3/8/11
How did the Ottoman Empire become a center of Jewish Life?
v Welcome for Jews whether or not they had been baptized
¨ Reasons for this
Ø Muslims are simply more tolerant (than Christians)
Ø Jews brought skills
Finance- like Dona Gracia
Leather production
Physicians
Merchants
Jews were experts with gunpowder and canon
¨ Marranos are allowed to Judaize
v Joseph (D.G.’s nephew) was friendly with the sultan à given a prominent title, Duke of Naxos, called Joseph Nasi by the Jews
¨ Joseph got permission from the sultan to make Tiberius the center of Jewish settlements in Israel, under the rule of the Ottomans with Joseph as governor
Ø The economy would be based on silk production- the climate in Israel is good for the growth of mulberry trees, and it required a lot of labor so it would provide a lot of jobs for Jews
Ø The project failed
Too few Jews came
¶ War between the Ottoman Empire and Venice made travel difficult
¶ Joseph didn’t even go à real loss of enthusiasm
Arabs opposed the settlement and attacked the Jews
3/9/11
v Ancona Affair 1556
¨ Pope Paul IV ruled Ancona
Ø Head of the Catholic counter-Reformation
Ø Persecuted Jews who were not baptized, and executed 25 marranos à Dona Gracia and Joseph asked the sultan to intervene, but the Pope brushed the sultan off à marranos fled to Pesaro (which was under the control of the Duke of Urbino)
¨ Dona Gracia decided to encourage a commercial boycott of Ancona. She told her Jewish business friends to send their ships to Italy and use Pesaro’s ports, not Ancona (commercial boycott of Ancona)
Ø She was basically declaring an economic war on the Pope
Ø Was this the right thing to do?
R. Joseph Karo approved the boycott
R. Yosef ibn Lev said the boycott should be mandatory
R. Joshua Soncino disagreed- the boycott should be a personal decision. This boycott can cause a danger to the Jews of Ancona. The marranos of Ancona were being tortured, not the Jews, so why instigate this to harm the Jews. It’s all the marranos fault anyway for converting
Ø The boycott was an epic fail due to a lack of unity
Ø Now, Jews are more hesitant to boycott anything
v Tzfat was a major Torah center in the 16th century
¨ Mainly because of the gedolim who lived there…
¨ Joseph Karo
Ø Beis Yosef
Ø Shulchan Aruch
Spells out all the Jewish laws
¨ Arizal (R. Isaac Luria)
Ø Explained and popularized Kabala
Ø Created Nusach Ari which is used by Chabad
¨ R. Yosef Berav
Ø Wanted to revive Smicha that they had back in the day
All the Rabbis in Tzfat gave him smicha, and then he gave it around to other Rabbis in Tzfat
Wasn’t done by all the Rabbis of the generation, just in Tzfat, so it eventually died out again
¶ Smicha had been gone for a thousand years, so why should it be revived now?
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