Joseph Karo
Spanish rabbi and author on Jewish law (1488–1575)
Joseph ben Ephraim Karo, also spelled Yosef Caro, or Qaro (Hebrew: יוסף קארו; 1488 – March 24, 1575, 13 Nisan 5335 A.M.), was a prominent Sephardic Jewish rabbi renowned as the author of the last great codification of Jewish law, the Beit Yosef, and its popular analogue, the Shulhan Arukh. Karo is regarded as the preeminent halakhic authority of his time, and is often referred to by the honorific titles HaMechaber (Hebrew: הַמְחַבֵּר, lit. 'the author') and Maran (Jewish Babylonian Aramaic: מָרַן, lit. 'our master').
Biography
Joseph Karo was born in Toledo, Spain, in 1488. In 1492, aged four, he was expelled from Spain with his family as a result of the Alhambra Decree and subsequently settled in the Kingdom of Portugal. After the expulsion of the Jews from Portugal in 1497, the Ottomans invited the Jews to settle within their empire. Karo went with his parents, after a brief move to Morocco, to Nikopolis, then a city under Ottoman rule. In Nikopol, he received his first instruction from his father, who was himself an eminent Talmudist. Following his father's death, Karo's uncle Isaac, an author of biblical commentary, adopted him. He was married twice, firstly to Isaac Saba's daughter, and, then after her death, to the daughter of Hayyim Albalag, both of these men being well-known Talmudists.
Between 1520 and 1522 Karo settled at Adrianople.
The public source identifies “Joseph Karo” as spanish rabbi and author on Jewish law (1488–1575). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Joseph, Karo and Spanish.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q467148. VIAF identifies the subject as 88686046. The Library of Congress control number is n79144980. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1488, 1575, 1492 and 1497.
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This entry incorporates text from “Joseph Karo” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.