Changing Minds: Geographic Discoveries and New Worlds through the Eyes of a Renaissance Jewish Scholar

This course will situate a manuscript in the context of the world from which it was produced so that we better understand both. The Italian Renaissance was a time of scientific discovery and artistic revolution, it was also a time of world exploration, religious ferment, and technological changes such as the broad dissemination of print. By understanding a single thinker, Jewish polymath Abraham ben Mordecai Farissol, and one of his most important manuscripts, Iggeret Orhot 'Olam , in context, this course will offer a fresh