Rabbi Yochanan (died c. 279) was a rabbi in the early era of the Talmud. He was also known as Rabbi Yochanan bar Nafcha ("Rabbi Yochanan son [of the] blacksmith"). Events Births Deaths Categories: 279 ... Rabbi (Classical Hebrew רִבִּי ribbī;; modern Ashkenazi and Israeli רַבִּי rabbī) in Judaism, means teacher, or more literally great one. The word Rabbi is derived from the Hebrew root-word RaV, which in biblical Hebrew means great or distinguished, (in knowledge). In the ancient Judean schools the sages were addressed as רִבִּי (Ribbi... The Talmud (תלמוד) is a record of rabbinic discussions on Jewish law, Jewish ethics, customs, legends and stories, which Jewish tradition considers authoritative. ... Bar is the New Testament Aramaic equivalent of the Hebrew word ben meaning son of. ...

He was born in Tzippori. His father, a blacksmith, died prior to his birth, and his mother died soon after; he was raised by his grandfather in Tzippori. Rabbi Yehuda Hanasi took the boy under his wing and taught him Torah. Due to the disparity in ages, though — Yochanan was only fifteen years old when Rabbi Yehuda died — Yochanan was not one of Rabbi Yehuda's prime students; rather, he studied more under Rabbi Yehuda's students. He studied Torah diligently all his life, even selling what he had inherited from his parents in order to be able to devote his time to study; after that was spent, he lived a life of poverty. Tzippori, also known by several other names & spellings including Sepphoris, is one of the oldest Jewish settlements to be uncovered by archaeologists, and one of the richest in what has been found there. ... Judah haNasi, or more accurately in Hebrew, Yehudah HaNasi, was a key leader of the Jewish community of Judea under the Roman empire, toward the end of the 2nd century CE. He was reputedly from the Davidic line of the royal line from King David, hence his title Prince (Nasi... Torah (תורה) is a Hebrew word meaning teaching, instruction, or law. ...

When the time came to start teaching Torah, Rabbi Yochanan decided to move from Tzippori to Tiberias, so as not to show disrespect to great rabbis in Tzippori who did not have their own centers of Torah study. He was considered, however, the greatest rabbi in the Land of Israel, and was even esteemed in the other center of Torah Jewry, Babylonia — so much so that after the deaths of Rav and Shmuel in Babylonia, Rabbi Yochanan was considered by Babylonian Jews as the greatest rabbi of the generation. He was the rosh yeshiva in Tiberias for about sixty years, and was succeeded after his death by Rabbi Elazar ben Pedas. Tiberias in 1862, the ruins reminiscent of its ancient heritage. ... This article concerns the concept of The Land of Israel (Hebrew: ארץ ישראל Eretz Yisrael) in Jewish and Christian thought throughout the history from its Biblical sources to the present day. ... Jews (Hebrew: יהודים translit. ... Babylonia, named for the city of Babylon, was an ancient state in Mesopotamia (in modern Iraq), combining the territories of Sumer and Akkad. ... Abba Arika, the name of the Babylonian amora of the 3rd century, who established at Sura the systematic study of the Rabbinic traditions which, using the Mishnah as text, led to the compilation of the Talmud. ... Samuel of Nehardea or Samuel bar Abba was a Babylonian amora of the first generation; son of Abba bar Abba and head of the Yeshiva at Nehardea. ... A Rosh yeshiva (Hebrew: ראש ישיבה) (plural in Hebrew: Roshei yeshiva, but also referred to in the English form as Rosh yeshivas) is a rabbi who is the academic head, or rosh (ראש), of a yeshiva (ישיבה), a college of higher Talmudic study. ...

Rabbi Yochanan compiled the Jerusalem Talmud from the collected wisdom of the Talmudic sages of the Land of Israel. The Jerusalem Talmud (In Hebrew Talmud Yerushalmi, in short known as the Yerushalmi), also known as the Palestinian Talmud, (not related to current Palestinian issues at all!), was written in the Land of Israel at the same time of the writing of the the Babylonian Talmud, (which is known as...

Rabbi Yochanan's method in deciding halakha was to establish broad rules that apply in many cases; for example, he held that the halakha always follows a s'tam mishna (a mishna with no dispute or authorship attribution in it), and he had rules for which tanna ("Mishnah teacher") to follow in cases of dispute. Halakha (Hebrew: הלכה; also transliterated as Halakhah, Halacha, Halachah) is the collective corpus of Jewish rabbinic law, custom and tradition. ... The Mishnah (Hebrew משנה, Repetition) is a major source of rabbinic Judaisms religious texts. ...

He is believed never to have left Israel in his life, a rare feat for rabbis in those days, who frequently visited Babylonia. Rabbi Yochanan was known for his beauty and reportedly lived more than one hundred years. Babylonia, named for the city of Babylon, was an ancient state in Mesopotamia (in modern Iraq), combining the territories of Sumer and Akkad. ...

See also

• Resh Lakish

Simeon ben Lakish (in Hebrew, Shimon ben Lakish; in Aramaic, Shimon bar Lakish or bar Lakisha), better known by his nickname of Resh Lakish, was a Palestinian amora of the third century CE. He was reputedly born in Bostra, east of the Jordan River, in around 200 CE, but lived...

References

• Margaliyot, Mordekhai, ed. Entziklopedya l'chachme haTalmud v'hag'onim (2d ed., vol. 1). Jerusalem, 1945 or 1946.
• Gross, Moses David. Avos hadoros: monografyot al avos haMishna v'haTalmud (5th ed.). Tel Aviv: Yavneh, 1966.