The Fox and the Fish

The sages taught: One time, [after the Bar Kokhba rebellion,] the evil empire [of Rome] decreed that Israel may not engage in [the study and practice of] Torah. Pappos ben Judah came and found R. Akiva, who was convening assemblies in public and engaging in Torah [study. Pappos] said to him, “Akiva, are you not afraid of the empire?”

[R. Akiva] answered him, “I will relate a parable. To what can this be compared? [It is like] a fox walking along a riverbank when he sees fish gathering [and fleeing] from place to place.

“[The fox] said to them, ‘From what are you fleeing?’ They said to him, ‘[We are fleeing] from the nets that people cast upon us.’ He said to them, ‘Do you wish to come up onto dry land, and we will reside together just as my ancestors resided with your ancestors?’ [The fish] said to him, ‘You are the one of whom they say, “He is the cleverest of animals”? You are not clever; you are a fool. If we are afraid in [the water], our [natural] habitat [which gives us] life, [then] in a habitat [that causes our] death, all the more so.’

“[The moral is:] So too, we [Jews], now that we sit and engage in Torah [study], about which it is written: For that is your life, and the length of your days (Deuteronomy 30:20), [we fear the empire] to this extent; if we proceed to [sit] idle from its [study, as its abandonment is the habitat that causes our death], all the more so [will we fear the empire].”