Adda bar Ahavah or Adda bar Ahabah (רב אדא בר אהבה) is the name of two
Jew
Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, religion, and community are highly inte ...
ish
rabbi
A rabbi (; ) is a spiritual leader or religious teacher in Judaism. One becomes a rabbi by being ordained by another rabbi—known as ''semikha''—following a course of study of Jewish history and texts such as the Talmud. The basic form of t ...
s and
Talmud
The Talmud (; ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (''halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of Haskalah#Effects, modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the cen ...
ic scholars, known as
Amoraim, who lived in
Lower Mesopotamia, a region known in Jewish texts as "
Babylonia
Babylonia (; , ) was an Ancient history, ancient Akkadian language, Akkadian-speaking state and cultural area based in the city of Babylon in central-southern Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq and parts of Kuwait, Syria and Iran). It emerged as a ...
".
The amora of the second generation
Rav Adda bar Ahavah was a Talmudist who lived in Babylonia, known as an
amora of the second generation (third and fourth centuries), frequently quoted in both the
Jerusalem
Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...
and the Babylonian Talmuds. He is said to have been born on the day that
Judah haNasi
Judah ha-Nasi (, ''Yəhūḏā hanNāsīʾ''; Yehudah HaNasi or Judah the Prince or Judah the President) or Judah I, known simply as Rebbi or Rabbi, was a second-century rabbi (a tannaim, tanna of the fifth generation) and chief redactor and e ...
died. He was a disciple of
Abba Arikha, at whose funeral he rent his garments twice in mourning for the great scholar.
At
Pumbedita, Rav Adda gathered about him many pupils, whom he taught sometimes in the public thoroughfares. He lived to an old age, and when interrogated on the merits that entitled him to be so favored, he listed his merits as follows:
In another talmudic tale, Rav Adda observed on the street a woman named Matun ("Patience") dressed in a manner unbecoming a
modest Jewish woman and he ripped off her clothing. Unfortunately for him, the woman was a
Samaritan, and thus not subject to Rabbinic jurisdiction, and for the attack on her he was condemned to pay a fine of 400
zuz, and thereupon he exclaimed, "Matun, matun
atience, patienceyou were worth 400 zuz to me!"
The following is attributed to Rav Adda: "The man who is conscious of sin and confesses it, but does not turn away from it, is like the man who holds a defiling reptile in his hand; were he to bathe in all the waters of the world, the bath would not restore him to cleanness. Only when he drops it from his hand, and bathes in but forty
seahs (about 100 gallons) of water he is clean."
Legends as to his sanctity
In talmudic legend, Rav Adda's piety was purportedly so highly valued by heaven that no favor asked by him was ever refused. In times of drought, for example, when he pulled off just one shoe (preparatory to offering prayer), an abundance of rain descended; but if he pulled off the other, the world was flooded. Even his teacher, Rav, realized Adda's protective influence. On one occasion when he and
Samuel of Nehardea, accompanied by Adda, came to a tottering ruin, and Samuel proposed to avoid it by taking a circuitous route, Rav observed that just then there was no occasion for fear, since Rav Adda, whose merits were very great, was with them; consequently no accident would befall them. Samuel's great colleague
Rav Huna also believed in and availed himself of Rav Adda's supposed miraculous influence with heaven. Rav Huna had a lot of wine stored in a building that threatened to collapse. He was anxious to save his property, but there was danger of accident to the laborers. Therefore, he invited Rav Adda into the building, and there engaged him in legal discussions until the task of removing its contents was safely accomplished; hardly had the rabbis vacated the premises when the tottering walls fell.
The disciple of Rava
A second Rav Adda bar Ahavah was also a Jewish Talmudist, a disciple of
Rava, addressed by Rava as "my son." In a discussion the elder rabbi once rebuked him as devoid of understanding. Subsequently, he studied under
Rav Pappa and waited on
Rav Nachman bar Yitzchak.
[Babylonian Talmud Bava Batra 22a]
References
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Talmud rabbis of Babylonia