Galante, Moses Ben-mordecai

Galante, Moses ben-Mordecai brother of Abraham (see above), was president of the celebrated Jewish college for rabbins at Safed. His הִזּוֹהִר מַפתִּחֹ, Index to Sohar (Zohar)

(Venice, 1666; 2d ed. Frankf. a.M. 1681), explains all the passages of the O.T. occurring in the Zohar (q.v.). This book exhibits the manner in which the Messianic passages of the Old Testament are treated in the Talmud and Cabbala. We have also from him a commentary on Ecclesiastes קהַלִּת יִעֲקֹב, Safed, 1578), which is illustrated throughout with extracts from the Sohar. The time of his death is a matter of much dispute. Robinson (Biblical Researches in Palestine, 2:430) and Furst give it 1618; Steinschneider (Catal. lit. hebr. in Biblioth. Bodleiana) places it much earlier, but Jost says that he was sixty-eight years old at the time of his death (1689), which would be impossible, as Abraham Galante is said to have died about 1600. — Kitto, Encyclop. of Bib. Lit. 2:52; Jost, Gesch. d. Judenthums u. s. Sekten, 3:237; Furst, Bibl. Jud. 1:313. (J.H.W.)