March 2nd, 2025, 1:00 pm - 2:15 pm
The recording of this class is at https://youtu.be/f-rwlFKG1QQ
She was born in Lisbon in 1510 to a New Christian family less than two decades after the forced conversions in Portugal and the end of organized Jewish life in the Iberian Peninsula. Dona Gracia Nasi was at the center of the Jewish struggle to survive and strive in the 1500s Europe. From Lisbon, to Antwerp, to Venice, to Ferrara, to Constantinople, Dona Gracia Nasi left a trail of contributions to Jewish life using her enormous wealth and considerable influence to further the major Jewish causes of the time.
After presenting the context of Jewish life in 1500s Europe, we will review among others, Dona Gracia Nasi‘s role in developing the 1500s Jewish version of the “Underground Railroad”, the printing of the first Bibles in vernacular in Ferrara, the boycott of the port of Ancona, and the attempt to establish a foothold of Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel.
Books about Gracia Nasi:
The Woman Who Defied Kings: The Life and Times of Doña Gracia Nasi by Andrée Aelion Brook
The House of Nasi: Doña Gracia by Cecil Roth
The Long Journey of Gracia Mendes by Marianna Birnbaum
Rabbi Dr. Shlomo Pereira is a native of Lisbon, Portugal and moved to the United States in 1982. Aside from Judaic Studies and Economics, his passions include history, in particular Iberian Jewish history.
Rabbi Pereira received his rabbinical ordination in Jerusalem in 2004 and has served in the last two decades as assistant rabbi and education director at Chabad of Virginia. He has taught extensively in topics ranging from Jewish history and law to Jewish philosophy and mysticism and is the founder-director for the Richmond chapter of the Jewish Learning Institute. He is the author of two widely circulated research documents — Hadrat Melech, biographical notes on the Jewish sages throughout the centuries and Chachmei Halacha, an overview of the major works in Jewish law over the last fifteen hundred years. More recently, he co-authored with Rabbi Eli Rosenfeld of Chabad Portugal two bilingual books of commentaries by rabbis who called Portugal home in the fifteenth century — Jewish Voices from Portugal on commentaries on the Torah portion and Jewish Ethics from Portugal on commentaries on Pirkei Avot (“Ethics of the Fathers”).
An economist and university professor by trade, Rabbi Pereira received his Ph.D. in Economics from Stanford University in 1987 and has been a faculty member at the College of William and Mary since 1995 where he is the Thomas Vaughan Professor of Economics and Public Policy. His main research and teaching interests are in the area of economics of the public sector, specifically on taxation, social security reform, infrastructure policies, and environmental issues. Having served frequently as advisor for successive Portuguese governments over the last two decades, he made a definite technical contribution toward the introduction of a carbon tax in Portugal in 2015. He is the author of over 120 refereed research articles in international journals and of several policy books.
Rabbi Pereira lives with his wife Elisheva in Richmond, Virginia. They have five children and eleven grandchildren who live in the USA and in Israel
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