Akavia ben Mehalalel

(1)Akabyah ben Mahalalel said: mark well three things and you will not come into the power of sin: know from where you come, and where you are going, and before whom you are destined to give an account and reckoning. From where do you come? From a putrid drop. Where are you going? To a place of dust, of worm and of maggot. Before whom you are destined to give an account and reckoning? Before the King of the kings of kings, the Holy One, blessed be He.

Akavia ben Mahalalel testified concerning four things. They said to him: Akavia, retract these four things which you say, and we will make you the head of the court in Israel. He said to them: it is better for me to be called a fool all my days than that I should become [even] for one hour a wicked man before God; So they shouldn’t say: “he withdrew his opinions for the sake of power.” He used to pronounce impure the hair which has been left over [in leprosy], And green (yellow) blood (of vaginal discharge); But the Sages declared them clean. He used to permit the wool of a first-born animal which was blemished and which had fallen out and had been put in a niche, the first-born being slaughtered afterwards; But the sages forbid it. He used to say: a woman proselyte and a freed slave-woman are not made to drink of the bitter waters. But the Sages say: they are made to drink. They said to him: it happened in the case of Karkemith, a freed slave-woman who was in Jerusalem, that Shemaiah and Avtalion made her drink. He said to them: they made her drink an example (and not the real water). Whereupon they excommunicated him; and he died while he was under excommunication, and the court stoned his coffin. Rabbi Judah said: God forbid [that one should say] that Akavia was excommunicated; for the courtyard is never locked for any man in Israel who was equal to Akavia ben Mahalalel in wisdom and the fear of sin. But whom did they excommunicate? Eliezer the son of Hanoch who cast doubt against the laws concerning the purifying of the hands. And when he died the court sent and laid a stone on his coffin. This teaches that whoever is excommunicated and dies while under excommunication, his coffin is stoned.

And that which we learned elsewhere in a mishna with regard to the ban placed upon Akavya ben Mahalalel for having spoken harshly about Shemaya and Avtalyon, that Rabbi Yehuda said: Heaven forbid that Akavya ben Mahalalel was banned; it must have been someone else, as even when the entire Jewish people would come to Jerusalem for the Festival, the Temple courtyard would not close on any man from Israel as full of wisdom and fear of sin as Akavya ben Mahalalel; Abaye can explain this statement according to his opinion, and Rava can also explain it according to his opinion. Abaye can explain it according to his opinion as follows: No man from Israel was in the Temple courtyard when it closed by itself who was as full of wisdom and fear of sin as Akavya ben Mahalalel. Rava, too, can explain it according to his opinion as follows: No man from Israel was in the Temple courtyard when they closed it who was as full of wisdom and fear of sin as Akavya ben Mahalalel.

§ The mishna teaches: There were three courts there in Jerusalem. The mishna then details the procedure followed when a rebellious elder appeared before these courts. Rav Kahana says: If the rebellious elder says his ruling on the basis of the tradition he received from his teacher, and the members of the court say their ruling on the basis of the tradition they received from their teachers, the rebellious elder is not executed, because there is a legitimate basis for his ruling.