When Is The Next Shmita Year

second century rabbi and editor of the Mishnah

Judah ha-Nasi
(Hebrew:
יְהוּדָה הַנָּשִׂיא‎,
Yəhūḏā hanNāsīʾ‎;
Yehudah HaNasi
or
Judah the Prince) or
Judah I, was a second-century rabbi (a tanna of the fifth generation) and chief redactor and editor of the
Mishnah. He lived from approximately 135 to 217 CE. He was a fundamental leader of the Jewish community during the Roman occupation of Judea.

Name and titles

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The championship
nasi
was used for presidents of the Sanhedrin.^[1]
He was the kickoff
nasi
to have this title added permanently to his proper name; in traditional literature he is normally called "Rabbi Yehuda ha-Nasi." Ofttimes though (and always in the Mishnah), he is just chosen "Rabbi" (רבי‎), the master par excellence. He is occasionally called "Rabbenu" (= "our master").^[2]
He is too called "Rabbenu HaQadosh" (רבנו הקדוש‎, "our holy Master")^[three]
due to his deep piety.^[4]
[5]

Biography

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Youth

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Judah the Prince was born in 135 CE to Simeon ben Gamliel II. Co-ordinate to the Talmud he was of the Davidic line.^{[6]
[seven]
[8]}
He is said to have been born on the same 24-hour interval that Rabbi Akiva died every bit a martyr.^[9]
The Talmud suggests that this was a result of Divine Providence: God had granted the Jewish people another leader of great stature to succeed Rabbi Akiva. His place of nascence is unknown.

Judah spent his youth in the city of Usha. His father presumably gave him the same education that he himself had received, including the Greek language.^[10]
This knowledge of Greek enabled him to become the Jews' intermediary with the Roman authorities. He favoured Greek as the language of the state over Jewish Palestinian Aramaic.^[11]
In Judah's house, only the Hebrew language was spoken, and the maids of the firm became known for their use of obscure Hebrew terminology.^[12]

Judah devoted himself to the study of the oral and the written law. He studied under some of R' Akiva'southward nigh eminent students. As their student and through converse with other prominent men who gathered about his father, he laid a strong foundation of scholarship for his life'south work: the editing of the Mishnah.

His teachers

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His instructor at Usha was R' Judah bar Ilai, who was officially employed in the house of the patriarch every bit gauge in religious and legal questions.^[13]
In later years, Judah described how in his babyhood he read the Book of Esther at Usha in the presence of Judah bar Ilai.^[14]

Judah felt especial reverence for R' Jose ben Halafta, the educatee of Akiva's who had the closest relations with Simon ben Gamaliel. When, in after years, Judah raised objections to Jose's opinions, he would say: "Nosotros poor ones undertake to attack Jose, though our time compares with his as the profane with the holy!"^[xv]
Judah hands down a halakhah by Jose in Menachot 14a.

Judah studied from R' Shimon bar Yochai in "Tekoa",^[16]
a place some have identified with Meron.^[17]
He besides studied with Eleazar ben Shammua.^[18]
Judah did not report with Rabbi Meir, evidently in issue of the conflicts which distanced Meir from the house of the patriarch. Even so, he considered himself lucky even to have seen Meir from behind.^[19]

Another of Judah's teachers was Nathan the Babylonian, who also took a part in the disharmonize between Meir and the patriarch; Judah confessed that one time, in a fit of youthful ardour, he had failed to treat Nathan with due reverence.^[xx]
In both halakhic and aggadic tradition, Judah's stance is ofttimes opposed to Nathan's.

In the Jerusalemite tradition, Judah ben Korshai (the halakhic specialist mentioned equally assistant to Simon ben Gamaliel^[21]) is designated as Judah'southward existent teacher.^[22]
Jacob ben Hanina (possibly the R. Jacob whose patronymic is not given and in whose name Judah quotes halakhic sentences)^[23]
is likewise mentioned as one of Judah's teachers, and is said to have asked him to repeat halakhic sentences.^[24]

Judah was besides taught past his male parent (Simon ben Gamaliel);^[25]
when the ii differed on a halakhic matter, the father was generally stricter.^[26]
Judah himself says: "My opinion seems to me more correct than that of my male parent"; and he and then proceeds to give his reasons.^[27]
Humility was a virtue ascribed to Judah, and he admired it greatly in his father, who openly recognised Shimon bar Yochai's superiority, thus displaying the same modesty as the Bnei Bathyra when they gave manner to Hillel, and as Jonathan when he voluntarily gave precedence to his friend David.^[28]

Leadership

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Nothing is known regarding the time when Judah succeeded his father as leader of the Palestinian Jews. According to Rashi, Judah's father, Rabbi Simon ben Gamliel, had served as the
nasi
of the Sanhedrin in Usha, before it transferred to Shefar'am.^[29]
According to a tradition,^[thirty]
the country at the fourth dimension of Simon ben Gamaliel'due south death not only was devastated past a plague of locusts, but suffered many other hardships. From Shefar'am, the Sanhedrin transferred to Beit Shearim, where the Sanhedrin was headed by Rabbi Judah ha-Nasi.^[29]
Here he officiated for a long time. Eventually, Judah moved with the court from Beit Shearim to Sepphoris,^[31]
where he spent at to the lowest degree 17 years of his life. He had chosen Sepphoris chiefly considering of his sick-health, and existence induced to go there because of the place's high altitude and pure air.^[32]
All the same, Judah'southward memorial as a leader is principally associated with Bet She'arim: "To Bet She'arim must i go in lodge to obtain Rabbi's decision in legal matters."^[33]

Amid Judah's contemporaries in the early on years of his action were Eleazar ben Simeon, Ishmael ben Jose, Jose ben Judah, and Simeon ben Eleazar. His better-known contemporaries and students include Simon b. Manasseh, Phinehas ben Jair, Eleazar ha-Kappar and his son Bar Kappara, Hiyya the Great, Shimon ben Halafta, and Levi ben Sisi. Among his students who taught as the commencement generation of Amoraim after his expiry are: Hanina bar Hama and Hoshaiah in Palestine,^[34]
Rav and Samuel in Babylon.

Only scattered records of Judah's official activity be. These include: the ordination of his students;^[35]
the recommendation of students for communal offices;^[36]
orders relating to the declaration of the new moon;^[37]
amelioration of the law relating to the Sabbatical twelvemonth;^[38]
and to decrees relating to tithes in the frontier districts of Palestine.^[39]
[xl]
The last-named he was obliged to defend against the opposition of the members of the patriarchal family.^[40]
The ameliorations he intended for Tisha B'av were prevented past the college.^[41]
Many religious and legal decisions are recorded every bit having been rendered by Judah together with his court, the college of scholars.^[42]

According to the Talmud,^[43]
Rabbi Judah HaNasi was very wealthy and greatly revered in Rome. He had a shut friendship with "Antoninus", possibly the Emperor Antoninus Pius,^[44]
though information technology is more than likely his famous friendship was with either Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus^[45]
[46]
or Antoninus who is besides called Caracalla and who would consult Judah on various worldly and spiritual matters.^[47]
Jewish sources tell of diverse discussions between Judah and Antoninus. These include the parable of the blind and the lame (illustrating the judgment of the body and the soul after death),^[48]
and a give-and-take of the impulse to sin.^[49]

The authority of Judah's office was enhanced by his wealth, which is referred to in various traditions. In Babylon, the hyperbolic statement was later fabricated that even his stable-master was wealthier than Male monarch Shapur.^[50]
His household was compared to that of the emperor.^[51]
Simeon ben Menasya praised Judah by maxim that he and his sons united in themselves beauty, power, wealth, wisdom, age, award, and the blessings of children.^[52]
During a famine, Judah opened his granaries and distributed corn among the needy.^[53]
Only he denied himself the pleasures procurable past wealth, saying: "Whoever chooses the delights of this world will exist deprived of the delights of the adjacent earth; whoever renounces the one-time will receive the latter".^[54]

Death

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The year of Judah'south death is deduced from the argument that his student Rav left Palestine for good not long earlier Judah's death, in year 530 of the Seleucid era (219 CE).^[55]
He causeless the function of patriarch during the reign of Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus (c. 165). Hence Judah, having been built-in about 135, became patriarch at the age of 30, and died at the age of about 85. The Talmud notes that Rabbi Judah the Prince lived for at least 17 years in Sepphoris, and that he practical unto himself the biblical verse, "And Jacob lived in the land of Arab republic of egypt seventeen years"
(Genesis 47:28).^[56]

According to a unlike adding, he died on 15 Kislev, AM 3978 (effectually December 1, 217 CE),^[57]
[58]
in Sepphoris, and his body was interred in the necropolis of Beit Shearim, fifteen.2 kilometres (9.iv mi) distant from Sepphoris,^[59]
during whose funeral procession they made xviii stops at different stations forth the route to eulogise him.

It is said that when Judah died, no one had the heart to announce his demise to the anxious people of Sepphoris, until the clever Bar Ḳappara broke the news in a parable, saying: "The heavenly host and globe-born men held the tablets of the covenant; then the heavenly host was victorious and seized the tablets."^[60]

Judah's eminence as a scholar, who gave to this menstruum its distinctive impression, was characterised at an early date by the saying that since the time of Moses, the Torah and greatness (i.e. cognition and rank) were united in no i to the same extent every bit in Judah I.^[61]

Two of Judah's sons assumed positions of authority after his death: Gamaliel succeeded him as
nasi, while Shimon became hakham of his yeshiva.

According to some Midrashic and Kabbalistic legends, Judah ha-Nasi had a son named Yaavetz who ascended to Heaven without experiencing death.^{[62]
[63]
[64]}

Talmudic narratives

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Various stories are told about Judah, illustrating different aspects of his grapheme.

It is said that once he saw a dogie being led to the slaughtering-block, which looked at him with bawling eyes, as if seeking protection. He said to information technology: "Become; for you were created for this purpose!" Due to this unkind attitude toward the suffering animal, he was punished with years of illness. Later, when his maid was nearly to kill some small animals which were in their firm, he said to her: "Let them live, for it is written: '[God's] tender mercies are over all his works'."^[65]
Afterwards this demonstration of compassion, his disease ceased.^[66]
Judah likewise once said, "One who is ignorant of the Torah should non eat meat."^[67]
The prayer he prescribed upon eating meat or eggs also indicates an appreciation of animal life: "Blessed be the Lord who has created many souls, in order to support past them the soul of every living being."^[68]

He exclaimed, sobbing, in reference to iii different stories of martyrs whose deaths made them worthy of futurity life: "Ane human earns his world in an hour, while another requires many years".^[69]
He began to weep when Elisha ben Abuyah's daughters, who were soliciting alms, reminded him of their father's learning.^[70]
In a legend relating to his meeting with Pinchas ben Yair, he is described equally tearfully admiring the pious Pinchas' unswerving steadfastness, protected by a higher power.^[71]
He was frequently interrupted past tears when explaining Lamentations 2:2 and illustrating the passage by stories of the destruction of Jerusalem and of the Temple.^[72]
While explaining certain passages of Scripture,^[73]
he was reminded of divine judgment and of the uncertainty of amortization, and began to weep.^[74]
Hiyya found him weeping during his last illness because decease was about to deprive him of the opportunity of studying the Torah and of fulfilling the commandments.^[75]

Once, when at a meal his students expressed their preference for soft tongue, he fabricated this an opportunity to say, "May your tongues be soft in your mutual intercourse" (i.east., "Speak gently without disputing").^[76]

Before he died, Judah said: "I need my sons! ... Let the lamp continue to fire in its usual identify; let the table be set in its usual identify; let the bed be fabricated in its usual place."^[77]

His prayers

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While pedagogy Torah, Judah would often interrupt the lesson to recite the Shema Yisrael. He passed his manus over his optics as he said information technology.^[78]

When 70-year-old wine cured him of a protracted illness, he prayed: "Blessed be the Lord, who has given His world into the hands of guardians".^[79]

He privately recited daily the following supplication on finishing the obligatory prayers: "May information technology be Thy volition, my God and the God of my fathers, to protect me against the impudent and against impudence, from bad men and bad companions, from severe sentences and severe plaintiffs, whether a son of the covenant or not."^[80]

Post-Talmudic narratives

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Rabbi Judah ben Samuel of Regensburg relates that the spirit of Rebbi Judah used to visit his home, wearing Shabbat dress, every Friday evening at dusk. He would recite Kiddush, and others would thereby discharge their obligation to hear Kiddush. One Friday nighttime at that place was a knock at the door. "Sorry," said the maid, "I tin can't let y'all in simply now because Rabbeinu HaKadosh is in the middle of Kiddush." From then on Judah stopped coming, since he did not want his coming to become public cognition.^[81]

Teachings

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Compilation of the Mishnah

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According to Rabbinical Jewish tradition, God gave both the Written Law (the Torah) and the Oral Law to Moses on biblical Mount Sinai. The Oral Police is the oral tradition as relayed by God to Moses and from him, transmitted and taught to the sages (rabbinic leaders) of each subsequent generation.

For centuries, the Torah appeared only as a written text transmitted in parallel with the oral tradition. Fearing that the oral traditions might be forgotten, Judah undertook the mission of consolidating the various opinions into one body of law which became known as the
Mishnah. This completed a projection which had been mostly antiseptic and organised by his father and Nathan the Babylonian.^[45]

The Mishnah consists of 63 tractates codifying Jewish constabulary, which are the basis of the
Talmud.
According to Abraham ben David, the
Mishnah
was compiled by Rabbi Judah the Prince in 3949 AM, or the year 500 of the Seleucid era, which corresponds to 189 CE.^[82]
[83]

The Mishnah contains many of Judah's own sentences, which are introduced by the words, "Rabbi says."

The Mishnah was Judah's work, although it includes a few sentences by his son and successor, Gamaliel Iii,^[84]
perhaps written after Judah's death. Both the Talmuds assume as a thing of grade that Judah is the originator of the Mishnah—"our Mishnah," as information technology was called in Babylon—and the author of the explanations and discussions relating to its sentences. Withal, Judah is more correctly considered redactor of the Mishnah, rather than its author. The Mishnah is based on the systematic division of the halakhic material as formulated by Rabbi Akiva; Judah following in his work the organisation of the halakot as taught by Rabbi Meir (Akiva'due south foremost student).^[85]
Judah's work in the Mishnah appears both in what he included and in what he rejected. The volume of tannaitic statements not included in the Mishnah (but recorded in the Tosefta and in the baraitot of both Talmuds) shows that Judah had no small chore in selecting the material that he included in his work. Also, the formulating of halakic maxims on controverted points required both his unusual technical knowledge and his undisputed authority; and the fact that he did not invariably lay down the rule, but e'er admitted divergent opinions and traditions both of the pre-Hadrianic time and, more particularly, of Akiva'south eminent students, demonstrates his circumspection and his consciousness of the limits imposed upon his say-so by tradition and by its recognised representatives.

Halacha

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Using the precedent of Rabbi Meir's reported actions, Judah ruled the Beit Shean region to be exempt from the requirements of tithing and shmita regarding produce grown there.^[86]
He also did the aforementioned for the cities of Kefar Tzemach, Caesarea and Beit Gubrin.^[87]

He forbade his students to report in the marketplace, basing his prohibition on his interpretation of Song of Songs 7:ii, and censured one of his students who violated this restriction.^[88]

Biblical interpretation

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His exegesis includes many attempts to harmonise conflicting Biblical statements. Thus he harmonises the contradictions betwixt Genesis 15:xiii ("400 years") and 15:16 ("the 4th generation");^[89]
Exodus twenty:xvi and Deuteronomy 5:xviii;^[90]
Numbers 9:23, 10:35 and ib.,^[91]
Deuteronomy 14:xiii and Leviticus 11:14.^[92]
The contradiction between Genesis 1:25 (which lists 3 categories of created beings) and 1:24 (which adds a fourth category, the "living souls") Judah explains by proverb that this expression designates the demons, for whom God did not create bodies considering the Sabbath had come.^[93]

Noteworthy among the other numerous Scriptural interpretations which have been handed down in Judah's name are his clever etymological explanations, for example: Exodus 19:8-9;^[94]
Leviticus 23:40;^[95]
Numbers fifteen:38;^[96]
II Samuel 17:27;^[97]
Joel 1:17;^[98]
Psalms 68:7.^[99]

He interpreted the words "to do the evil" in Ii Samuel 12:9 to mean that David did non actually sin with Bathsheba, but just intended to do so. Every bit she was actually divorced at the fourth dimension he took her. Rav, Judah's student, ascribes this amends for Male monarch David to Judah's desire to justify his ancestor.^[100]
A sentence praising King Hezekiah^[40]
and an extenuating opinion of King Ahaz^[101]
have also been handed down in Judah'southward name. Characteristic of Judah's appreciation of aggadah is his interpretation of the word "vayagged" (Exodus 19:nine) to the issue that the words of Moses attracted the hearts of his hearers, similar the aggadah does.^[94]
One time when the audience was falling asleep in his lecture, he fabricated a ludicrous statement in order to revive their interest, and and then explained the argument to be accurate in a metaphorical sense.^[102]

Judah was particularly addicted of the Book of Psalms.^[103]
He paraphrased the psalmist's wish "Let the words of my oral cavity ... be adequate in thy sight,"^[104]
thus: "May the Psalms have been composed for the coming generations; may they be written down for them; and may those that read them be rewarded like those that study halakhic sentences".^[105]
He said that the Book of Job was important if simply because it presented the sin and punishment of the generations of the Flood.^[106]
He proves from Exodus 16:35 that there is no chronological social club in the Torah.^[107]
Referring to the prophetic books, he says: "All the Prophets begin with denunciations and cease with comfortings".^[108]
Even the genealogical portions of the Book of Chronicles must exist interpreted.^[109]

It appears that there was an aggadic collection containing Judah's answers to exegetical questions.^[110]
Amidst these questions may have been the one which Judah's son Simeon addressed to him.^[111]

Other quotes

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• What is the correct manner for man to cull? That which is honorable in his ain eyes (i.e. canonical by his censor), and, at the same time, honorable in the optics of his beau-men.^[112]
• Exist as careful with a calorie-free mitzvah every bit a serious 1, for you practise non know the reward given for mitzvot. Calculate the loss of a mitzvah against its proceeds, and the gain of a sin against its loss. Look at three things and you lot will not come to sin: Know what is above you, an center seeing and an ear listening, and all your deeds are written in a book.^[112]
• Wait not at the jar, merely upon what is inside; many a new jug is full of sometime wine; and many an one-time jug does not fifty-fifty comprise new vino.^[113]
• Much have I learned from my teachers; more from my colleagues; but about from my students.^[114]
• Why is the story of the Nazirite^[115]
  juxtaposed to the story of the suspected adulteress?^[116]
  In order to tell you that anyone who sees a suspected adulteress in her corrupted state, he should put himself under a vow never again to drink wine.^[117]
• Let your secret be known only to yourself; and do not tell your neighbor annihilation which you perceive may not fitly exist listened to.^[54]
• Dandy is work, for whoever does not work, people speak nigh him: From what does that human being eat? From what does he beverage? ... Nifty is piece of work, for whoever works, his hand is never missing a prutah.^[118]

References

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 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain:Solomon Schechter, Wilhelm Bacher (1901–1906). "Judah I". In Singer, Isidore; et al. (eds.).
The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls.


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