flourished 2nd century AD
Rabbi and scholar of Palestine.
He fled Palestine during the persecutions that followed the Bar Kokhba revolt in AD 13235 but later returned and helped reestablish the Sanhedrin . The patriarch of the Sanhedrin eventually threatened him with excommunication over a question of protocol, and he left for Asia Minor, where he had been born. Known for his great dialectical skill, he is cited repeatedly in the Talmud and is remembered as the greatest of the tannaim , a group of masters of the Jewish oral law. Legends of his miraculous powers sprang up during the Middle Ages.