Rabbi Akiba

“ Then spoke Rabbi Eleazer, the son of Azoria:—
"Thou art better to Israel," said he, "than father and mother to man. They bring him into the world, but thou, my teacher, showest him the way into the world of Immortality."
Then said Rabbi Akiba:—
"It is well that man should be afflicted, for his distresses atone for his sins."
"Does the Bible make such an assertion, Akiba?" asked his teacher.
"Yes," answered Akiba. "'Twelve years old was Manassah when he became king, and fifty-and-five years did he reign in Jerusalem, and he did what was evil in the eyes of the Lord' (Kings) . ”

“ Has not He, who created you, likewise created them?”
If Rabbi Akiba had replied that, in spending the night with them in the manner of the sons of man with woman, he would have committed a sin, then the ruler would surely become angry. Did his hospitality then lead to sin? Was his hospitality an incentive to wrong-doing?
Rabbi Akiba’s wisdom saw this at once, and with an altogether innocent expression he replied, “What could I do? Before they came to me they must surely have eaten impure things, and the odour from them was that of carrion-meat, impurities, reptiles.” ”

“ By this curious contrivance the letter of the Law, the charter of Judaism, was sanctified forever, while its spirit was remodelled to the exigencies of the present or the future, till it would have been no longer recognized by its authors, or even by very recent disciples. To this new learning of traditions and glosses the ardent youth of the nation devoted itself with a fanaticism not less vehement than that which had fought and bled half a century before. The name [Pg 226] of the rabbi Akiba is preserved as a type of the hierophant of restored Judaism. ”

“ The Governor Turnusrupis once asked Rabbi Akiba, "What is this day you call the Sabbath more than any other day?" The Rabbi responded, "What art thou more than any other person?" "I am superior to others," he replied, "because the emperor has appointed me governor over them."
Then said Akiba, "The Lord our God, who is greater than your emperor, has appointed the Sabbath day to be holier than the other days."
When man leaves the synagogue for his home an angel of good and an angel of evil accompany him. ”

“ And as they listened a message came from the rich man, who had not joined in the common crowd of welcome. He desired to consult the famous Rabbi, whose visit was an event and an honour to the place. This rich man must have been one of those Jews who call themselves Jews in their heart; he evidently was not a Jew in his actions or his interests, or he would have surely heard that Akiba was something more than a distinguished stranger. However, Akiba went to him, and found that his advice was wanted. The rich man told the Rabbi of the vow which he had made never to see or help his daughter ”

“ His teacher appears to have regarded him with a certain amount of contempt. Perhaps the peculiar system, pursued by Rabbi Akiba with regard to the newer Halachas, also excited Eliezer's disapproval. Akiba had learned this new system under Nachum of Gimso (or Emmaus) , under whom he studied, not,352 indeed, for two-and-twenty years, as the legend relates. Akiba raised what was incomplete and fragmentary in this school to a complete system, and thus he stands at a turning-point in Jewish history. ”

“ Rabbi Akiba was usually a very pleasant companion at table. He was in the habit of telling amusing anecdotes and making witty remarks in the course of the meal, and it was his invariable custom to discourse learnedly on some theme of the law before the blessing of the food was pronounced, in order to fulfil the rabbinical precept, “a man shall always speak words of the law over his table” ”

“ The interior of the synagogue was half-empty. The people dispersed slowly and silently, as if they were seized by a great sorrow and doubt. The poor and rich, until now great admirers of the Rabbi. There was the rustle of the belated women in the gallery, and then everything was quiet and deserted.
As in times of yore, Joseph Akiba was coming back in the moonlit night, to his shepherd's hut, so Meir pale and trembling approached the house of his fathers. ”

“ He who beholds in such stories as these only a biblical or religious strain, misses more than half of their beauty. Rabbi Akiba [Pg xiii] and High Priest Johanan are not spirits of an ancient age, individuals of a departed civilisation. Far from it. They are you and I. “Beruriah” is by no means the virtuous wife of an overwrought Rabbi. ”

“ Rabbi Akiba probably referred to the Paulinian dogma that Jesus, the crucified Messiah, is the only son of God, in his well-known saying: “Beloved is man, for he is created in God's image, and it was a special token of love that he became conscious of it. Beloved is Israel, for they are called the children of God, and it was a special token of love that they [pg 260] became conscious of it.”829 Here he claims the glory of being a son of God for Israel, but not for all men. ”

“ Hail to you, ye God-fearing men, for your places are set aside, and kept, and guarded, in Paradise, for the time to come. Hail to thee, Rabbi Akiba, that thy lifeless body found lodgment for a night in a lovely spot." (62)
CENSOR AND AVENGER
Helpfulness and compassion do not paint the whole of the character of Elijah. He remained the stern and inexorable censor whom Ahab feared. The old zeal for the true and the good he never lost, as witness, he once struck a man dead because he failed to perform his devotions with due reverence. ”

“ Compare the preface to Chronicles addressed to Domnio and Rogatianus.↑ The version of Aquila, a Jewish proselyte and disciple of the famous Rabbi Akiba, was made expressly in the interests of Jewish exegesis, and reproduced with scrupulous accuracy the received text of the second Christian century. Symmachus and Theodotion followed later, but still in the second century. The former, according to Eusebius and Jerome, was an Ebionite, one of the sect of Jewish Christians who still held to the observance of the law, like the opponents of Paul. ”

“ Rabbi Eliezer, Rabbi Joshua, and Rabbi Akiba travelled about annually in the land of Israel, to collect money for the poor. Among their many and various contributors, none gave more liberally, nor with more cheerfulness, than Abba Judan, who was then in very affluent circumstances. ”

“ Mosheh told Rabbi Akiba that his daughter Deborah (whom Rabbi Akiba knew as a dutiful and God-fearing maiden and pretty withal) had been betrothed to a poor but very worthy youth, Samuel of Kempen, for more than two years; that the two young people were ardently devoted to each other, and desirous, as were also the parents on 274both sides, of sealing their love by the sacred bond of wedlock, but that prudence forbade the union until the youth would be the possessor of a business of his own, and able properly to maintain a wife and family. ”

“ His last retreat was Bether, a strong fortress, near Jerusalem, and forty Jewish miles from the sea. For three years and a half the fanatical party here held out, and are said to have been finally betrayed by a Samaritan.
Dion Cassius relates that 580,000 Jews were massacred when the fortress fell. Rabbi Akiba, the friend and banner-bearer of Bar Choseba, was flayed alive, repeating with his last breath the noble words of the Shema, or morning prayer of the Temple: “Hear, O Israel! the Lord our God is one Lord.” ”

“ Unless I can procure a thousand gulden within a day or two I do not know what misfortune will happen. My poor wife and daughter will surely die of broken hearts and my name will be blackened forever.”
Rabbi Akiba was not intimately acquainted with Mosheh. All he knew of him was that he was an “honest Jew,” a good, straightforward, religious man; but that was sufficient to gain his sympathy, and especially the sorrows of his wife and daughter touched him to the quick. He at once offered to go and collect the money for the dowry among the wealthy members of his flock ”

“ Into this enlarged kernel of pithy sayings of the oldest authorities, which may be characterized as the Abot of Rabbi Akiba, later Tannaim—Rabbi Meir, Rabbi Judah ha-Nasi, and others—interpolated additional sayings of the afore-mentioned Rabbis, and also typical utterances of their disciples, and of other well-known teachers. This accounts for the presence in Abot of the body of maxims of the six generations of the school of Hillel, designated above as section B 1, and which was very properly introduce after the aphorisms of Hillel and of his contemporary, Shammai. ”

“ He says: "It is right to suppose that the whole section contains a prophecy regarding the righteous ones who are visited by sufferings." He then makes two classes of righteous men:--those who in general must endure many sufferings and much misery: and those who are publicly executed, as Rabbi Akiba and others. He supposes that the Prophet shows the dignity of both of these classes of righteous men, to both of which the name of a Servant of God is justly due. ”

“ But Rabbi Joshua, son of Levi, said, He is a Ben-hannidda. And the Rabbi Akiba said also, He is a Ben-hannidda.123Therefore the Rabbi Akiba went forth out of the school, and asked Jeschu in what city he was born. Jeschu answered, I am of Nazareth; my father's name is Mezaria,124and my mother's name is Karchat.
“Then the Rabbis Akiba, Eliezer and Joshua went into the school of the Rabbi Joshua, son of Perachia, and seized Jeschu by the hair and cut it off in a circle, and washed his [pg 104] head with the water Boleth, so that the hair might not grow again.” ”

“ Rabbi Taraphon, though a very wealthy man, was exceedingly avaricious, and seldom gave help to the poor. Once, however, he involuntarily bestowed a considerable sum in relieving the distressed. Rabbi Akiba came to him one day, and told him that he knew of certain real estate, which would be a very profitable investment. Rabbi Taraphon handed him [pg 229] 4000 dínars in gold to be so invested, and Rabbi Akiba forthwith distributed the whole among the poor. By-and-by, Rabbi Taraphon, happening to meet his friend, desired to know where the real estate was in which his money had been invested. ”

“ They perceive it to be erroneous and rash to infer guilt from suffering; and, henceforth, when they see a righteous man suffering, they will think of no other reason, than that he bears their diseases, and that his chastisements are for their salvation. The Servant of God is thus supposed to be as it were, a personification of the righteous ones.--A similar view probably lies at the foundation of those passages of the Talmud, where some portions of the prophecy under consideration are referred to Moses, and others to Rabbi Akiba, who is revered as a martyr by the Jews. ”

“ Third, Pentecost. Then the Lord blesses the fruit of the trees, or bids them bear not in plenty.
Fourth, The Feast of Tabernacles. Then the Lord determines whether the rain shall bless the earth in its due season or not.
Man is judged on New Year's and the decree is made final on the Day of Atonement.
Rabbi Nathan has said that man is judged at all times.
Thus taught Rabbi Akiba. "Why does the law command the bringing of a sheaf of barley on the Passover? Because the Passover is the season of the harvest of the grain. ”

“ This changed the law of Moses from a limited group of unvarying precepts to a living fount of continuous tradition, and made the laws of the days of the Jewish monarchy capable of modification and enlargement to fit Israel's life under the Roman Empire. Interpretation that would produce new precepts to meet the changing conditions of later times was undertaken by Hillel (p. 113) but never before reduced to so complete a system as was done by Rabbi Akiba. On such a principle there was no end of the possible deductions from Scripture. ”

“ That the Jews were notoriously guilty of common swearing is allowed on all hands; and that swearing by heaven, earth, Jerusalem, the temple, the altar, different parts of the body, was not considered by them as binding oaths, has been sufficiently proved. Rabbi Akiba taught that "a man might swear with his lips, and annul it in his heart ”

“ And if people had been somewhat better acquainted with their Bibles, they would have known that the woman lawyer of Iowa was only another confirmation of Rabbi Ben Akiba's famous saying: "There is nothing new under the sun!" ”

“ The adherence of Akiba to the rebel leader was doubtless the main cause of the hold which he obtained over his countrymen, for the authority of Akiba was greater than that of any other living Jew. Other pretenders had obtained followers, but not among the doctors learned in the law, not among such Rabbis as Akiba. When the mischief was done and, by the influence of Akiba, Barcochebas found himself at the head of two hundred thousand warriors, mad with religious zeal, Turnus Rufus, the new governor, seized and imprisoned the aged rabbi. ”

“ Earlier compilers of the Mishnah had been Hillel, Akiba, and R. Meir. Rabbi Judah was also known as Rabbenu (our Master) , ha-Nasi (the Prince) , and ha-Kodesh (the Holy) . He is said to have died [*] on the day that Akiba met his death at the hands of the Romans. See Danziger, Jewish Forerunners of Christianity, pp. 242-274, Myers, Story of the Jewish People, I, 210-222, and Strack, Einleitung in den Talmud, p. 96. [* a prior owner of the source text annotated it by crossing out "died" and writing in "been born".] ”