrophe for the Jewish people. So it's a man of the Renaissance. It's an incredible mind and incredible contributions. And in the meantime, it's also very difficult time to be a Jew with the expulsions of Spain and then the forced conversions and expulsions from Portugal. So we'll look at all of these and how all of this comes together. And I will essentially talk about four different things. We'll talk a little bit about the times of Rabbi Abram Sakuto. It's important to put things in perspective. A little bit about his life. But most of our times will be addressing the contributions to science. And here I already have to apologize that I'm completely ignoring for the purpose of today's discussion. I'm completely ignoring his contributions to Jewish studies. So it's just his contributions to science that I'm focusing upon. And then we'll sort of wrap up and see how his contributions have been regarded throughout times. OK, so let's think a little bit about the time in which Rabbi Abraham Zekut was alive. And again, just to put things in perspective again and looking at the dates. He was born in Salamanca in 1452, and he died in the Ottoman Empire, probably in the land of Israel, in 1515. So he's basically the second half of the 15th century and the beginning of the 16th century. That's what we were talking about. Now, these times when he lived were framed by several... development, several events, historical events that conditioned everything that was going on in Europe in particular. One was the invention of the printing press. The invention of the printing press in the middle 1400s was a paradigm shift in general, and it was very much a paradigm shift in the Jewish world, because for the first time we were able to produce books in a quantity, copies in a quantity that was... comfortable enough for us not to have our books destroyed faster than we could actually write them and reproduce them manually. So printing press was very much adopted by the Jewish world and there is a connection here with Rabbi Zucotto. The other is that the Ottoman Empire at the time was a very powerful force and they were expanding very fast. And not only they were expanding very fast, but they basically at that time, late 15th century, they controlled virtually all commercial routes from Europe to the Middle East, to Asia. And we are going to see that this plays a very important, it's a very important component of what's going on during the time of Rabbi Abram Zaguto. Mostly for one reason that is sort of intuitive, and that is because of all these land routes being blocked by the Ottoman Empire, all the merchants from Italy and from all the other European countries, they were desperate because they did not have a way to make it to Asia to get the different things they were getting. And in particular, spices were the big thing, pepper and other. more sophisticated spices, there was a humongous trade with Asia on that. So that was a problem. And very much related to this is the fact that this is the period of the maritime expansions. So it's the period in which Portugal and Spain happened to be on top of the world. As difficult as that may be to visualize now, they were so much on top of the world. that they thought it was perfectly okay to have a treaty between the two countries and divide the world in two spheres of influence. So, I mean, they were really the powers at the time. And Portugal and the kingdoms of Spain, Spain of course didn't exist, but the kingdoms, the other kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula, they were very much engaged in the expansion, in the maritime explorations and so forth. And here that's where Rabbi Zakutu has an absolutely critical role. in facilitating some of the difficulties and solving some of the difficulties that the maritime expeditions were facing at the time. On the other hand, in the Jewish world, this was a period of very much... It was a very difficult period, not that it was the only difficult period, but it was certainly a very difficult period. The... core of the Jewish population was in the Iberian Peninsula. Most Jews were in the Iberian Peninsula, so it was sort of arguably the center of the Jewish world. And as we know, in 1492, the Jewish population was expelled from Spain. Many of the Jews from Spain came to Portugal, Rabbi Zakutu included, we'll get to that. And then, just a few years after, in 1497, there is, well, 1496, 1497, there is a decree of expulsion from Portugal, which is not a decree of expulsion in the sense that what happens in reality is that the Jewish population is massively converted by force and prevented from leaving the country. So, and Rabbi Zagut is in the middle of all of this. He's in Spain in 1492, he's in Portugal in 1496 and 1497. And then this is the time of the beginning of the Sephardic diaspora, the Jewish diaspora, and that's why people like Rabbi Zacuto, who was born in Spain and they're living in Portugal, and that ended up in the Ottoman Empire, ended up in the land of Israel. So he was already someone showing this diaspora, these different exile routes. in the aftermath of the expulsions and forced convergence from the Iberian Peninsula. So these are the things that are framing the times of Rabbi Ram Zekut. Now, a little bit about his life. So he was born in Salamanca, to the best of our understanding. There are other opinions, but be it as it may. He came from a very prestigious family. Actually, his family came from the southern areas of France, from the Provence. And in Jewish thought, especially in that time period, Provence was a very strong bastion of Jewish learning. So it's a very prestigious area and a very prestigious family. He had absolutely fabulous Jewish education through his family. And he was a student. also of Rabbi Isaac Aboab, and that's an important name in and of itself. And the thing that is interesting, not very unique, but the thing that's very interesting about Rabbi Zakutu is that together with an absolutely outstanding Jewish education, he got an equally outstanding secular education. Just as a footnote, in the Sephardic world, the two things were never perceived as incompatible, quite the opposite. It's mostly an Ashkenazi take on these things that Jewish studies are everything and you minimize or you put in the second place secular education. That's not a typical Sephardic approach. And so he got an excellent education and relatively early he was offered a position in the University of Salamanca. as a mathematician, as an astronomer. At that time, he was actually in very good relations with all the hierarchy, political and religious hierarchy, in this case, Catholic. So, otherwise, he would not be able to be in university. But be it as it may, he is from a very young age, college instructor, college professor, and he starts writing also very early. So he's barely 25, 26 years old when he starts writing well, his first writings. In the meantime, he ends up going through different places. He goes to other universities for a while, he goes around. But the most important thing is that he is so much integrated in all of these, in the scientific world and everything in Spain, that he, we have evidence, we have records already, that in 1486, he meets with Columbus, Christopher Columbus. And it's a meeting with Christopher Columbus that it's facilitating, among others, by the Rabbi Barbanel, by Itzhak Barbanel, and it is already in preparation for what would be than in 1492, the voyages of Columbus. So there is a very deep connection between Abraham Zacuto, Rabbi Zacuto, and Columbus, Christopher Columbus. A connection, a scientific connection, mostly. It's not, well, it's a scientific connection. So when it comes to 1492, so Rabbi Zakut is about 40 years old, and it's the expulsion from Spain. And with the expulsion from Spain, obviously, he was expelled from Spain. He left with his family, and he settled in Portugal, like many other Jews from Spain settled in Portugal. In this specific case, even more so, because Rabbi Zakut already had significant connections with Portugal. One of his students was Josef Vizinho, who was already at that time one of the astronomers, a Jewish astronomer of the kingdom, King John II at the time. So you already have those connections, but at the same time... One of the leaders, maybe the major leader of the Spanish exiles that took, that basically seek refuge in Portugal at that time was Rabbi Itzhak Abalab, who was his teacher. So it was a very natural thing that he just went with his teacher to Portugal. In fact, his teacher... died a couple of months after going to Portugal, and Rabbi Zakut is the one that wrote the eulogy, the funeral eulogy of Rabbi Isaac Aboua. Very soon after he arrives in Portugal, and again, keep in mind the expulsion from Spain is in August of 1492, by 1493 we already have documentation. in the Portuguese archives that shows that he was the official astronomer of the king. Because we have documents of payments, documents that mention him as the chief mathematician or the chief astronomer of the king. So it was a very smooth transition, so to speak. When the king, John II, dies, a new king comes into the picture. He continues being the mathematician. of the crown and a major advisor in terms of anything that had to do with astronomy and navigation and so forth. And we know that at the time he meets with Vasco da Gama, well, he was a major Portuguese navigator that found the maritime way to India, the maritime routes. So he's in the middle of everything, also in Portugal now. And then it comes 1497 with the expulsion from Portugal and the forced conversions. And here we have Rabbi Zacuto's family again having to be on the run. And in fact, he was able to flee Portugal, we know, with part of his family, one of his kids. But we also know that... Most of his family actually stayed behind and they were not allowed to leave. They were forcibly converted and they were forced to stay in the country. More on that later on. So after that, he goes through North Africa, where he does a lot of his writings. He ended up then going to the Ottoman Empire. He spends a fair amount of time in Jerusalem. He has some family in Jerusalem. And basically the last years of his life, he is between Jerusalem and Damascus. And we are not completely sure where he died, either Jerusalem or Damascus. But that's basically the story of his life. So what we have until now, as we pass to the issue of his scientific contributions, is we have a good idea. about the things that are going around him. And hopefully we have a good idea that he's in the middle of everything. He's in the middle of everything in terms of the Jewish life. I mean, he's riding this horrible wave of these persecutions, these expulsions from Spain and then from Portugal. Okay, he's exiled twice. And on the other hand, he's very much also riding the wave of the... basically the scientific elite of the two countries that were on the top of the world at that time and were engaging in this major globalization, as we would call it today, effort. So this leads us to trying to understand how incredibly important his scientific contributions were. So let's understand a little bit closer the nature of the situation. What was the big issue for the different kingdoms, for the secular powers? in Europe at this time, what was the essence of the situation? The essence of the situation was that there was a major concern and the major need to find alternative routes to Asia. All the trade has been blocked, as we mentioned before, because of the Ottoman conquest of most of what is Eastern Europe, and they were at the doors of Vienna. in Austria now. So at that time, the assumption could have been that the Ottoman Empire is going to be conquering most of Europe. Didn't happen, but it was certainly a very plausible situation. So what we have then is that the European countries, you're talking about Italy, the different Italian states. You're talking about the Iberian Peninsula also, but you're talking about France and Antwerp and then what is now Belgium and Holland and the United Kingdom now, what is now the United Kingdom. They were being strangulated because they didn't have access to their most important trade routes to Asia. And of course, as I mentioned before, spices were very important for many reasons, among the reasons being that they were a close substitute at the time for refrigeration. We don't need to elaborate on that, which is a way of saying that spices were incredibly important back then, but also silk and other types of fabrics that were noble fabrics. So these were big businesses. So because all these trade routes were disrupted, then the name of the game was, since we cannot go to Asia by by land, we have to find a way of going to Asia by the sea, by ocean. We need to find a maritime route to Asia. Okay. So this is the main quest. And all the politics, all the policies, all the scientific research, the top of the concern was this, to find a route, the maritime route for from Europe to Asia. And you can say, but what is the problem with that? Why was that so complicated? Well, it was very complicated. It was actually started by being impossible. And whoever would discover those routes would get the monopoly, essentially, of all this trade. So the stakes were incredibly high. What was the problem? What were the problems? The problem was that to navigate all the way to Asia, you had to go around the Horn of Africa. And first of all, we didn't know the maps. It's not as if people knew the map of Africa as we know it today. So they didn't. And in fact, at the time, there was this idea that at the Horn of Africa, the world would end. I'm not sure exactly how that would work, but it would be the end of the world. So there was a little trepidation to even try to go through that. So, but on the more serious vein, you have in that area, very strong currents that are not very well known and are very dangerous. You have also, when you come a little bit further up, meaning closer to Europe, you have a huge problem. That is, again, the currents don't allow you to benefit from the winds as much as otherwise you would want. And again, keep in mind that all the maritime travel was fueled, so to speak, by wind. It's the sails, wind sails. There is nothing. It's winds and currents. So what we have is this situation that you have currents. If you leave Europe and you start going south, you have currents that take you. not south, but take you in the direction of what is America. Okay. But you want to go south. But be it as it may, the moment you get taken by the currents away from the coast, then we have problems because all the navigation at the time was done by sight. So the coast, you know where you are because you look at the coast that is next to you and you see where you are. High sea navigation was not common at all. Certainly not this part of the world. High sea navigation. where you don't have landmarks that allow you to know where you are, this was a big problem. So you have two problems. One is that you don't know the currents very well, and the second is that even if you know the currents, you don't have a GPS that will tell you where to go. So this was incredibly dangerous and that's why it was so difficult to do anything. It turns out that Rabbi Ezekiel too... is someone who brings essentially the answer to these questions. I'm not going to say that he's the only person, but he's certainly one of the major contributors to solving this puzzle. How can we navigate the high ocean if we cannot see the coast? We have to orient ourselves by... the position of the sun during the day, by the stars during the night. So we have to orient ourselves, we have to guide ourselves to know where we are by looking at the stars, again, at night, and looking at the sun during the day, because we cannot do anything just looking at the coast. So suddenly... Knowing a lot about astronomy and knowing exactly where the planets are and the constellations are and everything is, is going to be fundamental. Knowing how they change, the so-called ephemerides, how the relative location of the sun and the moon and this planet and that planet are at a very specific time frame, this is fundamental to know. And this is very difficult knowledge. complicated knowledge to develop. And this is where Rabbi Zakutu jumps into and makes an absolutely major contribution that would be used for a long time. So Rabbi Zakutu wrote what is called, I mean, that's different names, but it's referred to as the Almanac Perpetuum. That's the name in Latin, the Almanac Perpetuum. And the Almanac Perpetuum is basically an enormous number of tables. You're talking about astronomical tables that tell us for a certain period of time where the different stars or the different planets, where everything is. Where everything is, allowing you to... have an idea of, first of all, where you are, because knowing the position of the stars, the relative position, will allow you to figure out where you are and which direction to go and so forth. So these were incredibly complicated tables and they required a very, a lot of a lot of deep and sophisticated knowledge about astronomy. Here, maybe allow me to make a parenthesis because there is a very interesting side note here. And that is these type of tables like this, if you want to find them today, where you will find them is in astrology, astrology sites. Astrology uses a lot of these types of tables. And it's not a coincidence because at the time, there was not a very clear difference between astronomy and astrology. Rabbi Zakuto wrote a lot about astrology. So all of this was very important for the navigations. But all of this was also very important from an astrological perspective to know exactly what the planets were or what God was trying to communicate with us through the planets. God knows what. All the astrology things. So there was that component of this research, which again, it's not very important for us. But... These tables are the tables that are the basis of all the tables that are used today in astrology as well. Okay, or whatever that's worth. So the Almanac Perpetuum was written still while Rabbi Ezekut was in Salamanca. was written originally in Hebrew with the name Akhibura Gagadol, it's the big computations. And this is a book that was printed for the first time in 1496 in Leiria in Portugal, and it was printed in Latin and Spanish with the Latin and Spanish translations, which is very interesting. The Latin and Spanish translations were developed by his former student, Josef Vizinho. And I think they were printed in Leiria. And to the best of our understanding, actually, this is the last book that was printed in a Hebrew printing press in Portugal before expulsion, before the end of Jewish life in the Iberian Peninsula. It was the last book to be printed. Now, it's not just the last book to be printed. It's the first scientific book that is printed in the Iberian Peninsula in any language. The first scientific book. It's the first book in mathematics. The first book in astronomy. The first book in anything that is not more religiously oriented. It's the first scientific book. It's the first book that is published in a Hebrew printing house ever that is in a language that is not Hebrew. This is not trivial. And this is not trivial. Why? Because. it was very expensive to produce the mobile characters, the metal mobile characters that you use to print in this new technology of printing press. And if you have this printing shop that has all the characters, different alphabets, cursive, not cursive, in Hebrew, but you don't have that in the Gothic characters. You don't have that with Latin characters. So you have to develop the Latin characters, which they did. But this is the first time ever in the Jewish world that you have a Hebrew printing press that publishes a non-Hebrew book and a non-religious book at that. It's the only case before the year 1500s. It's the only case that we know that is known in the history of the printing press, the only case in the 15th century. So in the 1400s. So very important book, again, is translated into Latin and in Portuguese and in Spanish. And notice that it's translated into Latin and Spanish because it's to be used by the people around that need to use these books for the purposes of facilitating the maritime expeditions. It should be mentioned that there was a little bit of a Spanish translation. already before that was not printed, but it existed before. That's the translation that was used by Christopher Columbus. So, and that Spanish translation, that manuscript was used then to produce this print edition in Spanish. This book was used extensively by Columbus, was used extensively by the Portuguese navigators, Vasco da Gama and others, was translated almost immediately into Latin, as I say, into Spanish, into Arabic, it was used all over the world and updated. Because again, this gives the relative motions for a certain number of years. This is an incredibly consequential book. It's an enormous impact that is used extensively after the expulsion, used extensively by all these powers way after Rabbi Zekruto is dead. So, I mean, for decades into the 1500s, the book is used as sort of the Bible of navigation. You cannot go anywhere without it. The other contribution that is very important is, OK, so you can look at the stars and see how they are, but you have to measure. You have to measure. the distance between the stars because that's what's going to tell you where you are. Okay, so just having a table of astronomical occurrences is not good enough. You need to have, it's like instead of having a GPS, you just have a map. But if you have a map and you don't know where you are in the map, it's not going to help. So you need something to measure, some distances to measure the declinations to measure. things to allow you to identify where you are. And the problem is that all the instruments that were used at the time in the sea, in the ocean, they were not developed. Why? Because those were instruments that had just been taken from land trips, land voyages. They were not adapted to the ocean and they were never needed before because all the ocean travel was close to the coast. You didn't need those things, but now you do and you need precision. And all the... instruments that were used in land were made of wood, which did not, was not very good in terms of precision. All the instruments were based on looking directly at the stars. And guess what? Now you have to look at the sun as well, which is a different game when you have to look at the sun. We know you cannot look directly at the sun, so you need to have some roundabout way around it. And if this is not worth, not enough, most. most of the measurements were based on identifying where the North Pole was, and the constellations around the North Pole. And that's great, except that when you get closer and closer to the equator, as they were going, well, you cannot see. The North Pole, you cannot see those constellations anymore. So you need an instrument to measure things. And guess what? Abraham Zakutu, Rabbi Zakutu, developed exactly, not from scratch, but developed what is called to this day the Mariner Astrolabe, which is made of metal and is very precise and is exactly designed to be used in the ocean and used also to... measure the positionings of the Sun, not just the stars. So he adapted the quadrant and the australabs that were used in land to the maritime use. So the Mariner's australab is a contribution, another contribution of Rabbi Abraham Zakut. So with these contributions it's hardly surprising, and we can just look at a little bit of a timeline here, that... that Rabbi Zagut was on top of everything when it comes to the maritime discoveries, the maritime travels. So we know that he met the King Ferdinando and Queen Isabel as early as 1486. So this is six years before the expulsion and six years also before the voyage of Cuesto de Columbus. We know also that as early as 1487, Columbus and Rabbi Zacuto had several meetings, and at that time Columbus already had a Spanish translation of the Almanac Perpetuum that he was using, using, and used for quite some time. And we know that in 1492, that when Columbus goes into his expeditions, he takes with himself the Almanac Perpetuum, all the tables of Rabbi Zakutu as a way of orienting himself. And that is true in his first voyage, is true in the two other voyages that Columbus makes. Sequentially, he takes with him always this copy of the Almanac Perpetuum, of these tables, and uses them extensively. And they are widely annotated with Columbus handwriting, and they still exist, those tables. They are in the Colombian, Colombiano Museum in Seville, in Spain. They are there. Anyone who goes to Seville and goes to this Museum of Columbus, you can see those tables that he used so extensively. There is one... Very interesting story with these tables that I want to mention to you. Because in the writings of Christopher Columbus, he tells us that the tables saved his life at some point. The tables saved his life. And he explains this third voyage. It's 1504, 1505. And at this time, they got stranded. He's... vessels, this ship got stranded in Hispaniola. So basically in the... And the problem was that they didn't have food, they didn't have water. The natives of the islands where they were were not being very cooperative, to say the least. And they were not giving them any food or anything, and they were not letting them leave either. So they were stuck. And Christopher Columbus writes that he thinks that maybe this is going to be it. We are going to die. We don't have anything to eat or drink, and they didn't want to let us go. So Christopher Columbus decided, and again, this is what he describes. he decided to outsmart the natives, so to speak. And he told the natives that if they don't give him food and let him go, he is going to steal, he's going to rob the moon and take the moon away from them. Okay, of course, the natives were not particularly convinced. But it so happens that it gets to the night. And guess what? There is no moon. and the natives freak out and give everything that Christopher Columbus wants and goes and there he goes. He leaves with the, they let him go. So basically he saved his life. Now how did he, what is it that he knew? He knew from the tables of Rabbi Izakutu that there would be a lunar eclipse that night. He knew because these things were recorded there. So there's going to be a lunar eclipse. So he used that knowledge to tell the natives that he's going to steal the moon, he's going to rob the moon from them. And of course, it was a little bit of a trick, but it's absolutely incredible how this knowledge, according to Columbus, this knowledge of the tables and all these ephemerids, as they are called, saved his life. That's what he says. When he moves to Portugal, he continues doing all types of... of advice in 1493, he is actually known for having been very close to the very end in advising Vasco da Gama in his expeditions to find the maritime way to India. Vasco da Gama, he leaves Portugal for his voyage in July of 1497, so a couple of months before. the forced convergence, the bulk of the forced convergence. And this in the middle right here, it's actually tapestry that shows the departure of, I mean, it's a symbolic showing of the departure of the caravans, the Vasco da Gama caravans to India. And it shows among other things, circled here, Rabbi Zakuto. giving the crown and giving Vasco da Gama the tables, the almanac perpetuum, the tables. So the tables and the Australab played a major role in both Columbus and in the case of the Portuguese. And that is celebrated in all types of documentation from the time. Trying to wrap things up and tell you a little bit about how his legacy is understood to this day, his legacy was understood as extremely important. And again, notice that we are just talking about the scientific part. I didn't say anything about his Jewish writings. The contribution was recognized from the very beginning. So, for example. There was a clear knowledge in Spain that the connection between Rabbi Zacuto and Columbus was fundamental in determining the future of the expeditions and so forth. And in 1986, so it was celebrating 500 years from... the first meeting of Columbus and the Queen, Isabel and Ferdinando. In the celebration of that, the Spanish government issued a commemorative medal, a coin, that features the three people that were perceived to be the most important people making the Columbus trips and voyages possible. And that is Rabbi Zacuto. It's... Rabbi Isaac Abravanel as a financier. And Luis Santangel, Luis Santangel was a conversal. It was a very famous Jewish family that converted, was converted by force, but they remained converses for a while. So it's fascinating to see that by 1986, the Spanish authorities recognized that. Columbus voyages were possible because of three Jews. I mean, this is, I could not have invented this, if you know what I mean. The other thing that is very interesting is that in the Portuguese chronicles also, there is, from the beginning, detailed descriptions of how important not only the astrolabe but also the Almanac Perpetuum was. So, in the legends from India that was first published in 1566, and this is the records of all those voyages, it's extensively mentioned, the Rabbis are good by name, in the what is considered the masterpiece of Portuguese literature that is the Lusíadas, is poetry and Here there are references as well to, although not by name, but there are references as well to Rabbi Zacuto in this major poem, was first published in 1572. And again, for many, this Lusíadas is really, I mean, it's the essence of what Portuguese history is. And it mentions, let's see where that is. I don't know where I put that. Well. maybe I raised that slide. But in the Lusitas, it mentions explicitly two things. It mentions the Australab, Australab and how important it was. And then it has another interesting mention that according to some historians, it's a very fabulous mention. And that is, okay, now, anyone that is a little familiar with Portuguese history of the time remembers to hear the idea that before Vasco da Gama went on his expedition, the day before there was the ancient man, the old man, the old sage from Belém, the old sage from Restilo that advised him and taught him all types of things about the navigation and so forth. And guess what? that ancient sage, that elder sage from Restelo that is such a mythical figure in Portuguese history, well, that's Rabbi Abraham Zacuto. It's not a universal opinion, but it's according to most opinions. Fascinating to see that the last king of Portugal was deposed in 19... 1910. And he was very much into Portuguese history, in particular, the history of the period of the other king with name Manuel, which was the king of the time of Rabbi Zakut. And he did his research and he published in 1920s in the American Hebrew. The American Hebrew is a was a magazine from New York at the time. He writes an article that is fascinating because He says, basically what he says is that it's unbelievable how Rabbi Zacuto contributes so much to the development, to the zenith, a glory of Portugal and Spain at the time, and how horribly treated he was. So the title is a victim of royal ingratitude. That's what he calls the article. He paved the way to the glory of Portugal and Spain and yet he was kicked out. by both countries. As a final thought, and again for those of us that are still not convinced of what I said and maybe think that I'm exaggerating in all of these, well in recognition for these contributions to astronomy, Rabbi Zakut was honored first in the 1700s and then in 1935 with having crater in the moon that is named after him is the zakut zakut crater These, incidentally, the names of the craters in the moon, if you're interested in where this comes from, they were introduced in the middle 1700s originally by a Jesuit priest. So it was a Jesuit priest that decided for the first time to name one of the craters after Rabbi Abraham Tzakut. Of course, he was a Jesuit priest. He was an astronomer as well. And in 1935, what changed was that. All these names and the standards pertaining to the stars and the moon and all the celestial objects became in the jurisdiction of the National Astronomy, whatever. So there is an academy that deals with this thing. I don't remember the name of that academy. And in 1935, they confirmed the name of this crater. So Rabbi Zagud has a crater in the moon named after him. the Zakutu crater. Okay, so Rabbi Zakutu was the epitome of a renaissance man. He is an incredibly strong Jew. I mean, for all accounts, he is a Jewish leader as well. But he's also a mathematician, he's an astronomer, he's a cartographer. And he played a major role in advising both the Spanish, in particular Columbus, and the Portuguese navigations, in particular Vasco da Gama. And I will end here. There are maybe a couple of footnotes that I can add, just one footnote. Maybe we should answer some questions before you do that. No problem. Because that's also kind of like a footnote. And there was a... Interesting question here. I found it interesting. You called him rabbi. Was he called rabbi at the time? Is there a smicha process that he went through? Okay, so those are actually two different questions. Okay. Yes, he was referred to as rabbi. At the time, he is referred as rabbi in the colophon, meaning in sort of the... the documentation of the printed book in 1496 is referred as Rabbi Zakuto in some of, I actually don't know, let me just look at the first image because this right here at the end, this at the end is the signature of Rabbi Zakuto in a document from 1493, the first time that he's mentioned. And he signs himself as a Rabbi Abraham Zakuta. So this is his signature. And he refers himself as the calculator, the mathematician of the King Manuel of King. So, I mean, this, of course, the document is not in Hebrew. The document is a crown document giving him money. But he is saying, oh, I got this money. That's basically what this is. And this document is in the Portuguese National Archives. anyone can see it if you know what you're looking for. So, that was a rabbi recognized as such by everybody, there's no question about that, both in the Jewish world and the outside. Now, when you say, if you have the process of smicha, then we get into a completely different question, because the notion of smicha, as we have it today, and please forgive me for phrasing it this way, is very much a Nashkenazic concept. It's not a Sephardic concept. The Sephardic concept of smicha was when you learn and you get to a point in which your teacher tells you to start teaching Talmud and Jewish law and things like that, then you got smicha. That's what it means. You got permission to teach. So it was a much more informal process, much more informal. And it was a process that not only required great knowledge of Jewish stuff, but required a lot of knowledge about non-Jewish stuff as well. Point being that you didn't want people to be ignorant. And when they are going to talk to the crown and things like that, they didn't know anything about, let's say, Greek philosophy or Roman philosophy. They have to be conversant on these things so they wouldn't look like ignoramuses. So it was a much more informal process, but there's no question that he's recognized by everybody as a rabbi. He was a teacher. But I'm not sure that he had a formal exam, as you would expect somebody to be. But he was constantly tested in his learning. Yes, yes. Look, the truth of the matter is that the rabbi is a title that you have to earn it. This is not like getting a bachelor degree, that you go through an exam and that's it, you get the degree. That's devaluing the whole idea. The whole idea is... Are people going to recognize you as a teacher, as a leader? If people recognize you that way, then you are a rabbi. If the people don't recognize you that way, it doesn't matter how many certificates you have. Because, I mean, people don't recognize you. So historically speaking was a very different mechanism. Today, there is not such a big difference. But again, this is a side note. That's a really important point. So thank you, and thank you particularly. for bringing that up. I want to be cognizant of people's times and we will, God willing, have Rabbi Pereira back. So we will continue this and other conversations except that... Okay, but it would be very unfair if at least I don't answer the question that was posed to you before. So I'm going to just make sure you will receive a recording of this, so those who have to go, I understand it is... the end of our hour. I really appreciate that Rabbi Pereira is open to staying. And so we will make sure to answer that question. And then I would pose another one or two, if that's okay, that came in. Absolutely. And I just want to remind everybody that this is a series and we will have Rabbi Pereira back in the series. And we will be having Professor Ronnie Pirellis and Jeannie Milgram and Dr. Roger Martinez de Vila and Professor Rene, sorry, Rene Levine-Malamid and Dr. Debbie Corrin. So it'll, I really suggest and recommend that you follow us. Make sure to get our emails and our newsletters. And we look forward to hearing you back. Those who can stay, please do. And thank you. Okay. So now for the few, the proud, let me know the. questions and we can even start with that one that someone posed. You want to start with that one? Yes, why don't you just read that question? Is there a possible relationship of Abraham Zucuto with Gaspar de Gama who arrived in Lisbon in 1498 coming from Calcutta? Okay, so let me tell you because that's a fascinating question for many different reasons. Let me see if I can okay find right here. Okay, so the Gaspar da Gama, that is referred to in the question, was a pilot. It was a pilot in a lot of the expeditions of Vasht da Gama. And it so happens that Gaspar da Gama, that was not his original name, he was a Jew from from Calcutta. There was a fairly large Jewish community in the area. And he was actually taken prisoner and converted by force. And the person that sponsored this conversion to Christianity was Vasco da Gama. So it was sort of typical at the time that you adopt the family name of the person that was your sponsor. So he became Gaspar da Gama. That's his name. Portuguese is a secular name. If you want, we don't know what his Hebrew name was. And he was an incredibly helpful person because he spoke many languages. So he not only knew about all the oceans and all the currents and everything in that area of the world, but he spoke Arabic and he spoke Hebrew and he spoke all. This was an incredible asset. And the reality is that although he was converted by force, he sort of, I mean, I don't know if he became a very devout Christian, we don't have any evidence about that. What we have is evidence that he never made any effort to leave. So, he was okay with whatever it was going on. Okay, so that's who Gaspar da Gama is. So there is no, there is a very strong connection between Gaspar da Gama and Vasco da Gama, and I'm sure that used a lot the, it had to be, used a lot the documents, the tables, and the astrolabe developed by Abraham Sakut, or rather Sakut, but the overwhelming odds are that they never met, and there is no indication whatsoever that they are related. And again, the overwhelming odds are that they never met because Rabbi Izakutu left Portugal in around the summer, we presume, of 1497. And Gaspar da Gama only came to Portugal the first time in 1498, when Vasco da Gama returned from his first expedition to India. So, the immediate answer to the question is there is no evidence whatsoever and there is no reason to believe whatsoever that they are related family. However, there is a fascinating story that I found recently about Gaspar da Gama that I want to share with you. Because this is, I mean, I could say that this is, well, it's not a known story. It took a fair amount of effort to find it. Okay, but this is the story. In 1497, when there was, well, 1496, 1497, when was the decree of expulsion from Portugal and at the same time all the process of forced conversions, one of the things that was done from the very beginning was confiscation of Hebrew books. And this is starting still in December of 1496, confiscation of Hebrew books. a confiscation of ritual objects. All these Hebrew books were placed in storage areas that were essentially where the synagogues were closed immediately. So what I'm saying literally is that the decree of expulsion is issued in the early December of 1496 and very soon thereafter Jewish life is cut short. That's not like in Spain that people were allowed to continue for six or seven months. Life was cut short and all these Hebrew manuscripts and books and everything was confiscated. Okay, now what did the crown decide to do with these books? They didn't really know too much what to do with the books, so we have records of the books being used by almost the truckload to pay things. So, for example, you need to pay ransom or the crown needed to pay ransom for some captives in North Africa, you send a trunk of books, Hebrew books, and they are worth a certain thing. Or on the other hand, you have people that had access to the books that simply stole the books and then sold them. So there is a lot going on here. Now, what's the point now? In 1505, 1505... but we are talking about eight years already after the expulsion and the forced convergence, in one of the trips to India with a new vice king, as they were called, Viswar, the new governor of India that was taking possession. The new governor of India took with himself several trunks of Hebrew books. And when he got to India, Kuching and other areas, he offered the Jewish community to buy the books, if they wanted to buy the books. And the books were bought, indeed, by the effort of a Jewish lady. And this Jewish lady, again, She did everything she could to collect the money and to do everything and buy the books. And so the books were bought. And then there is a sort of a follow up because there was a lot of confusion whether the crown wanted the books to be sold or not. But let's forget about that. Now, why? What is the connection? The connection is that this lady that bought the books is the wife of Gaspar da Gama. She's the wife of Gaspar da Gama that never left Judaism. And she actually ended up being denounced by the husband as being a very staunch Jewess. Not that anything came out of it, but this is the wife of Gaspar da Gama. And this story is very moving in many different dimensions. One, because you have the books that are precious books of Portuguese and Spanish Jewry. just being handled as if they were garbage. I mean, they really didn't have a notion of what the books were. I mean, the books were used to cut the books and just use those pages as covers for the other books. It was unbelievable. But the other thing is also it tells us the tragedy. This is in the microcosmos, the tragedy of these families. There are many cases of families where the husband converts and the wife does not, or vice versa. Plenty of cases like this. And this is dramatic. I mean, I don't have to tell you why it is dramatic, but this is one case. Another very famous case, situation similar is the case of Rabbi Shlomo Alevi of Burgos, Rabbi Shlomo Alevi that became Pablo the Santa Maria and became the Archbishop of Burgos and his wife never converted. And it was always a tension. I mean, they were married, but the wife never converted, never accepted. And the ignominy of everything is that he ended up, after she died, having her buried in the Cathedral of Burgos. So again, the point is, The fact that this lady that defied everything to get those books is the wife of Gaspar de Gama. So I found not long time ago the documents showing all of that. Anyway, that's the... Oh, that's very, very interesting. And Victor is asking if and what is the relationship between Gaspar and Vasco de Gama? They have no relationship whatsoever. That's what I thought you said. I just wanted to be sure. The relationship is that the, okay, basically when you have, at that time, when you have Jewish people being converted by force, there was an awareness that they did not know much about Christianity. That means that typically they needed a sponsor. They needed somebody that would vouch for them. You can call it whatever you want, but a sponsor. And Vasco da Gama was the sponsor of Gaspar da Gama. And as it was normal at the time, since Gaspar did not have a secular name, he just adopted the family name of Vasco da Gama. So they don't have any relation. But yeah, so you can think about Vasco da Gama as the godfather of... the baptism godfather of Gespar Legan. So here's a problem. I think we have to have you back talking about him again because this question seems very big. Can you talk about Zacuto and Kabbalah? I just think that's a whole other topic that is not going to be done in the next five minutes. Well, I actually exercised some self-restraint by eliminating from this PowerPoint everything that had to do with that topic. Right, I think that's a whole other topic that's huge. Yes, but I can tell you very briefly what the connection is. First of all, there is no evidence in and of itself that Rabbi Zakut was a Kabbalist. I don't have any reason to believe that he's a Kabbalist from all his writings. However, he has an incredible connection with Kabbalah and he's a name that is constantly referred in. certain circles and certain contexts. Why? Because in one of his Hebrew books that is called Sefer Yuchassim, it's a book of generations, it's a history book. In his history book, among the many different things that he talks about, he talks about the effort by the main sages of Eretz Israel. in the 1300s, 1200s, 1300s. the major effort of trying to figure out what was the story with the Zohar, the great book of the Zohar. Okay, what is the story with the book of the Zohar that remains to this day? If you go to the Orthodox world or the traditional Jewish world and you ask who wrote the Zohar, they will tell you it was Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai and it was written in the around the time of Rabbi Akiva, so you're talking about, broadly speaking, the second century of the Common Era. Okay, that's... if you go to academia, to a university, and you ask the question, they will tell you, well, this book was written by Rabbi Moshe de Leon in Spain in the late 1200s. Okay, so this question that exists now, it's a question that existed at the time, because the sages of Eretz Israel, the land of Israel, they were somewhat puzzled by the fact that there was a major Kabbalistic book that they were not very aware of, okay? And there were great Kabbalists, great Mekupalim, but they were not aware of. Now, they knew that Kabbalah was transmitted in secret, so it was not impossible, but if there is such an important book that we don't know of, we want to know. So, they send an emissary, Rabbi Itzhak, from Acre to the Iberian Peninsula to investigate this on purpose and to get the book and to figure out what what's the story. Is this really some something ancient from the Rashbi, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, or is this something that that Moshe de Leon wrote? So did Moshe de Leon publicize it, made it public, or did he write it? So the Rabbi Itzhak and notice that all of this that I'm saying is the description that Rabbi Abraham Zakkoult presents to us in that book, the history book, the Seferi Chassim. So that's his discussion of what happened. So he's telling us that Rabbi Itzhak from Acre went to investigate. And so he first goes to talk about Rabbi Moshe de Leon. And Rabbi Moshe de Leon tells you, okay, I will show you the original that was written, even with the handwriting of maybe the Rashvi, or I will show the origin. And in the meantime, in the meantime, Rabbi Moshe de Leon died. So he didn't have anything. He was not able to see anything. And then after that, you start having a lot of problems, writes Abraham Zakuto, because seven people stuck. telling Rabbi Itzhak that this was really an invention of Rabbi Moshe de Leon to make money. So there was a lot of confusion there, accusing Rabbi Moshe de Leon of basically developing a forgery, although this at the time would not be understood as a forgery. The concept of forgery was very different at the time. But the point was that this was something that Rabbi Moshe de Leon wrote and not... the Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, so it didn't have the authority of being an ancient writing. That's what he wanted to investigate. And with all these opinions, he said that Rabbi Itzhak of Acre, he went out of the way, spent there maybe a couple of years talking to people, talking to different people, collecting all the information to make a deliberation on whether or not this was an original, written by Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai. or it was written by Rabbi Moshe de Leon. And now this could be a movie script because the documentation that was left by Rabbi Itzhak of Akkar is described by Rabbi Yom HaRam Zekutu the following way, I'll paraphrase it. after searching everything and after recording everything that he came to the conclusion about this, he was able to come to a very deliberate decision, without any shadow of a doubt, that this book was. And this book was. That's where, that's where the narrative from Rabbi Itzhak of Akker. And this book was, he knows for sure, but that part of the... That's the next page and we don't have the next page. This again, it could be a movie, it's a cliffhanger. So after all of these, he came to complete conclusion, except that, well, we don't know what the conclusion is. And Rabbi Izakut tells us that although we don't have this, that from writings of Rabbi Itzhak Akker and others after, we can infer that the conclusion was that indeed this was written by Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai. So it was not a forgery, it was that that's his conclusion. Now this is a very famous piece of information, is a very famous point of contention in the in the kabbalistic circles. It's enough to say that that book of Rabbi of Rabbi Izakutu, the history book was printed for the first time in the 1550s or so. It was printed the second time in Krakow, Poland, towards the end of the 1500s. And in the second edition of the book, all that part about searching about the Zohar and everything was eliminated, was cut, was censored, censored by the Jewish printers. money. It was just too much questioning and everything. So now that book, we were able to bring it back because there were earlier printings of the book. But for a couple of hundred years, that part had been deleted. It was censored from the book because again, it challenges too much. this issue of whether what is the authority of the Zohar. So, incredible story. Yeah, well, like we said, it's a very large other topic, but thank you for kind of just giving us a little bit, and particularly that in reaction to the historical fiction that we started with. So that's an interesting point in that. So remember, historical fictions aren't always true. So thank you. I'm going to send, I know people said many thanks and appreciation to you. I'm going to send you the transcript of the chat so you can see what people said. You can also see if there are follow-up questions for other times. So thank you all. Please know that your chats will be getting to Rabbi Pereira. I will send them to you. Thank you all for staying. Thank you all for joining. Thank you all for listening. And thank you particularly, Rabbi Pereira, for a really insightful and interesting talk. And we hope to see you all again soon. Thank you so much to everybody. Bye.

We'll hear more about it. I'm not going to discuss him at all. I want to make sure that you all follow us. that we will be having a whole series in Portuguese with Rabbi Dr. Pereira. So thank you for that.

That'll be in January. To kind of give us a taste of what that's going to be, that's going to be November 24th is going to be a Portuguese introduction to the topic. And in addition, we're going to continue our English series starting December 4th.

most Wednesdays. The next speaker is going to be Dr. Roger Martinez, and we're excited for that as well. So please do follow us. Please make sure you're on our mailing list. Please help support our programs so we can continue bringing back these quality speakers who I am excited to be hosting.

So thank you, Rabbi Pereira, for joining us today. And thank you for being our partner in this series as well. And on that note.

Our partners in the series are the Jewish Studies Center of Chabad of Virginia. It's Sammy, who is also the Jewish Unity Through Diversity fiscal sponsor, Reconnectar, the Jeanne Milgram Institute, or Jeanne Milgram herself, as well as our Certificate of Sephardic Ancestry. So I know some of you are aware of that.

Those who aren't, please do reach out. Please do follow up. There Many things going on, but we're going to focus now on our history here and Rabbi Abraham Zucuto.

So I'm excited again to welcome Rabbi Pereira, who is the Director of Adult Education at Chabad of Virginia, Richmond. And he is the founding director of the RVA, the Jewish Study Center. He has co-authored several books, including Jewish Voices from Portugal and Jewish Ethics from Portugal. He has a long... bio, which I'm not going to repeat each time, but it will come out in various mailings.

Needless to say, we very much appreciate your sharing with us. And I won't take away from more of your time, just one more technical detail. Please do put questions or comments in the chat and or Q&A. I will be monitoring if need be.

I have permission to interrupt Rabbi Pereira if there's something right there. But otherwise, questions and answers will be at the end. And we will also invite you to open your cameras and or microphones at that point if you want to ask a live question. So just let me know. And I hand it over to you.

Thank you very much. Thank you so much. It's absolutely a delight to be with the Institute again.

And hopefully this will continue for many, many, many, many years to come. It's wonderful work that you guys are doing. And.

And while you were introducing me, I was thinking, I'm going to change my bio because I want the introduction to be very short, because the more people spend time on my introduction, the less time I have to speak. So anyway, so the idea today is to talk about Rabbi Abraham Zakuto. This is an extremely interesting case of someone who managed to excel in both. secular studies, if you want, as a mathematician, as an astronomer, and on Jewish studies. So he's a scholar on both fields, which is something that was not very uncommon in the Sephardic world back then.

But be it as it may, he was a quite accomplished scholar. And to put things in perspective, if we want... This is not just a great scholar, but is someone that was riding the wave, as if it were, in a period of extremely intense development in Europe, and at the same time, a period of great catastrophe for the Jewish people. So it's a man of the Renaissance.

It's an incredible mind and incredible contributions. And in the meantime, it's also very difficult time to be a Jew with the expulsions of Spain and then the forced conversions and expulsions from Portugal. So we'll look at all of these and how all of this comes together. And I will essentially talk about four different things. We'll talk a little bit about the times of Rabbi Abram Sakuto.

It's important to put things in perspective. A little bit about his life. But most of our times will be addressing the contributions to science. And here I already have to apologize that I'm completely ignoring for the purpose of today's discussion.

I'm completely ignoring his contributions to Jewish studies. So it's just his contributions to science that I'm focusing upon. And then we'll sort of wrap up and see how his contributions have been regarded throughout times.

OK, so let's think a little bit about the time in which Rabbi Abraham Zekut was alive. And again, just to put things in perspective again and looking at the dates. He was born in Salamanca in 1452, and he died in the Ottoman Empire, probably in the land of Israel, in 1515. So he's basically the second half of the 15th century and the beginning of the 16th century. That's what we were talking about.

Now, these times when he lived were framed by several... development, several events, historical events that conditioned everything that was going on in Europe in particular. One was the invention of the printing press. The invention of the printing press in the middle 1400s was a paradigm shift in general, and it was very much a paradigm shift in the Jewish world, because for the first time we were able to produce books in a quantity, copies in a quantity that was... comfortable enough for us not to have our books destroyed faster than we could actually write them and reproduce them manually.

So printing press was very much adopted by the Jewish world and there is a connection here with Rabbi Zucotto. The other is that the Ottoman Empire at the time was a very powerful force and they were expanding very fast. And not only they were expanding very fast, but they basically at that time, late 15th century, they controlled virtually all commercial routes from Europe to the Middle East, to Asia.

And we are going to see that this plays a very important, it's a very important component of what's going on during the time of Rabbi Abram Zaguto. Mostly for one reason that is sort of intuitive, and that is because of all these land routes being blocked by the Ottoman Empire, all the merchants from Italy and from all the other European countries, they were desperate because they did not have a way to make it to Asia to get the different things they were getting. And in particular, spices were the big thing, pepper and other.

more sophisticated spices, there was a humongous trade with Asia on that. So that was a problem. And very much related to this is the fact that this is the period of the maritime expansions.

So it's the period in which Portugal and Spain happened to be on top of the world. As difficult as that may be to visualize now, they were so much on top of the world. that they thought it was perfectly okay to have a treaty between the two countries and divide the world in two spheres of influence. So, I mean, they were really the powers at the time. And Portugal and the kingdoms of Spain, Spain of course didn't exist, but the kingdoms, the other kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula, they were very much engaged in the expansion, in the maritime explorations and so forth.

And here that's where Rabbi Zakutu has an absolutely critical role. in facilitating some of the difficulties and solving some of the difficulties that the maritime expeditions were facing at the time. On the other hand, in the Jewish world, this was a period of very much...

It was a very difficult period, not that it was the only difficult period, but it was certainly a very difficult period. The... core of the Jewish population was in the Iberian Peninsula. Most Jews were in the Iberian Peninsula, so it was sort of arguably the center of the Jewish world. And as we know, in 1492, the Jewish population was expelled from Spain.

Many of the Jews from Spain came to Portugal, Rabbi Zakutu included, we'll get to that. And then, just a few years after, in 1497, there is, well, 1496, 1497, there is a decree of expulsion from Portugal, which is not a decree of expulsion in the sense that what happens in reality is that the Jewish population is massively converted by force and prevented from leaving the country. So, and Rabbi Zagut is in the middle of all of this.

He's in Spain in 1492, he's in Portugal in 1496 and 1497. And then this is the time of the beginning of the Sephardic diaspora, the Jewish diaspora, and that's why people like Rabbi Zacuto, who was born in Spain and they're living in Portugal, and that ended up in the Ottoman Empire, ended up in the land of Israel. So he was already someone showing this diaspora, these different exile routes. in the aftermath of the expulsions and forced convergence from the Iberian Peninsula. So these are the things that are framing the times of Rabbi Ram Zekut.

Now, a little bit about his life. So he was born in Salamanca, to the best of our understanding. There are other opinions, but be it as it may.

He came from a very prestigious family. Actually, his family came from the southern areas of France, from the Provence. And in Jewish thought, especially in that time period, Provence was a very strong bastion of Jewish learning. So it's a very prestigious area and a very prestigious family.

He had absolutely fabulous Jewish education through his family. And he was a student. also of Rabbi Isaac Aboab, and that's an important name in and of itself.

And the thing that is interesting, not very unique, but the thing that's very interesting about Rabbi Zakutu is that together with an absolutely outstanding Jewish education, he got an equally outstanding secular education. Just as a footnote, in the Sephardic world, the two things were never perceived as incompatible, quite the opposite. It's mostly an Ashkenazi take on these things that Jewish studies are everything and you minimize or you put in the second place secular education.

That's not a typical Sephardic approach. And so he got an excellent education and relatively early he was offered a position in the University of Salamanca. as a mathematician, as an astronomer.

At that time, he was actually in very good relations with all the hierarchy, political and religious hierarchy, in this case, Catholic. So, otherwise, he would not be able to be in university. But be it as it may, he is from a very young age, college instructor, college professor, and he starts writing also very early.

So he's barely 25, 26 years old when he starts writing well, his first writings. In the meantime, he ends up going through different places. He goes to other universities for a while, he goes around.

But the most important thing is that he is so much integrated in all of these, in the scientific world and everything in Spain, that he, we have evidence, we have records already, that in 1486, he meets with Columbus, Christopher Columbus. And it's a meeting with Christopher Columbus that it's facilitating, among others, by the Rabbi Barbanel, by Itzhak Barbanel, and it is already in preparation for what would be than in 1492, the voyages of Columbus. So there is a very deep connection between Abraham Zacuto, Rabbi Zacuto, and Columbus, Christopher Columbus.

A connection, a scientific connection, mostly. It's not, well, it's a scientific connection. So when it comes to 1492, so Rabbi Zakut is about 40 years old, and it's the expulsion from Spain. And with the expulsion from Spain, obviously, he was expelled from Spain.

He left with his family, and he settled in Portugal, like many other Jews from Spain settled in Portugal. In this specific case, even more so, because Rabbi Zakut already had significant connections with Portugal. One of his students was Josef Vizinho, who was already at that time one of the astronomers, a Jewish astronomer of the kingdom, King John II at the time.

So you already have those connections, but at the same time... One of the leaders, maybe the major leader of the Spanish exiles that took, that basically seek refuge in Portugal at that time was Rabbi Itzhak Abalab, who was his teacher. So it was a very natural thing that he just went with his teacher to Portugal.

In fact, his teacher... died a couple of months after going to Portugal, and Rabbi Zakut is the one that wrote the eulogy, the funeral eulogy of Rabbi Isaac Aboua. Very soon after he arrives in Portugal, and again, keep in mind the expulsion from Spain is in August of 1492, by 1493 we already have documentation.

in the Portuguese archives that shows that he was the official astronomer of the king. Because we have documents of payments, documents that mention him as the chief mathematician or the chief astronomer of the king. So it was a very smooth transition, so to speak. When the king, John II, dies, a new king comes into the picture.

He continues being the mathematician. of the crown and a major advisor in terms of anything that had to do with astronomy and navigation and so forth. And we know that at the time he meets with Vasco da Gama, well, he was a major Portuguese navigator that found the maritime way to India, the maritime routes. So he's in the middle of everything, also in Portugal now. And then it comes 1497 with the expulsion from Portugal and the forced conversions.

And here we have Rabbi Zacuto's family again having to be on the run. And in fact, he was able to flee Portugal, we know, with part of his family, one of his kids. But we also know that...

Most of his family actually stayed behind and they were not allowed to leave. They were forcibly converted and they were forced to stay in the country. More on that later on.

So after that, he goes through North Africa, where he does a lot of his writings. He ended up then going to the Ottoman Empire. He spends a fair amount of time in Jerusalem. He has some family in Jerusalem. And basically the last years of his life, he is between Jerusalem and Damascus.

And we are not completely sure where he died, either Jerusalem or Damascus. But that's basically the story of his life. So what we have until now, as we pass to the issue of his scientific contributions, is we have a good idea.

about the things that are going around him. And hopefully we have a good idea that he's in the middle of everything. He's in the middle of everything in terms of the Jewish life. I mean, he's riding this horrible wave of these persecutions, these expulsions from Spain and then from Portugal. Okay, he's exiled twice.

And on the other hand, he's very much also riding the wave of the... basically the scientific elite of the two countries that were on the top of the world at that time and were engaging in this major globalization, as we would call it today, effort. So this leads us to trying to understand how incredibly important his scientific contributions were. So let's understand a little bit closer the nature of the situation. What was the big issue for the different kingdoms, for the secular powers?

in Europe at this time, what was the essence of the situation? The essence of the situation was that there was a major concern and the major need to find alternative routes to Asia. All the trade has been blocked, as we mentioned before, because of the Ottoman conquest of most of what is Eastern Europe, and they were at the doors of Vienna. in Austria now.

So at that time, the assumption could have been that the Ottoman Empire is going to be conquering most of Europe. Didn't happen, but it was certainly a very plausible situation. So what we have then is that the European countries, you're talking about Italy, the different Italian states. You're talking about the Iberian Peninsula also, but you're talking about France and Antwerp and then what is now Belgium and Holland and the United Kingdom now, what is now the United Kingdom.

They were being strangulated because they didn't have access to their most important trade routes to Asia. And of course, as I mentioned before, spices were very important for many reasons, among the reasons being that they were a close substitute at the time for refrigeration. We don't need to elaborate on that, which is a way of saying that spices were incredibly important back then, but also silk and other types of fabrics that were noble fabrics.

So these were big businesses. So because all these trade routes were disrupted, then the name of the game was, since we cannot go to Asia by by land, we have to find a way of going to Asia by the sea, by ocean. We need to find a maritime route to Asia. Okay. So this is the main quest.

And all the politics, all the policies, all the scientific research, the top of the concern was this, to find a route, the maritime route for from Europe to Asia. And you can say, but what is the problem with that? Why was that so complicated? Well, it was very complicated. It was actually started by being impossible.

And whoever would discover those routes would get the monopoly, essentially, of all this trade. So the stakes were incredibly high. What was the problem? What were the problems? The problem was that to navigate all the way to Asia, you had to go around the Horn of Africa.

And first of all, we didn't know the maps. It's not as if people knew the map of Africa as we know it today. So they didn't. And in fact, at the time, there was this idea that at the Horn of Africa, the world would end. I'm not sure exactly how that would work, but it would be the end of the world.

So there was a little trepidation to even try to go through that. So, but on the more serious vein, you have in that area, very strong currents that are not very well known and are very dangerous. You have also, when you come a little bit further up, meaning closer to Europe, you have a huge problem.

That is, again, the currents don't allow you to benefit from the winds as much as otherwise you would want. And again, keep in mind that all the maritime travel was fueled, so to speak, by wind. It's the sails, wind sails. There is nothing. It's winds and currents.

So what we have is this situation that you have currents. If you leave Europe and you start going south, you have currents that take you. not south, but take you in the direction of what is America. Okay. But you want to go south.

But be it as it may, the moment you get taken by the currents away from the coast, then we have problems because all the navigation at the time was done by sight. So the coast, you know where you are because you look at the coast that is next to you and you see where you are. High sea navigation was not common at all. Certainly not this part of the world.

High sea navigation. where you don't have landmarks that allow you to know where you are, this was a big problem. So you have two problems.

One is that you don't know the currents very well, and the second is that even if you know the currents, you don't have a GPS that will tell you where to go. So this was incredibly dangerous and that's why it was so difficult to do anything. It turns out that Rabbi Ezekiel too...

is someone who brings essentially the answer to these questions. I'm not going to say that he's the only person, but he's certainly one of the major contributors to solving this puzzle. How can we navigate the high ocean if we cannot see the coast?

We have to orient ourselves by... the position of the sun during the day, by the stars during the night. So we have to orient ourselves, we have to guide ourselves to know where we are by looking at the stars, again, at night, and looking at the sun during the day, because we cannot do anything just looking at the coast. So suddenly...

Knowing a lot about astronomy and knowing exactly where the planets are and the constellations are and everything is, is going to be fundamental. Knowing how they change, the so-called ephemerides, how the relative location of the sun and the moon and this planet and that planet are at a very specific time frame, this is fundamental to know. And this is very difficult knowledge.

complicated knowledge to develop. And this is where Rabbi Zakutu jumps into and makes an absolutely major contribution that would be used for a long time. So Rabbi Zakutu wrote what is called, I mean, that's different names, but it's referred to as the Almanac Perpetuum. That's the name in Latin, the Almanac Perpetuum. And the Almanac Perpetuum is basically an enormous number of tables.

You're talking about astronomical tables that tell us for a certain period of time where the different stars or the different planets, where everything is. Where everything is, allowing you to... have an idea of, first of all, where you are, because knowing the position of the stars, the relative position, will allow you to figure out where you are and which direction to go and so forth.

So these were incredibly complicated tables and they required a very, a lot of a lot of deep and sophisticated knowledge about astronomy. Here, maybe allow me to make a parenthesis because there is a very interesting side note here. And that is these type of tables like this, if you want to find them today, where you will find them is in astrology, astrology sites.

Astrology uses a lot of these types of tables. And it's not a coincidence because at the time, there was not a very clear difference between astronomy and astrology. Rabbi Zakuto wrote a lot about astrology.

So all of this was very important for the navigations. But all of this was also very important from an astrological perspective to know exactly what the planets were or what God was trying to communicate with us through the planets. God knows what. All the astrology things. So there was that component of this research, which again, it's not very important for us.

But... These tables are the tables that are the basis of all the tables that are used today in astrology as well. Okay, or whatever that's worth. So the Almanac Perpetuum was written still while Rabbi Ezekut was in Salamanca. was written originally in Hebrew with the name Akhibura Gagadol, it's the big computations.

And this is a book that was printed for the first time in 1496 in Leiria in Portugal, and it was printed in Latin and Spanish with the Latin and Spanish translations, which is very interesting. The Latin and Spanish translations were developed by his former student, Josef Vizinho. And I think they were printed in Leiria.

And to the best of our understanding, actually, this is the last book that was printed in a Hebrew printing press in Portugal before expulsion, before the end of Jewish life in the Iberian Peninsula. It was the last book to be printed. Now, it's not just the last book to be printed.

It's the first scientific book that is printed in the Iberian Peninsula in any language. The first scientific book. It's the first book in mathematics.

The first book in astronomy. The first book in anything that is not more religiously oriented. It's the first scientific book. It's the first book that is published in a Hebrew printing house ever that is in a language that is not Hebrew.

This is not trivial. And this is not trivial. Why?

Because. it was very expensive to produce the mobile characters, the metal mobile characters that you use to print in this new technology of printing press. And if you have this printing shop that has all the characters, different alphabets, cursive, not cursive, in Hebrew, but you don't have that in the Gothic characters. You don't have that with Latin characters. So you have to develop the Latin characters, which they did.

But this is the first time ever in the Jewish world that you have a Hebrew printing press that publishes a non-Hebrew book and a non-religious book at that. It's the only case before the year 1500s. It's the only case that we know that is known in the history of the printing press, the only case in the 15th century. So in the 1400s. So very important book, again, is translated into Latin and in Portuguese and in Spanish.

And notice that it's translated into Latin and Spanish because it's to be used by the people around that need to use these books for the purposes of facilitating the maritime expeditions. It should be mentioned that there was a little bit of a Spanish translation. already before that was not printed, but it existed before.

That's the translation that was used by Christopher Columbus. So, and that Spanish translation, that manuscript was used then to produce this print edition in Spanish. This book was used extensively by Columbus, was used extensively by the Portuguese navigators, Vasco da Gama and others, was translated almost immediately into Latin, as I say, into Spanish, into Arabic, it was used all over the world and updated. Because again, this gives the relative motions for a certain number of years. This is an incredibly consequential book.

It's an enormous impact that is used extensively after the expulsion, used extensively by all these powers way after Rabbi Zekruto is dead. So, I mean, for decades into the 1500s, the book is used as sort of the Bible of navigation. You cannot go anywhere without it. The other contribution that is very important is, OK, so you can look at the stars and see how they are, but you have to measure.

You have to measure. the distance between the stars because that's what's going to tell you where you are. Okay, so just having a table of astronomical occurrences is not good enough. You need to have, it's like instead of having a GPS, you just have a map.

But if you have a map and you don't know where you are in the map, it's not going to help. So you need something to measure, some distances to measure the declinations to measure. things to allow you to identify where you are.

And the problem is that all the instruments that were used at the time in the sea, in the ocean, they were not developed. Why? Because those were instruments that had just been taken from land trips, land voyages. They were not adapted to the ocean and they were never needed before because all the ocean travel was close to the coast. You didn't need those things, but now you do and you need precision.

And all the... instruments that were used in land were made of wood, which did not, was not very good in terms of precision. All the instruments were based on looking directly at the stars.

And guess what? Now you have to look at the sun as well, which is a different game when you have to look at the sun. We know you cannot look directly at the sun, so you need to have some roundabout way around it. And if this is not worth, not enough, most.

most of the measurements were based on identifying where the North Pole was, and the constellations around the North Pole. And that's great, except that when you get closer and closer to the equator, as they were going, well, you cannot see. The North Pole, you cannot see those constellations anymore.

So you need an instrument to measure things. And guess what? Abraham Zakutu, Rabbi Zakutu, developed exactly, not from scratch, but developed what is called to this day the Mariner Astrolabe, which is made of metal and is very precise and is exactly designed to be used in the ocean and used also to... measure the positionings of the Sun, not just the stars. So he adapted the quadrant and the australabs that were used in land to the maritime use.

So the Mariner's australab is a contribution, another contribution of Rabbi Abraham Zakut. So with these contributions it's hardly surprising, and we can just look at a little bit of a timeline here, that... that Rabbi Zagut was on top of everything when it comes to the maritime discoveries, the maritime travels.

So we know that he met the King Ferdinando and Queen Isabel as early as 1486. So this is six years before the expulsion and six years also before the voyage of Cuesto de Columbus. We know also that as early as 1487, Columbus and Rabbi Zacuto had several meetings, and at that time Columbus already had a Spanish translation of the Almanac Perpetuum that he was using, using, and used for quite some time. And we know that in 1492, that when Columbus goes into his expeditions, he takes with himself the Almanac Perpetuum, all the tables of Rabbi Zakutu as a way of orienting himself.

And that is true in his first voyage, is true in the two other voyages that Columbus makes. Sequentially, he takes with him always this copy of the Almanac Perpetuum, of these tables, and uses them extensively. And they are widely annotated with Columbus handwriting, and they still exist, those tables. They are in the Colombian, Colombiano Museum in Seville, in Spain. They are there.

Anyone who goes to Seville and goes to this Museum of Columbus, you can see those tables that he used so extensively. There is one... Very interesting story with these tables that I want to mention to you. Because in the writings of Christopher Columbus, he tells us that the tables saved his life at some point.

The tables saved his life. And he explains this third voyage. It's 1504, 1505. And at this time, they got stranded.

He's... vessels, this ship got stranded in Hispaniola. So basically in the...

And the problem was that they didn't have food, they didn't have water. The natives of the islands where they were were not being very cooperative, to say the least. And they were not giving them any food or anything, and they were not letting them leave either. So they were stuck.

And Christopher Columbus writes that he thinks that maybe this is going to be it. We are going to die. We don't have anything to eat or drink, and they didn't want to let us go.

So Christopher Columbus decided, and again, this is what he describes. he decided to outsmart the natives, so to speak. And he told the natives that if they don't give him food and let him go, he is going to steal, he's going to rob the moon and take the moon away from them.

Okay, of course, the natives were not particularly convinced. But it so happens that it gets to the night. And guess what? There is no moon.

and the natives freak out and give everything that Christopher Columbus wants and goes and there he goes. He leaves with the, they let him go. So basically he saved his life.

Now how did he, what is it that he knew? He knew from the tables of Rabbi Izakutu that there would be a lunar eclipse that night. He knew because these things were recorded there. So there's going to be a lunar eclipse.

So he used that knowledge to tell the natives that he's going to steal the moon, he's going to rob the moon from them. And of course, it was a little bit of a trick, but it's absolutely incredible how this knowledge, according to Columbus, this knowledge of the tables and all these ephemerids, as they are called, saved his life. That's what he says. When he moves to Portugal, he continues doing all types of...

of advice in 1493, he is actually known for having been very close to the very end in advising Vasco da Gama in his expeditions to find the maritime way to India. Vasco da Gama, he leaves Portugal for his voyage in July of 1497, so a couple of months before. the forced convergence, the bulk of the forced convergence. And this in the middle right here, it's actually tapestry that shows the departure of, I mean, it's a symbolic showing of the departure of the caravans, the Vasco da Gama caravans to India. And it shows among other things, circled here, Rabbi Zakuto.

giving the crown and giving Vasco da Gama the tables, the almanac perpetuum, the tables. So the tables and the Australab played a major role in both Columbus and in the case of the Portuguese. And that is celebrated in all types of documentation from the time.

Trying to wrap things up and tell you a little bit about how his legacy is understood to this day, his legacy was understood as extremely important. And again, notice that we are just talking about the scientific part. I didn't say anything about his Jewish writings.

The contribution was recognized from the very beginning. So, for example. There was a clear knowledge in Spain that the connection between Rabbi Zacuto and Columbus was fundamental in determining the future of the expeditions and so forth.

And in 1986, so it was celebrating 500 years from... the first meeting of Columbus and the Queen, Isabel and Ferdinando. In the celebration of that, the Spanish government issued a commemorative medal, a coin, that features the three people that were perceived to be the most important people making the Columbus trips and voyages possible.

And that is Rabbi Zacuto. It's... Rabbi Isaac Abravanel as a financier. And Luis Santangel, Luis Santangel was a conversal.

It was a very famous Jewish family that converted, was converted by force, but they remained converses for a while. So it's fascinating to see that by 1986, the Spanish authorities recognized that. Columbus voyages were possible because of three Jews. I mean, this is, I could not have invented this, if you know what I mean.

The other thing that is very interesting is that in the Portuguese chronicles also, there is, from the beginning, detailed descriptions of how important not only the astrolabe but also the Almanac Perpetuum was. So, in the legends from India that was first published in 1566, and this is the records of all those voyages, it's extensively mentioned, the Rabbis are good by name, in the what is considered the masterpiece of Portuguese literature that is the Lusíadas, is poetry and Here there are references as well to, although not by name, but there are references as well to Rabbi Zacuto in this major poem, was first published in 1572. And again, for many, this Lusíadas is really, I mean, it's the essence of what Portuguese history is. And it mentions, let's see where that is. I don't know where I put that.

Well. maybe I raised that slide. But in the Lusitas, it mentions explicitly two things.

It mentions the Australab, Australab and how important it was. And then it has another interesting mention that according to some historians, it's a very fabulous mention. And that is, okay, now, anyone that is a little familiar with Portuguese history of the time remembers to hear the idea that before Vasco da Gama went on his expedition, the day before there was the ancient man, the old man, the old sage from Belém, the old sage from Restilo that advised him and taught him all types of things about the navigation and so forth. And guess what?

that ancient sage, that elder sage from Restelo that is such a mythical figure in Portuguese history, well, that's Rabbi Abraham Zacuto. It's not a universal opinion, but it's according to most opinions. Fascinating to see that the last king of Portugal was deposed in 19...

1910. And he was very much into Portuguese history, in particular, the history of the period of the other king with name Manuel, which was the king of the time of Rabbi Zakut. And he did his research and he published in 1920s in the American Hebrew. The American Hebrew is a was a magazine from New York at the time.

He writes an article that is fascinating because He says, basically what he says is that it's unbelievable how Rabbi Zacuto contributes so much to the development, to the zenith, a glory of Portugal and Spain at the time, and how horribly treated he was. So the title is a victim of royal ingratitude. That's what he calls the article. He paved the way to the glory of Portugal and Spain and yet he was kicked out.

by both countries. As a final thought, and again for those of us that are still not convinced of what I said and maybe think that I'm exaggerating in all of these, well in recognition for these contributions to astronomy, Rabbi Zakut was honored first in the 1700s and then in 1935 with having crater in the moon that is named after him is the zakut zakut crater These, incidentally, the names of the craters in the moon, if you're interested in where this comes from, they were introduced in the middle 1700s originally by a Jesuit priest. So it was a Jesuit priest that decided for the first time to name one of the craters after Rabbi Abraham Tzakut.

Of course, he was a Jesuit priest. He was an astronomer as well. And in 1935, what changed was that. All these names and the standards pertaining to the stars and the moon and all the celestial objects became in the jurisdiction of the National Astronomy, whatever.

So there is an academy that deals with this thing. I don't remember the name of that academy. And in 1935, they confirmed the name of this crater.

So Rabbi Zagud has a crater in the moon named after him. the Zakutu crater. Okay, so Rabbi Zakutu was the epitome of a renaissance man.

He is an incredibly strong Jew. I mean, for all accounts, he is a Jewish leader as well. But he's also a mathematician, he's an astronomer, he's a cartographer.

And he played a major role in advising both the Spanish, in particular Columbus, and the Portuguese navigations, in particular Vasco da Gama. And I will end here. There are maybe a couple of footnotes that I can add, just one footnote.

Maybe we should answer some questions before you do that. No problem. Because that's also kind of like a footnote.

And there was a... Interesting question here. I found it interesting. You called him rabbi.

Was he called rabbi at the time? Is there a smicha process that he went through? Okay, so those are actually two different questions.

Okay. Yes, he was referred to as rabbi. At the time, he is referred as rabbi in the colophon, meaning in sort of the...

the documentation of the printed book in 1496 is referred as Rabbi Zakuto in some of, I actually don't know, let me just look at the first image because this right here at the end, this at the end is the signature of Rabbi Zakuto in a document from 1493, the first time that he's mentioned. And he signs himself as a Rabbi Abraham Zakuta. So this is his signature. And he refers himself as the calculator, the mathematician of the King Manuel of King. So, I mean, this, of course, the document is not in Hebrew.

The document is a crown document giving him money. But he is saying, oh, I got this money. That's basically what this is. And this document is in the Portuguese National Archives. anyone can see it if you know what you're looking for.

So, that was a rabbi recognized as such by everybody, there's no question about that, both in the Jewish world and the outside. Now, when you say, if you have the process of smicha, then we get into a completely different question, because the notion of smicha, as we have it today, and please forgive me for phrasing it this way, is very much a Nashkenazic concept. It's not a Sephardic concept.

The Sephardic concept of smicha was when you learn and you get to a point in which your teacher tells you to start teaching Talmud and Jewish law and things like that, then you got smicha. That's what it means. You got permission to teach.

So it was a much more informal process, much more informal. And it was a process that not only required great knowledge of Jewish stuff, but required a lot of knowledge about non-Jewish stuff as well. Point being that you didn't want people to be ignorant. And when they are going to talk to the crown and things like that, they didn't know anything about, let's say, Greek philosophy or Roman philosophy. They have to be conversant on these things so they wouldn't look like ignoramuses.

So it was a much more informal process, but there's no question that he's recognized by everybody as a rabbi. He was a teacher. But I'm not sure that he had a formal exam, as you would expect somebody to be.

But he was constantly tested in his learning. Yes, yes. Look, the truth of the matter is that the rabbi is a title that you have to earn it.

This is not like getting a bachelor degree, that you go through an exam and that's it, you get the degree. That's devaluing the whole idea. The whole idea is... Are people going to recognize you as a teacher, as a leader? If people recognize you that way, then you are a rabbi.

If the people don't recognize you that way, it doesn't matter how many certificates you have. Because, I mean, people don't recognize you. So historically speaking was a very different mechanism. Today, there is not such a big difference.

But again, this is a side note. That's a really important point. So thank you, and thank you particularly.

for bringing that up. I want to be cognizant of people's times and we will, God willing, have Rabbi Pereira back. So we will continue this and other conversations except that... Okay, but it would be very unfair if at least I don't answer the question that was posed to you before. So I'm going to just make sure you will receive a recording of this, so those who have to go, I understand it is...

the end of our hour. I really appreciate that Rabbi Pereira is open to staying. And so we will make sure to answer that question. And then I would pose another one or two, if that's okay, that came in. Absolutely.

And I just want to remind everybody that this is a series and we will have Rabbi Pereira back in the series. And we will be having Professor Ronnie Pirellis and Jeannie Milgram and Dr. Roger Martinez de Vila and Professor Rene, sorry, Rene Levine-Malamid and Dr. Debbie Corrin. So it'll, I really suggest and recommend that you follow us. Make sure to get our emails and our newsletters.

And we look forward to hearing you back. Those who can stay, please do. And thank you.

Okay. So now for the few, the proud, let me know the. questions and we can even start with that one that someone posed. You want to start with that one?

Yes, why don't you just read that question? Is there a possible relationship of Abraham Zucuto with Gaspar de Gama who arrived in Lisbon in 1498 coming from Calcutta? Okay, so let me tell you because that's a fascinating question for many different reasons.

Let me see if I can okay find right here. Okay, so the Gaspar da Gama, that is referred to in the question, was a pilot. It was a pilot in a lot of the expeditions of Vasht da Gama. And it so happens that Gaspar da Gama, that was not his original name, he was a Jew from from Calcutta.

There was a fairly large Jewish community in the area. And he was actually taken prisoner and converted by force. And the person that sponsored this conversion to Christianity was Vasco da Gama.

So it was sort of typical at the time that you adopt the family name of the person that was your sponsor. So he became Gaspar da Gama. That's his name. Portuguese is a secular name. If you want, we don't know what his Hebrew name was.

And he was an incredibly helpful person because he spoke many languages. So he not only knew about all the oceans and all the currents and everything in that area of the world, but he spoke Arabic and he spoke Hebrew and he spoke all. This was an incredible asset. And the reality is that although he was converted by force, he sort of, I mean, I don't know if he became a very devout Christian, we don't have any evidence about that.

What we have is evidence that he never made any effort to leave. So, he was okay with whatever it was going on. Okay, so that's who Gaspar da Gama is.

So there is no, there is a very strong connection between Gaspar da Gama and Vasco da Gama, and I'm sure that used a lot the, it had to be, used a lot the documents, the tables, and the astrolabe developed by Abraham Sakut, or rather Sakut, but the overwhelming odds are that they never met, and there is no indication whatsoever that they are related. And again, the overwhelming odds are that they never met because Rabbi Izakutu left Portugal in around the summer, we presume, of 1497. And Gaspar da Gama only came to Portugal the first time in 1498, when Vasco da Gama returned from his first expedition to India. So, the immediate answer to the question is there is no evidence whatsoever and there is no reason to believe whatsoever that they are related family. However, there is a fascinating story that I found recently about Gaspar da Gama that I want to share with you. Because this is, I mean, I could say that this is, well, it's not a known story.

It took a fair amount of effort to find it. Okay, but this is the story. In 1497, when there was, well, 1496, 1497, when was the decree of expulsion from Portugal and at the same time all the process of forced conversions, one of the things that was done from the very beginning was confiscation of Hebrew books. And this is starting still in December of 1496, confiscation of Hebrew books.

a confiscation of ritual objects. All these Hebrew books were placed in storage areas that were essentially where the synagogues were closed immediately. So what I'm saying literally is that the decree of expulsion is issued in the early December of 1496 and very soon thereafter Jewish life is cut short. That's not like in Spain that people were allowed to continue for six or seven months. Life was cut short and all these Hebrew manuscripts and books and everything was confiscated.

Okay, now what did the crown decide to do with these books? They didn't really know too much what to do with the books, so we have records of the books being used by almost the truckload to pay things. So, for example, you need to pay ransom or the crown needed to pay ransom for some captives in North Africa, you send a trunk of books, Hebrew books, and they are worth a certain thing. Or on the other hand, you have people that had access to the books that simply stole the books and then sold them.

So there is a lot going on here. Now, what's the point now? In 1505, 1505... but we are talking about eight years already after the expulsion and the forced convergence, in one of the trips to India with a new vice king, as they were called, Viswar, the new governor of India that was taking possession.

The new governor of India took with himself several trunks of Hebrew books. And when he got to India, Kuching and other areas, he offered the Jewish community to buy the books, if they wanted to buy the books. And the books were bought, indeed, by the effort of a Jewish lady.

And this Jewish lady, again, She did everything she could to collect the money and to do everything and buy the books. And so the books were bought. And then there is a sort of a follow up because there was a lot of confusion whether the crown wanted the books to be sold or not.

But let's forget about that. Now, why? What is the connection?

The connection is that this lady that bought the books is the wife of Gaspar da Gama. She's the wife of Gaspar da Gama that never left Judaism. And she actually ended up being denounced by the husband as being a very staunch Jewess.

Not that anything came out of it, but this is the wife of Gaspar da Gama. And this story is very moving in many different dimensions. One, because you have the books that are precious books of Portuguese and Spanish Jewry.

just being handled as if they were garbage. I mean, they really didn't have a notion of what the books were. I mean, the books were used to cut the books and just use those pages as covers for the other books. It was unbelievable.

But the other thing is also it tells us the tragedy. This is in the microcosmos, the tragedy of these families. There are many cases of families where the husband converts and the wife does not, or vice versa.

Plenty of cases like this. And this is dramatic. I mean, I don't have to tell you why it is dramatic, but this is one case. Another very famous case, situation similar is the case of Rabbi Shlomo Alevi of Burgos, Rabbi Shlomo Alevi that became Pablo the Santa Maria and became the Archbishop of Burgos and his wife never converted. And it was always a tension.

I mean, they were married, but the wife never converted, never accepted. And the ignominy of everything is that he ended up, after she died, having her buried in the Cathedral of Burgos. So again, the point is, The fact that this lady that defied everything to get those books is the wife of Gaspar de Gama. So I found not long time ago the documents showing all of that.

Anyway, that's the... Oh, that's very, very interesting. And Victor is asking if and what is the relationship between Gaspar and Vasco de Gama? They have no relationship whatsoever. That's what I thought you said.

I just wanted to be sure. The relationship is that the, okay, basically when you have, at that time, when you have Jewish people being converted by force, there was an awareness that they did not know much about Christianity. That means that typically they needed a sponsor.

They needed somebody that would vouch for them. You can call it whatever you want, but a sponsor. And Vasco da Gama was the sponsor of Gaspar da Gama. And as it was normal at the time, since Gaspar did not have a secular name, he just adopted the family name of Vasco da Gama. So they don't have any relation.

But yeah, so you can think about Vasco da Gama as the godfather of... the baptism godfather of Gespar Legan. So here's a problem.

I think we have to have you back talking about him again because this question seems very big. Can you talk about Zacuto and Kabbalah? I just think that's a whole other topic that is not going to be done in the next five minutes. Well, I actually exercised some self-restraint by eliminating from this PowerPoint everything that had to do with that topic. Right, I think that's a whole other topic that's huge.

Yes, but I can tell you very briefly what the connection is. First of all, there is no evidence in and of itself that Rabbi Zakut was a Kabbalist. I don't have any reason to believe that he's a Kabbalist from all his writings. However, he has an incredible connection with Kabbalah and he's a name that is constantly referred in.

certain circles and certain contexts. Why? Because in one of his Hebrew books that is called Sefer Yuchassim, it's a book of generations, it's a history book.

In his history book, among the many different things that he talks about, he talks about the effort by the main sages of Eretz Israel. in the 1300s, 1200s, 1300s. the major effort of trying to figure out what was the story with the Zohar, the great book of the Zohar. Okay, what is the story with the book of the Zohar that remains to this day? If you go to the Orthodox world or the traditional Jewish world and you ask who wrote the Zohar, they will tell you it was Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai and it was written in the around the time of Rabbi Akiva, so you're talking about, broadly speaking, the second century of the Common Era.

Okay, that's... if you go to academia, to a university, and you ask the question, they will tell you, well, this book was written by Rabbi Moshe de Leon in Spain in the late 1200s. Okay, so this question that exists now, it's a question that existed at the time, because the sages of Eretz Israel, the land of Israel, they were somewhat puzzled by the fact that there was a major Kabbalistic book that they were not very aware of, okay?

And there were great Kabbalists, great Mekupalim, but they were not aware of. Now, they knew that Kabbalah was transmitted in secret, so it was not impossible, but if there is such an important book that we don't know of, we want to know. So, they send an emissary, Rabbi Itzhak, from Acre to the Iberian Peninsula to investigate this on purpose and to get the book and to figure out what what's the story.

Is this really some something ancient from the Rashbi, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, or is this something that that Moshe de Leon wrote? So did Moshe de Leon publicize it, made it public, or did he write it? So the Rabbi Itzhak and notice that all of this that I'm saying is the description that Rabbi Abraham Zakkoult presents to us in that book, the history book, the Seferi Chassim.

So that's his discussion of what happened. So he's telling us that Rabbi Itzhak from Acre went to investigate. And so he first goes to talk about Rabbi Moshe de Leon. And Rabbi Moshe de Leon tells you, okay, I will show you the original that was written, even with the handwriting of maybe the Rashvi, or I will show the origin.

And in the meantime, in the meantime, Rabbi Moshe de Leon died. So he didn't have anything. He was not able to see anything.

And then after that, you start having a lot of problems, writes Abraham Zakuto, because seven people stuck. telling Rabbi Itzhak that this was really an invention of Rabbi Moshe de Leon to make money. So there was a lot of confusion there, accusing Rabbi Moshe de Leon of basically developing a forgery, although this at the time would not be understood as a forgery.

The concept of forgery was very different at the time. But the point was that this was something that Rabbi Moshe de Leon wrote and not... the Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, so it didn't have the authority of being an ancient writing. That's what he wanted to investigate.

And with all these opinions, he said that Rabbi Itzhak of Acre, he went out of the way, spent there maybe a couple of years talking to people, talking to different people, collecting all the information to make a deliberation on whether or not this was an original, written by Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai. or it was written by Rabbi Moshe de Leon. And now this could be a movie script because the documentation that was left by Rabbi Itzhak of Akkar is described by Rabbi Yom HaRam Zekutu the following way, I'll paraphrase it. after searching everything and after recording everything that he came to the conclusion about this, he was able to come to a very deliberate decision, without any shadow of a doubt, that this book was.

And this book was. That's where, that's where the narrative from Rabbi Itzhak of Akker. And this book was, he knows for sure, but that part of the... That's the next page and we don't have the next page. This again, it could be a movie, it's a cliffhanger.

So after all of these, he came to complete conclusion, except that, well, we don't know what the conclusion is. And Rabbi Izakut tells us that although we don't have this, that from writings of Rabbi Itzhak Akker and others after, we can infer that the conclusion was that indeed this was written by Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai. So it was not a forgery, it was that that's his conclusion.

Now this is a very famous piece of information, is a very famous point of contention in the in the kabbalistic circles. It's enough to say that that book of Rabbi of Rabbi Izakutu, the history book was printed for the first time in the 1550s or so. It was printed the second time in Krakow, Poland, towards the end of the 1500s.

And in the second edition of the book, all that part about searching about the Zohar and everything was eliminated, was cut, was censored, censored by the Jewish printers. money. It was just too much questioning and everything. So now that book, we were able to bring it back because there were earlier printings of the book. But for a couple of hundred years, that part had been deleted.

It was censored from the book because again, it challenges too much. this issue of whether what is the authority of the Zohar. So, incredible story. Yeah, well, like we said, it's a very large other topic, but thank you for kind of just giving us a little bit, and particularly that in reaction to the historical fiction that we started with. So that's an interesting point in that.

So remember, historical fictions aren't always true. So thank you. I'm going to send, I know people said many thanks and appreciation to you.

I'm going to send you the transcript of the chat so you can see what people said. You can also see if there are follow-up questions for other times. So thank you all.

Please know that your chats will be getting to Rabbi Pereira. I will send them to you. Thank you all for staying.

Thank you all for joining. Thank you all for listening. And thank you particularly, Rabbi Pereira, for a really insightful and interesting talk.

And we hope to see you all again soon. Thank you so much to everybody. Bye.

Transcript for:Abraham Zacuto: Iberian Rabbi and Astronomer in the Age of Discoveries

Transcript for:
Abraham Zacuto: Iberian Rabbi and Astronomer in the Age of Discoveries