The Beauty and Practicality of Rachel and Rabbi Akiva’s Story

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Like many of the most powerful stories in the Torah, the story of Rachel and Akiva has become romanticized. Dramatic scenes in high school plays, center-plots for hundreds of books, specifically those for children. Terms get thrown around; ‘like water on the rock’, ‘can you be like Rachel?’, ‘you can do it. Remember the story of R’ Akiva?’

Rachel and Akiva’s story has become consonant with suffering too. The poverty they lived in. The family ties that Rachel severed. Her 24 lonely years. The death of R’ Akiva’s 24,000 students. R’ Akiva’s brutal death. And the list goes on. But can we look deeper?

Can we find joy and validity in the story of the Jewish people’s most esteemed sage Rabbi Akiva and his wife, Rachel, a story that occurred 2157 years ago? Because its message, its values and its truth, become ever more relevant with time.

It’s a story, not of martyrdom – martyrdom’s meaning ‘when someone suffers or is killed because of their religious or political beliefs’- is not what Rachel and Akiva’s story is about. The story’s central theme is not suffering, not pain, or torture, though all these play prominent roles as well. The story’s central theme is love.

Love – the real kind – is at the very center of the Torah, “Many waters cannot quench love; neither can the floods drown it.”¹

Back to our story – Rachel, wife of the great Rabbi Akiva, lived alone for 24 years while he studied Torah away from home and ultimately became one of the greatest Torah sages. Poor Rachel. Sacrificing, suffering Rachel.

You see, Rabbi Akiva’s life, from early on, was not paved with rose bushes. He was born as the child of a very poor family and became an ignorant shepherd, one of the many who took care of the thousands of flocks of the wealthy Kalba Sabua, about whose riches the Talmud tells many stories². The daughter of this fabulously wealthy man was a beautiful and God-fearing girl. The richest and most learned young men of that time would have considered themselves fortunate to marry her. But Rachel, Kalba Sabua’s only child, the heir to his riches, had observed the shepherd Akiba and some inner voice told her that this ignorant youth had the making of a great scholar. On the condition that he would leave her father’s work to go and study Torah, she married him secretly³.

As Rachel refused one young man after the other, Kalba Sabua found out about her secret marriage to his former shepherd. Enraged, he vowed that he would have nothing to do with her or her husband. Rachel left all the luxuries and comforts to which she had been accustomed and went to live with Akiva in a shack, sleeping on a bundle of straw, and working hard with her own, soft hands, so that her husband could devote himself to the study of Torah⁴. Once when she could not find work, she even cut off her beautiful long hair to sell it, so that she would have some money with which to buy a dry crust of bread.

After Akiva had mastered the basic knowledge of the Torah, his wife and he agreed that he was to go to the academy of the great scholars of those days, headed by Rabbi Eliezer, to devote twelve years to intensive study. Thus the two parted, and for twelve long years, Rachel slaved hard to support herself, while her husband grew to become one of the most learned of all men that ever lived. At the end of twelve years, Rabbi Akiva returned to his wife, as he had promised. When he came before the shabby old shack he heard a conversation between his wife and a neighbor who was taunting Rachel for being foolish enough to wait for her husband who had left her to study Torah. “You could live in riches and luxuries if you were not so foolish,” said the woman.

“From my part, he could stay away another twelve years at the Yeshivah to acquire more knowledge,” was Rachel’s reply⁵.

And he did. Another 12 years of separation. Of loneliness. Of heroic sacrifices.

But then I learned about her crown. In appreciation of his wife’s sacrifice, Rabbi Akiva presented his wife with an elaborate gold tiara, engraved with the domes and hills of the holy city of Jerusalem. As he fastened the tiara upon her head, he proclaimed “My Torah is her Torah. She is deserving of this honor.”⁶

He turned to his students and continued, “All I have, and by extension, all that you have, truly belongs to my wife. For she gets all the credit.”⁷

And there it is. A story spanning 55 years – from their marriage until R’ Akiva’s death. You’ve read it in a few prettily worded paragraphs.

What do you walk away with? That Torah equals suffering? That devoting yourself to His Will means poverty and loneliness? That reaching a level of elevated spirituality means the sacrifice of one’s life?

Those were my takeaways until not very recently. But then I learned their story again and I walked away with something life-changing.

Now I realize that Rachel’s story is not one of martyrdom, but of love. Love for the Torah, love for her husband, and an appreciation for what he was devoting his life to.

R’ Akiva and Rachel’s story is our story too. Yours and mine.

Because love is the central theme in all of our lives. Love for our close ones, love for Hashem and His Torah, and – love for ourselves.

Can we stroke the humble child within us, can we find it and can we whisper – I love you just the way you are, but remember, you can become so much greater than what you are now. One drop at a time.

¹ _{The Prophet Hosea (2:21)}

² _{Pesachim 49b}

³ _{Ketubot 62}

⁴ _{Yerushalmi Shabbat 6:1}

⁵ _{Ketubot 62}

⁶ _{Avos D’Rabbi Nassan 6:2}

⁷ _{Ketubot 62}