Del Medigo, Giuseppe Salomone

DEL MEDIGO, GIUSEPPE SALOMONE. - Jewish astronomer, mathematician and philosopher, b. in Candia (Crete) on 16 June 1591, d. in Prague on 16 Oct. 1655. He practiced the profession of physician and, on occasion, that of rabbi. He studied at the University of Padua, having Galileo Galilei also as a teacher. Having returned to his homeland ca. 1613, he soon began a continuous pilgrimage through the countries of western Asia and a great part of Europe, especially northern Europe, at the same time winning honor and contempt among his coreligionists.

A restless spirit, he often wavered between antithetical positions: now, in fact, he appears a freethinker, now an orthodox believer, now a cold critic, now a fervent mystic. For fear of being declared a heretic, he often concealed his true thought; but in general in religion he inclined toward the sect of the Karaites and sympathized with the Cabala. It appears that many of the works mentioned in the three principal writings that have come down to us he never composed. Of him there is: 1) a writing of general culture, entitled 'Elim, in which 70 doubts on various subjects are resolved; 2) Ta'alumàth Hòkmàh; 3) a letter to the Karaite Zeraḥ ben Nàthān.

Angelo Penna