Balance of Brotherhood: What We Can Learn from Rabbi Akiva’s Students

🖨 Print

During the days of counting the Omer, we implement certain practices of aveilut, to mourn the twenty-four thousand students of Rabbi Akiva who died during the period from Pesach to Shavuot. These were giants of Torah, the next generation of torch-bearers trained to carry the tradition into the diaspora so Torah could survive. What do their tragic deaths, all within a thirty-three day span, teach us?

A Spirit of Unity

The Gemara famously gives us the reason: Rabbi Akiva had twelve thousand pairs of students (in an area of land that stretched) from Gevat to Antipatris, and they all died in one period (of time), because they did not treat each other with respect.¹

Why does the Gemara refer to them as pairs, rather than simply twenty-four thousand individuals? The Ben Ish Chai² relates that Rabbi Akiva detected traces of jealousy and competition among his students. To combat it, he created a chavruta system whereby younger students were paired with veteran talmidim, so each was invested in the others’ success.

Apparently, Rabbi Akiva was a champion for achdut and compassion. It is from him that we learn about the mitzvah of visiting the sick, about which he said that it saves a life³. His are also the famous words: Ve’ahavta le’reacha kemocha, zeh klal gadol ba’Torah: Love your fellow as yourself, this is a core principle within Torah.

The crucial premise to giving kavod is to see the other as separate from oneself. The Shem MiShmuel tells us that respect for others flows from our recognition of their strengths and abilities that are unlike our own. Everyone is better at something or another, and everyone has what to learn from everyone else. When we take a step back and see the gifts and individuality of every Jew, we now have the tools to respect them for it.

Rayim, Rabbi Akiva’s word of choice to refer to one’s fellow, is different from the term chaver, friend. Rayim are parts of a union, as in rayim hu’ahuvim, our title of choice given to a young couple in the sheva brachot. Rayim aren’t just companions, but intrinsically connected entities, like different limbs of a body. This was the vision of Rabbi Akiva: that all Jewish people see the oneness we share and thereby love each other as we love ourselves.

The Tanya explains that although we are wired to love ourselves first, we can achieve this level if we relate to the Divine spark, the G-dly essence within each Jew. That life-giving connection is what we share, and that makes us all one entity.

Surely, Rabbi Akiva’s talmidim were themselves masters of ahavat yisrael and able to live by their teacher’s directive to see the underlying unity. How is it, then, that they failed to treat each other with proper kavod?

To Love and to Respect

The Shem MiShmuel⁴ says that indeed Rabbi Akiv’a talmidim had absolute affection for one another. Each was deeply connected to the other, relating to him truly as a part of a single whole. They saw each other as rayim, indivisible and intrinsically bonded, and loved each other dearly.

What was missing? Kavod. Somehow, their love sidestepped the imperative for honor.

Rav Hirsch⁵ explains the origins and implications of the term kavod using its root word, כבד. It is used to denote heaviness, indicating the potential for impact. To give something kavod is to recognize its weightiness, the difference it can make, the power it has. A tissue stuck to a shoe often goes unnoticed, but nobody can miss a rock that falls on their toe. Something that’s heavy demands that you take notice and recognize its impact.

Rabbi Akiva’s talmidim exemplified ve’ahavta le’reacha kemocha. But in their unmitigated love and connection, they missed the differences, the vital contributions that differentiated each from the pack and created in unison a multi-hued whole. They saw the essence, the unity, but lost sight of the olam maleh, the whole world that is within every person separately.

The Work of Sefirah

Maharal⁶ says that this is why they died during the period between Pesach and Shavuot. Their failure to fully appreciate each others’ Torah unique contributions showed a colossal lack of kavod haTorah, the tragic inability to see the nuance and meaning that each student brought to the halachic discourse. In their flaming pursuit toward emet, they did not make space for the legitimate expression of other perspectives. During the days of counting the Omer, we prepare ourselves for the ultimate kavod haTorah by seeing the units, by painstakingly acquiring middah after middah that will make us worthy vessels for matan Torah.

Maharal notes that the numerical value of kavod is thirty-two. The first thirty-two days of the Omer is when they passed away, and it is our time to rectify their mistake.The thirty-third day, says Maharal, is Lag Ba’Omer, the eighteenth of Iyar. Iyar is the same numerical equivalent of orech, long, and eighteen is the numerical value of chai, life. On this day when the plague ended and “long life” returned, Torat Chaim could finally resume.

On that day, too, we celebrate the everlasting Torah contributions of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, who was one of the handful of talmidim through whom Rabbi Akiva’s legacy survived. Fittingly, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai taught us: If Klal Yisrael was lacking even one person, the Divine Presence would not have appeared to them⁷. Each Jew is essential to create the People that could receive the Torah, and each one of their perspectives is beautiful and vital. The Torah of those masters who failed to fully appreciate this tenant could not survive, but the Torah of Rabbi Shimon grows ever more widespread.

The Torah’s survival relies on our unity, but also on our ability to respect the differences within achdut. The Torah Chaim we celebrate on Shavuot is a living, breathing code composed of all those layers that make our nation beautiful. Our oneness compels us to love each other; our differences compel us to honor one another, and the ability to balance these two modes of connection is how we hit the jackpot of kal yisrael areivim zeh bazeh and merit receiving the Torah.