On yesterday’s daf, when trying to decipher a beraita that mentioned two types of hand-laying (semichah) that require three judges, the Gemara clarified that one of these referred to semichah as we now commonly use the term, i.e. rabbinic ordination. But the Gemara challenges the suggestion that we require three judges for ordination from the story of Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava:
Doesn’t Rav Yehuda say that Rav says: Indeed, that man will be remembered favorably, and Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava is his name, as had it not been for him the laws of fines would have been forgotten from the Jewish people.
Would the laws of fines actually have been forgotten? Let them study them! Rather, it means that the laws of fines would have ceased (to be implemented) from among the Jewish people because at one time the wicked kingdom (of Rome) issued decrees of religious persecution against the Jewish people. The sages therefore said that anyone who ordains (judges) will be killed, and anyone who is ordained will be killed, and the city in which they ordain will be destroyed, and the boundaries in which they ordain judges will be uprooted.
Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava was an elder rabbi in the early second century during a time of intensified Roman repression. While there are many stories of Roman decrees forbidding particular religious practices, including the study and teaching of Torah, this narrative focuses on a degree forbidding the ordaining of judges. Ben Yehoyada, a 19th-century talmudic commentator, notes the logic of this particular decree: While decrees forbidding particular rituals can be massively destructive to a particular generation, that damage can theoretically be reversed if an emperor dies and a new one cancels the decree. But if the decree made it impossible to ordain judges, and it lasted long enough for all existing ordained rabbis and judges to die out, then the emperor would have permanently destroyed the ability to rule on certain matters, such as fines.
According to Rav, Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava ensured the Jewish people were able to continue judging and implementing the laws of fines, which one can only do if formally ordained. How did he do this? The Gemara continues:
What did Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava do? He went and sat between two large mountains, between two large cities, and between two Shabbat boundaries: Between Usha and Shefaram, and there he ordained five elders. And they were: Rabbi Meir, and Rabbi Yehuda, and Rabbi Shimon, and Rabbi Yosei, and Rabbi Elazar ben Shammua. Rav Avya adds Rabbi Nehemya also.
This is the part of the story relevant to our question above: How many judges are required to perform ordination? Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava, desperate to ensure that judges didn’t cease to exist even amid this repression, risked his life to ordain these students, seemingly by himself. This implies that ordination can be performed by only one judge.
The Gemara relays the consequences suffered for this brave act:
When their enemies discovered them, Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava said to the newly ordained sages: My sons, run. They said to him: My teacher, what will be with you? He said to them: In any case, I am cast before them like a stone that cannot be overturned. People say about this incident: The Roman soldiers did not move from there until they had inserted three hundred iron spears into him, making him like a sieve.
When the Roman authorities discovered what Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava had done, the elderly rabbi encouraged his newly ordained students to run. Since he himself was old and frail, he remained behind. The Gemara relays Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava’s martyrdom, which was later codified in the story of the Ten Martyrs that is recounted in the liturgical poem Eleh Ezkerah recited on Yom Kippur. However, the Gemara ultimately refutes this story as proof that one judge can perform ordination:
There may have been other (sages) with Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava, and this fact that they were not mentioned is due to the honor of Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava.
It’s possible that Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava was not alone in bravely defying the Roman decree, and may have been assisted in the ordination by fellow sages. Since he was one of the greatest sages of his generation, the story merely honors him by mentioning his name alone.
Read all of Sanhedrin 14 on Sefaria.
This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on December 31, 2024. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.
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