Tikun keriyah le-kol laylah ve-yom (Supplications for Every Day and Night)

David de Castro Tartas

1666

Image

Facing-page print with Hebrew text on left page and engraving on right page depicting man seated on a throne with lions and people below him and cherubs holding crown above him, and Hebrew inscription, and illustration below of men seated around a table with a crowd of people beyond. — The frontispiece of this book of penitential prayers, printed in Amsterdam by David de Castro Tartas, proclaims the pro-Sabbatean beliefs that were then widespread in the Amsterdam Jewish community and in many other Jewish communities worldwide. The engraving depicts Shabbetai Tzvi seated on a throne as the Messiah, under a crown with the words: “The crown of Tzvi.” Disciples and lions stand on both sides of the chair. The Hebrew inscription below is the messianic verse: “In those days and at that time, I will cause to grow up to David a branch of righteousness; he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the earth” (Jeremiah 33:15). The scene below shows a group of sages sitting around a table, watched by a gigantic crowd. The Hebrew there reads: “You shall meditate in [this book] day and night” (Joshua 1:8). The collection of prayers was compiled by Nathan of Gaza (though his name is not mentioned on the title pages of the Hebrew editions). In 1665, he sent the collection to Europe, where it was widely disseminated.

Credits

Courtesy Allard Pierson — the Collections of the University of Amsterdam, ROK A 1682.

Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 5.

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Creator Bio

David de Castro Tartas was a printer in Amsterdam from 1663 to 1695 and the publisher of rabbinical writings, including prayerbooks, in Hebrew, Spanish, and Portuguese. Between 1662 and 1701 his press printed the Gazeta de Amsterdam, considered to be the first Jewish newspaper. He was one of three sons of Portuguese New Christians who fled Portugal and eventually moved to Amsterdam to live freely as Jews. De Castro Tartas worked for the printer Manasseh ben Israel in Amsterdam before setting up his own press in 1662. In 1678, he became a member of the Amsterdam Printers’ Guild, competing with other well-known Jewish printers of the time. In 1684, de Castro Tartas published a lavish edition of Mikhlol Yofi (God Shines Forth), a grammatical commentary on the Torah, Joshua, Judges, and Chronicles. With approbations from the famous Christian Hebraist Johann Buxtorf and from four professors in Leiden, it marks the first time a Jewish press sought to attract Christian subscribers by including a Latin title page and Latin approbations in a Hebrew book.