Akiva Sofer

Akiva ben Joseph (Mishnaic Hebrew: ; – 28 September 135 CE), also known as Rabbi Akiva (), was a leading Jewish scholar and sage, a '' tanna'' of the latter part of the first century and the beginning of the second. Rabbi Akiva was a leading contributor to the ''Mishnah'' and to Midrash halakha. He is referred to in Tosafot as ''Rosh la-Hakhamim'' ("Chief of the Sages"). He was executed by the Romans in the aftermath of the Bar Kokhba revolt. He has also been described as a philosopher.

Biography

Early years

Akiva ben Joseph (written in the Babylonian Talmud and in the Jerusalem Talmud), born , was of humble parentage. According to some sources, he was descended from converts to Judaism.

When Akiva married the daughter of Ben Kalba Sabuaʿ (), a wealthy citizen of Jerusalem, Akiva was an uneducated shepherd employed by him. The first name of Akiva's wife is not provided in earlier sources, but a later version of the tradition gives it as Rachel.Avot of Rabbi Natan, ed. Solomon Schechter, 4:29 She stood loyally by her husband during the period of his late initiation into rabbinic studies after he was 40 years of age, and in which Akiva dedicated himself to the study of Torah.

A different tradition narrates that, at the age of 40, Akiva attended the academy of his native town, Lod, presided over by Eliezer ben Hurcanus. Hurcanus was a neighbour of Joseph, the father of Akiva. The fact that Eliezer was his first teacher, and the only one whom Akiva later designates as "rabbi", is of importance in settling the date of Akiva's birth. These legends set the beginning of his years of study at about 75–80.

Besides Eliezer, Akiva studied under Joshua ben Hananiah and Nachum Ish Gamzu. According to the Jerusalem Talmud, R. Joshua ordained Akiva as his fellow-student, presumably with ''semikhah''. Akiva was on equal footing with Gamaliel II, whom he later met. Rabbi Tarfon was considered as one of Akiva's masters, but the pupil outranked his teacher and he became one of Akiva's greatest admirers. Akiva remained in Lod as long as Eliezer dwelt there, and then moved his own school to Beneberak. Akiva also lived for some time at Ziphron, modern Zafran near Hamath.

Marriage

According to the Talmud, Akiva was a shepherd for Ben Kalba Sabuaʿ when the latter's daughter noticed his modesty and fine character traits. She offered to marry him if he would agree to begin studying Torah, as at the time he was 40 years old and illiterate. When her father found out she was secretly betrothed to an unlearned man, he was furious. He drove his daughter out of his house, swearing that he would never help her while Akiva remained her husband. Akiva and his wife lived in such poverty that they used straw for their bed. The Talmud relates that once Elijah the prophet assumed the guise of a poor man and came to their door to beg for some straw for a bed for his wife after she had given birth. When Akiva and his wife saw that there were people even poorer than they, Rachel said to him, "Go, and become a scholar". Nedarim 50a

By agreement with his wife, Akiva spent twelve years away from home, pursuing his studies. He would make a living by cutting wood from the forest, selling half for his wife's and children's wellbeing, and using the other half for keeping a fire burning at night to keep himself warm and to provide light thereby for his own studies. Returning at the end of twelve years accompanied by 12,000 disciples, at the point of entering his home he overheard his wife say to a neighbour who was critical of his long absence: "If I had my wish, he should stay another twelve years at the academy." Without crossing the threshold, Akiva went back to the academy. He returned twelve years later escorted by 24,000 disciples. When his wife went out to greet him, some of his students, not knowing who she was, sought to restrain her. But Akiva exclaimed, "Let her alone; for what is mine and yours, is hers" (she deserves the credit for our Torah study). Not knowing who he was, Ben Kalba Sabuaʿ also approached Akiva and asked him for help annulling his vow to disown his daughter and her husband. Akiva asked him, "Would you have made your vow if you had known that he would become a great scholar?" Ben Kalba Sabuaʿ replied, "Had I known that he would learn even one chapter or one single Halakha, would not have made the vow. Akiva said to him, "I am that man". Ben Kalba Sabuaʿ fell at Akiva's feet and gave him half his wealth.

According to another source, Akiva saw that at some future time he would take in marriage the wife of Turnus Rufus (his executioner, also known as Quintus Tineius Rufus) after she converted to Judaism, for which reason he spat on the ground (for having come from a fetid drop), smiled (at her conversion) and wept (at such beauty eventually rotting in the dust after death). The motive behind this marriage is not given.

Later years

The greatest tannaim of the middle of the second century came from Akiva's school, notably Rabbi Meir, Judah bar Ilai, Simeon bar Yochai, Jose ben Halafta, Eleazar ben Shammua, and Rabbi Nehemiah. Besides these, Akiva had many disciples whose names have not been handed down, but the ''Aggadah'' variously gives their number as 12,000, 24,000Yevamot 62b and 48,000.

Akiva is reported to have had a rabbinic relationship with Rabban Gamaliel dated as before their trip to Rome. Convinced of the necessity of a central authority for Judaism, Akiva became a devoted adherent and friend of Rabban Gamaliel, who aimed at constituting the patriarch the true spiritual chief of the Jews. However, Akiva was just as firmly convinced that the power of the patriarch must be limited both by the written and the oral law, the interpretation of which lay in the hands of the learned; and he was accordingly brave enough to act in ritual matters in Rabban Gamaliel's own house contrary to the decisions of Rabban Gamaliel himself. Akiva filled the office of an overseer of the poor. Various rabbinic texts testify to his personal qualities, such as benevolence and kindness toward the sick and needy.

In 95–96 CE, Akiva was in Rome, and some time before 110 he was in Nehardea. During his travels, it is probable that he visited other places having important Jewish communities.

Akiva allegedly took part in the Bar Kokhba revolt of 132–136, but his role here is not historically determined. The only established fact concerning Akiva's connection with Bar Kochba is that he regarded Bar Kochba as the promised Messiah; this is the only evidence of active participation by Akiva in the revolution. Some modern scholars argue that Akiva's thousands of students died fighting for Bar Kochba, but this opinion was first formulated by Nachman Krochmal around 200 years ago and has no earlier source. A ''baraita'' states that Akiva suffered martyrdom on account of his transgression of Hadrian's edicts against the practice and the teaching of the Jewish religion, being sentenced to die by Turnus Rufus in Caesarea. As this story credits the execution to religious rather than political reasons, it may be evidence against Akiva's having a role in the revolt. Akiva's death occurred after several years of imprisonment, which places it at about 132, before the suppression of the Bar Kochba revolution; otherwise the delay of the Romans in executing him would be quite inexplicable. That the religious interdicts of Hadrian preceded the overthrow of Bar Kochba is shown by the Mekhilta.

Jewish sources relate that he was subjected to combing, a Roman torture in which the victim's skin was flayed with iron combs.

Death

The death of Akiva is usually rendered as some redacted form of three separate versions of the circumstances. Each version shares the same basic plot points: Akiva defies the Roman prohibition on teaching Torah, the consul Turnus Rufus orders his execution, Akiva is flayed alive, and his final words are the Shema prayer.

The most common version of Akiva's death is that the Roman government ordered him to stop teaching Torah, on pain of death, and that he refused. When Turnus Rufus, as he is called in Jewish sources, ordered Akiva's execution, Akiva is said to have recited his prayers calmly, though suffering agonies; and when Rufus asked him whether he was a sorcerer, since he felt no pain, Akiva replied, "I am no sorcerer; but I rejoice at the opportunity now given to me to love my God 'with all my life,' seeing that I have hitherto been able to love Him only 'with all my means' and 'with all my might.'" He began reciting the Shema, and with the word ''Echad'', " od isOne!", he expired.

The version in the Babylonian Talmud tells it as a response of Akiva to his students, who asked him how he could yet offer prayers to God. He says to them, "All my life I was worried about the verse, 'with all your soul' (and the sages expounded this to signify), even if He takes away your soul. And I said to myself, when will I ever be able to fulfil this command? And now that I am finally able to fulfil it, I should not?" Then he said the Shema and he extended the final word ''Echad'' ("One") until his life expired with that word. A heavenly voice went out and announced: "Blessed are you, Rabbi Akiva, that your life expired with ''Echad''".

Another legend is that Elijah bore the body by night to Caesarea. The night, however, was as bright as the finest summer's day. When they arrived, Elijah and Joshua entered a cavern that contained a bed, table, chair, and lamp, and deposited Akiva's body there. No sooner had they left it than the cavern closed of its own accord, so that no one has found it since. Rebbe Akiva's modern day tomb is located in Tiberias. Annually, on the night of Lag BaOmer, pilgrims light bonfires at the tomb of Rebbe Akiva. The pilgrims include some from Boston, Massachusetts, a tradition reinstated by the Bostoner Rebbe in 1983.

Religious and scholarly perspectives

Religious philosophy

A Tannaitic tradition mentions that of the four who delved into the Pardes (legend), Akiva was the only one who was able to properly absorb this wisdom, with the other three suffering various consequences as a result of the attempt. This serves at least to show how strong in later ages was the recollection of Akiva's philosophical speculation.

As to the creation of man and his actions, Akiva would say: ''"All things are foreseen y God yet the freedom to choose is given nto man and the world is judged on tsmerits, while everything is according to the preponderance of ood or badworks."'' Mishnah ('' Avot'' 3:18)

The relationship between God and man

Akiva's opinion about the very creation of man is recorded in Pirkei Avot:

: How favoured is man, for he was created after an image; as Scripture says, "for in an image, God made man."

Akiva's ontology is based upon the principle that man was created בצלם, that is, not in the image of God—which would be בצלם אלהים—but after an image, after a primordial type; or, philosophically speaking, after an Idea—what Philo calls in agreement with Judean theology, "the first heavenly man" (see Adam ḳadmon). Strict monotheist that Akiva was, he protested against any comparison of God with the angels, and declared the plain interpretation of כאחד ממנו as meaning "like one of us" to be arrant blasphemy. It is quite instructive to read how a Christian of Akiva's generation, Justin Martyr, calls the literal interpretation—thus objected to by Akiva—a "Jewish heretical one". In his earnest endeavours to insist as strongly as possible upon the incomparable nature of God, Akiva indeed lowers the angels somewhat to the realms of mortals, and (alluding to Psalms 78:25) maintains that manna is the actual food of the angels. This view of Akiva's, in spite of the energetic protests of his colleague Rabbi Ishmael, became the one generally accepted by his contemporaries.

From his views as to the relation between God and man, he deduces that a murderer is to be considered as committing the crime against the divine archetype (דמות) of man. Similarly, he recognizes as the chief and greatest principle of Judaism the command, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." He does not, indeed, maintain thereby that the execution of this command is equivalent to the performance of the whole Law; and in one of his polemic interpretations of Scripture he protests strongly against a contrary opinion allegedly held by Christians, and other non-Jews since the diaspora, according to which Judaism is at best "simply morality." For, in spite of his philosophy, Akiva was an extremely strict and national Jew.

But he is far from representing strict justice as the only attribute of God: in agreement with the ancient Israel theology of the מדת הדין, "the attribute of justice", and מדת הרחמים, "the attribute of mercy," he teaches that God combines goodness and mercy with strict justice. Hence his maxim, referred to above, "God rules the world in mercy, but according to the preponderance of good or bad in human acts."

Eschatology

As to the question concerning the frequent sufferings of the pious and the prosperity of the wicked—truly a burning one in Akiva's time—this is answered by the explanation that the pious are punished in this life for their few sins, so that in the next they may receive only reward; while the wicked obtain in this world all the recompense for the little good they have done, and in the next world will receive only punishment for their misdeeds. Consistent as Akiva always was, his ethics and his views of justice were only the strict consequences of his philosophical system. Justice as an attribute of God must also be exemplary for man. "No mercy in iviljustice!" is his basic principle in the doctrine concerning law, and he does not conceal his opinion that the action of the Jews in taking the spoil of the Egyptians is to be condemned.

Biblical canon

Akiva was instrumental in drawing up the canon of the Tanakh

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