Mind-Benders of Jewish History
The author of the Shulchan Aruch and the Arizal were neighbors in Tzfat
Rav Yosef Karo, whose Shulchan Aruch we still open today, was forty-six years older than the Arizal — yet in the Arizal's final years the two lived in the same small hilltop town of Tzfat: the elder master of halacha and the young master of Kabbalah, within one city's walls.
How we know
Yosef Karo 1488–1575; the Arizal 1534–1572. The Arizal reached Tzfat c. 1570, where Karo led the beis din; their lives overlapped 38 years.
One of many fact-checked wonders across eight traditions at The Spring of Wisdom.