The Fourth Pair: Shemaiah and Avtalyon

The last pair before Hillel and Shammai works under Hyrcanus, on the eve of Herod's accession. Their sayings read as an answer to exactly that moment.

Shemaiah, the nasi, said: "Love work, hate lordship, and do not seek intimacy with the ruling power." Three refusals in a row, each the opposite of what the age pushed towards: work with your hands, do not seek office, do not cultivate the palace.

Avtalyon, the av beit din, said: "Sages, be careful with your words, lest you incur the penalty of exile and be exiled to a place of evil waters; and the disciples who come after you will drink and die — and the Name of Heaven will be profaned." The word is spoken by the teacher — and paid for by the student who repeats it wrongly. It is perhaps the strictest passage in Avot on a teacher's responsibility.

Tradition preserves two more things about the two of them.

They were descended from converts. The Talmud tells how the high priest was walking with the people escorting him, but on seeing Shemaiah and Avtalyon they all left him and followed the two sages. The slighted high priest made a jibe about their descent — and was answered: let the sons of the nations come in peace, who do the deeds of Aaron; and let the son of Aaron not come in peace, who does not do the deeds of Aaron.

And Hillel studied with them. He came from Babylonia poor, earning half a dinar a day and giving half of that to the doorkeeper of the study hall. One day there was no wage; the doorkeeper would not let him in. Hillel climbed to the roof and lay by the skylight to hear the words of Shemaiah and Avtalyon. It was a Friday, and snow was falling. In the morning the study hall was darker than usual — a man lay on the skylight under three cubits of snow. They took him down, washed him, rubbed him with oil and sat him by the fire, saying: this man is worthy that the Sabbath be profaned for his sake.