Born into a crypto-Jewish family in Braganza, Portugal, he studied medicine and philosophy and then became a physician and professor of metaphysics at Salamanca, Spain. Arrested by the Inquisition on charges of secretly practicing Judaism, he was imprisoned for three years, tortured and eventually confessed. When released, he fled to France and became professor of pharmacy at Toulouse. In 1662 he moved to Amsterdam, in the Netherlands, and was an open Jew. A leading intellectual among the Spanish and Portuguese refugees, he was the author of philosophical works in defense of Judaism. De Castro wrote against Christianity and against the philosophy of Spinoza and sought to show the compatibility of reason and traditional faith.

 

Bibliography

KAPLAN, Yosef. From Christianity to Judaism: the story of Isaac Orobio de Castro. Translated from the Hebrew by Raphael Loewe. Pp. xv, 531 p. [4] of plates: ill., genealogical tables, maps. Oxford: Published for the Littman Library by Oxford University Press, 1989

 BODIAN, Miriam. Hebrews of the Portuguese nation : conversos and community in early modern Amsterdam. Pp. xiii, 219. Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana University Press, 1997

 

Web Sites of Interest

Professor Yosef Kaplan’s Home Page - The Dinur Center for Research in Jewish History - The Hebrew University of Jerusalem