Joseph Colon Trabotto - Dispute With Capsali

Dispute With Capsali

It was natural that a man of Colon's stamp should sometimes be carried too far in his zeal for truth and justice; and this happened in his dispute with Capsali, the ḥakam-bashi (Hakham-bashi, or Chief Rabbi) of Turkey. Having been falsely informed by an emissary ("meshullaḥ") on behalf of the people of Jerusalem, that Capsali was very lax in divorce decisions, and that he had declared that the betrothed of a man who had become converted to Christianity should be considered as single, and that he had declared an engagement void because it had not been entered into according to the laws of the community, Colon, in order to establish the sanctity and inviolability of marriage beyond the power of any individual rabbi, wrote three letters (Responsa Nos. 83, 84, 85) to the president and leaders of the community of Constantinople. The responsa threatened to place Capsali under the ban if he did not recall his decisions and do public penance; and at the same time making it understood that in no case would Capsali ever again be allowed to fill the office of rabbi (Responsum No. 83).

This decree of an Italian rabbi pronounced against a Turkish colleague was an unprecedented attack on the rights of the community, and provoked the righteous indignation of the Jewish social order in Constantinople—all the more as it proved to rest upon a groundless and vulgar calumny. Capsali, conscious of having been maligned, did not mince matters in answering Colon's letters; and a bitter discussion arose between the two men, in which the leading rabbis of Germany, Italy, and the Orient took part. It is characteristic of Colon that as soon as he became convinced that he had been the victim of an intrigue, and so had done injustice to the ḥakam bashi, he did not hesitate to make amends. On his deathbed, he commissioned his son Perez to go to Constantinople and ask, in his father's name, the forgiveness of Capsali.

Trabotto died in Padua at the age of about sixty. Most references agree on his year of death, although one lists it as 1484, four years later than generally accepted.