AFTER RABAH BAR NACHMANI’S death Rav Joseph bar Chiya had to accept the position of head of the academy in Pumbeditha. For a long time they had been considered the two greatest scholars, and, as we have said, Rabah was called the “uprooter of mountains” meaning that he could tear up hills and grind them into dust by the power of his reasoning and Rav Joseph bar Chiya was called “Sinai” because all the laws of the Torah were as systematically arranged in his head as if he had heard them directly from the mouth of God on Mount Sinai. When the scholars wanted to appoint him head of the academy in Pumbeditha before they chose Rabah bar Nachmani, he went to consult an astrologer.
This Rav Joseph bar Chiya, who is always called simply Rav Joseph without a patronymic, was born about 270 C. E. and died 333 C. E. He was a sick man, always ailing, and very irritable. He would say, “There are three kinds of people whose life is not worth living; merciful people, angry people and sensitive people, and I have inherited all these qualities.”1)פּסחים קי״ג ב׳. It is related that later he grew even sicker and even became blind. He was not pained by the fact that he had to live in the darkness, but because he was exempt from all those commandments which require vision.2)בבא קמא פּ״ז א׳. Then Rav Joseph again suffered from a very severe illness, through which he lost his memory and all his learning. It then happened several times that some of Rav Joseph’s own laws came up in study and he said that he had never heard of them, and had to be reminded that they were his own.3)ערובין י׳ א׳, נדרים מ״א א׳. Then he would say that just as the whole and the broken tablets of the Mosaic law lay side by side in the Holy Ark, so we must infer that when a scholar has forgotten his learning he must not be humiliated.4)מנחות צ״ט א׳. Concerning his blindness it is not known whether this occurred before his last sickness and whether he remained blind until the end.
Unlike Rabah bar Nachmani, Rav Joseph bar Chiya was a wealthy man, who owned gold and silver, fields and vineyards of such excellent quality that his wine could be diluted with twice as much water as could be mixed with ordinary wine.5)מנחות פ״ז א׳. It sounds somewhat strange therefore when he says that “poverty suits a Jew like a red accoutrement suits a white horse.”6)חגיגה ט׳ ב׳.
On his sixtieth birthday, when he invited other scholars to a feast he said, in a similar whimsical vein: “No matter how I misbehave I can no longer die young.”7)מועד קטן כ״ח א׳.
Rav Joseph was different from his colleague Rabah in all his ways, in his private conduct as well as in his manner of studying. Though he was modest, he said “a teacher who has no regard for his dignity, has no dignity.”8)קדושין ל״ב ב׳. The difference between the scholarship of Rabah and that of Rav Joseph was many-sided. Rabah would usually depend upon his own reason and never hesitated if his opinion was that in the minority, and when he brought proof of his contentions they ordinarily were of a very complex sort and at first sight subject to objections of various sorts.9)שבת כ״ג ב׳, ערובין י״ט ב׳, בבא בתרא ל״א א׳, עבודה זרה מ״א א׳. Rav Joseph’s sayings were based, on the other hand, upon simple declarations and did not require complex reasoning, because he always kept the Mishnah and the Boraitha in mind, and avoided refinements and interpretations.10)שבת י״ח א׳, ערובין כ״ט ב׳, כתובות פ״א ב׳, מנחות ע״ה ב׳.
Since it was known that Rav Joseph was acquainted with metaphysics and cosmology, he was often asked to teach these subjects to his students. He would never agree to do so, however, and when they pressed him hard he evaded them with a quotation, interpreting the verse “honey and milk under your tongue” to mean that when some subject is as good as honey and milk it should be kept under the tongue and not expressed.11)חגיגה י״ג א׳.
Rav Joseph bar Chiya also paid much attention to the Aramaic translation of the Bible and especially to the “Haftaroth”. Since the masses understood very little Hebrew, the biblical portions that had to be read on Sabbath and holidays were to be read in the Babylonian tongue. Rav Joseph tried to prepare a correct translation of these synagogual readings in the Chaldean language, following the Greek translation of Aquilas (or Onkelos the convert) and this became the basis of our “Targum Onkelos.”
He was very fond of using folk-proverbs in his scholarly statements, as for instance: “A master who makes a spoon may still burn his tongue with it when it is full of broth,”12)פּסחים כ״ח א׳. or “even if you utter curses upon a dog’s tail, he will continue to do the same thing.”13)מועד קטן י״ז א׳.
Since Rav Joseph was very rich he fed his students at his own table, stating their number as about four hundred.14)כתובות ק״ו א׳. It is said that he was very modest and was aware of it himself and when people said that since the death of Rabbi Judah Hanasi modesty had died out among the Jews, he said: “Do not say that, for I am here.”15)סוטה מ״ט ב׳.
Along with Rabah bar Abahu, Rav Joseph held that just as Jews should not leave Palestine to come to Babylon, so Babylonians should not leave their homes to go to another country, even not so far as from Pumbeditha to Be-Kobi, which was the nearest city. When someone left Pumbeditha for Be-Kobi, Rav Joseph excommunicated him. Another person left Pumbeditha for Asthonia, which is located in southern Mesopotamia, and he died at once.16)כתובות קי״א א׳.
When he was nearing his end, Rav Joseph wanted assurance that the Torah would remain in his family and he fasted forty days until he saw in a dream the verse “my words which I have placed in thy mouth will not pass from out of thy mouth” (Isaiah 59, 21). Not being satisfied with this he fasted forty more days until he was shown the verse “they shall not pass from thy mouth and from the mouth of thy seed.” When he fasted another hundred days he was shown the verse “they shall not pass from thy mouth and from the mouth of thy seed and from the mouth of the seed of thy seed.” With this he was satisfied, for knowing that his grandchildren would be scholars also, he believed that the Torah would remain in his family.17)בבא מציעא פ״ה א׳.