Limborch, Philip von. De Veritate Religionis Christianæ. Amica Collatio cum Erudito Judæo [“Of the True Christian Religion. Amical Collation with an Erudite Jew (Baltasor Isaac Orobio de Castro)”]. * With: Acosta, Uriel. Exemplar Humanæ Vitæ

(SEPHARDICA)

J. ab Hoeue

Gouda

1687

FIRST EDITION. Title in red and black with engraved vignette. Broad margins

Freimann 412

Orobio (1620-87) was born in Braganza of Marrano parentage. After studying medicine and philosophy, he became a leading physician and professor of metaphysics at Salamanca. Subsequently arrested by the Inquisition and charged with secretly practicing Judaism, Orobio was tortured and incarcerated for three years before finally confessing. Upon his release he fled to France, where he became professor of pharmacy at Toulouse. In 1662 he moved to Amsterdam where he joined the Jewish community and soon became one of the leading intellectual figures among the newly arrived Spanish and Portuguese Jews. He resumed practicing medicine and also wrote poetry and philosophical treatises in defense of Judaism. Orobio became acquainted with the Dutch Protestant liberal preacher Philip van Limborch in Amsterdam, who, impressed by Orobio’s accounts of how the Spanish Inquisition functioned, used these accounts as the chief case history in his Latin history of the Inquisition. Limborch, however, was disturbed by Orobio’s anti-Christian arguments, and the challenge of public debate in the presence of John Locke was accepted by both - the subject of the present work. Orobio sought to defend Judaism from free-thinkers, orthodox Christians and religious liberals. His arguments opposing Christian theology are very close to Spinoza’s contentions against the plurality of substance. He made interesting efforts to provide a philosophical justification for Judaism in 17th-century terms, and in contrast to Spinoza, showed the compatibility of reason with traditional faith. See EJ, XII cols.1475-7 Published toward the end of Amica Collatio is “Examplar Humanae Vitae” the first appearance of Uriel da Costa’s philosophical autobiography