Abraham Zacuto - Life

Life

Zacuto was born in Salamanca, Spain in 1452. He may have studied and taught astronomy at the University of Salamanca. He later was for a time teacher of astronomy at the universities of Zaragoza and then Cartagena. He was versed in Jewish Law, and was rabbi of his community.

With the general expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492, Zacuto took refuge in Lisbon, Portugal. Already famous in academic circles, he was invited to court and nominated Royal Astronomer and Historian by King John II of Portugal, a position which he held until the early reign of Manuel I. He was consulted by the king on the possibility of a sea route to India, a project which he supported and encouraged. Zacuto would be one of the few who managed to flee Portugal during the forced conversions and prohibitions of departure that Manuel I enacted, in order to keep the Jews in Portugal as nominal Christians for foreign policy reasons (see History of the Jews in Portugal). He fled first to Tunis, and later moved to Jerusalem. He died probably in 1515 in Jerusalem, however, other reports indicate his final home was the Hebrew community of Damascus and the death occurred in 1520. However in a similar vein to other giants of the Jewish faith, such as Saadia, Maimonides and the Vilna Gaon, he followed the extremely old Jewish law (believed to have begun in Babylon) of dying or at least being buried as close to Jerusalem as possible, (Maimonides died in the Galilee, not making Jerusalem itself in his old age, all Jews pray facing Jerusalem in life, similar to Islamic law praying toward Mecca). Zacuto had established his wish to make his death pilgrimage at a Passover gathering.