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Shadal

Shadal

1800 CE–1865 CE · Modern · Trieste

R. Samuel David Luzzatto — Shadal (1800-1865) — was the leading Italian Jewish scholar of the 19th century and one of the founding voices of Italian Wissenschaft des Judentums. Born in Trieste, he served from 1829 until his death as a professor at the Collegio Rabbinico of Padua — the principal modern rabbinical seminary of the Italian-Sephardic world.

His commentaries on the Pentateuch, Isaiah, and Jeremiah marry rigorous philology with deep traditional learning; his Mehkarei haYahadut is a foundational collection of Italian-Jewish-history essays. He defended traditional Judaism against Spinozism and early Reform while pioneering modern scholarly methods, and was a major influence on Italian, French, and English Jewish thought into the 20th century.

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Stop 1 of 21800–1829Born

TriesteטריאסטהItaly

What they did here

Born in Trieste; a precocious Hebrew scholar and poet from his youth.

About Trieste

Trieste, a port city in northeastern Italy (historically under Habsburg rule), had a notable Jewish community. It was the birthplace, in 1800, of Rabbi Samuel David Luzzatto (Shadal), the eminent biblical scholar, grammarian, and poet, who went on to teach at the Rabbinical College of Padua.

In Trieste at the same time

Abraham Eliezer ha-Levi

See other sages who lived in Trieste→

In the same place & time

Sages whose lives overlapped with Shadal’s in the same cities, drawn from their recorded journeys.

Across the traditions

The world in their lifetime

Thinkers, teachers, and rulers whose lives overlapped with Shadal’s — a glimpse of the wider world they lived in. Drawn purely from recorded birth and death years.

Jewish world

Works

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