ספר שלחן הפנים / Sefer Shulhan HaPanim

While intending to write a concise version of the Beit Yosef, his commentary on halacha (Jewish law), Joseph ben Ephraim Karo (1488-1575) succeeded in creating an authoritative legal code, the Shulchan Arukh. Karo departed from the works of others by listing only definitive rulings, allowing his book (shown here in partial Ladino translation) to serve, with some Ashkenazic amendments, as the practical guide to observance for the Jewish world. A refugee from the Inquisition, Karo spent decades in Turkey before traveling to Egypt and settling in Safed.