Stories drawn from
A Bride for One Night: Talmud Tales
by Ruth Calderon

On Elisha/HA’AHER (The Other/Heretic)

Elisha Rabbi Meir was preaching in the study house in Tiberias. His teacher Elisha rode past on his horse on the Sabbath.

They came and said [to Rabbi Meir]: Your rabbi is outside.
He stopped and went out to him.

He [Elisha] said to him: What were you teaching today?

He [Rabbi Meir] said to him: “And the Lord blessed the latter years of Job’s life more than the former” (Job 42: 12).

He said to him: And with what verse did you introduce your teaching?

He said to him: “And the Lord gave Job twice what he had before” (Job 42: 10), meaning that he doubled his wealth.

He said to him: Enough Meir, we have come to the boundary beyond which it is forbidden to travel on the Sabbath.

He [Rabbi Meir] said to him: How do you know that?

He [Elisha] said to him: From the steps of my horse, which I counted as it trotted for a distance of 2,000 cubits.

He said to him: You have all this knowledge in you, yet you still do not want to repent from your heresy?

He said to him: I cannot.
He said to him: Why?

He said to him: Because once I was passing by the Holy of Holies on my horse on the Day of Atonement, which fell on the Sabbath. I heard a still, small voice coming out of the Holy of Holies and saying: Return, my wayward sons, except for Elisha ben Abuya, who recognized my power and turned against me.”

Jerusalem Talmud Hagiga 2:1

The Goblet

The Gemara relates: Abaye’s wife, Ḥoma, came before Rava after Abaye died, as Rava was the local judge.

She said to him: Apportion sustenance for me, as I am entitled to be sustained by Abaye’s heirs.

Rava apportioned sustenance for her.

She subsequently said to him: Apportion wine for me as well.

Rava said to her: I know that Naḥmani, i.e., Abaye, did not drink wine. Since you were not accustomed to drinking wine during your husband’s lifetime, you are not entitled to it after his death.

She said to him: By the Master’s life, this is not correct. In fact, he would give me wine to drink in cups [shufrazei] as large as this. She gestured with her hands to show how large the cups were. While she was showing him the size of the cups, her arm became uncovered, and she was so beautiful that it was as though a light had shined in the courtroom.  

Rava arose, went home, and requested intercourse from his wife, the daughter of Rav Ḥisda.

The daughter of Rav Ḥisda said to him: Who was just now in the courtroom? Noticing his unusual behavior, she suspected that there must have been a woman in the court.

He said to her: Ḥoma, Abaye’s wife, was there.

Upon hearing this, Rava’s wife went after Ḥoma and struck her with the lock of a chest until she drove her out of the entire city of Meḥoza, saying to her:

You have already killed three men, as Abaye was your third husband, and now you come to kill another one, my husband Rava? Since you showed him your beauty, he will want to marry you.

Babylonian Ketubot 65a