Rabban Gamaliel Is Deposed

There was a case in which a certain student came and asked R. Joshua, “What is the law concerning the evening prayer?” [R. Joshua] said to him, “It is optional.” [The student] went and asked Rabban Gamaliel, “What is the law concerning the evening prayer?” [Rabban Gamaliel] said to him, “It is obligatory.” [The student] said to him, “But did not R. Joshua say to me that it is optional?” [Rabban Gamaliel] said to him, “Tomorrow when I enter the house of meeting, stand up and ask about this legal issue.” The next day that same student stood up and asked Rabban Gamaliel, “What is the law concerning the evening prayer?” [Rabban Gamaliel] said, “It is obligatory.” [The student] said to him, “But did not R. Joshua say to me that it is optional?” Rabban Gamaliel said to R. Joshua, “Do you say that it is optional?” [R. Joshua] said, “No.” [Rabban Gamaliel] said, “Stand on your feet and testify about yourself.” Rabban Gamaliel sat and expounded while R. Joshua was still standing on his feet, until everyone murmured and said to R. Ḥutspit the interpreter, “Release the people.” They said to R. Zinun the sexton, “Say, ‘Begin!’” He said, “Begin!” and everyone stood on their feet and said to him: Upon whom has your anger not always passed? (Nahum 3:19).

[The people] went and appointed R. Eleazar ben Azariah in the academy. He was sixteen years old and his entire head was full of white hair. R. Akiva was sitting and troubled, saying, “It is not that he is a greater Torah scholar than I am, rather he is the son of those greater than I am. Happy is the man whose ancestors gain merit for him. Happy is the man who has a peg upon which to depend.” What was R. Eleazar ben Azariah’s peg? He was a tenth-generation descendent of Ezra. [ . . . ]

Immediately, Rabban Gamaliel went to each of them to appease them at their homes. He went to R. Joshua and found him sitting and making needles. [Rabban Gamaliel] said to him, “Is this your livelihood?” [R. Joshua] said to him, “Only now you want to know about this? Woe to the generation that you support.” [Rabban Gamaliel] said to him, “I am impoverished before you.”

They sent a certain fuller to R. Eleazar ben Azariah (and there are those who say that it was R. Akiva). He said to him, “Let the one who is a sprinkler [i.e., a priest], the son of a sprinkler, be the one to sprinkle; one who is neither a sprinkler nor the son of a sprinkler says to the sprinkler, son of a sprinkler, ‘Your waters are the waters of a cave, and your ashes are the ashes of a roasting place.’” He said to him, “They have been appeased. You and I shall get up early [and go] to the door of Rabban Gamaliel.” Even so, they did not lower [R. Eleazar ben Azariah] from his great status; rather, they appointed him as the head of the court.

Translated by Matthew Goldstone.