רב אבדימי בר חמא בר חסא

Rav Avdimi bar Chama bar Chasa (רב אבדימי בר חמא בר חסא), whose name also appears as Rav Avdimi bar Chama bar Dosa, was an amora among the baalei aggadah. His time and place are not known for certain, but he was most likely an amora of Bavel, since his words are found only in the Talmud Bavli and not in the Yerushalmi.

His best-known teaching reads the words “vayityatzvu b’tachtit hahar,” said of Bnei Yisrael before the giving of the Torah at Har Sinai, in their plain sense: they stood beneath the mountain. From this he teaches that Hashem held the mountain over them like a barrel and said to them: if you accept the Torah, good, and if not, there will be your burial. Rav Acha bar Yaakov drew from this drasha a defense for those who transgress the Torah, since it was accepted under duress and so does not bind them; Rava limited that defense to the period up to the days of Achashverosh, when, as Chazal teach, the Jews accepted the Torah willingly.

He also explains the pasuk “lo bashamayim hi v’lo me’ever layam hi” (it is not in the heavens, and it is not across the sea): were the Torah in the heavens, one would have to go up after it, and were it across the sea, one would have to cross after it. And he teaches that whoever busies himself with Torah, Hashem carries out his wishes for him, as it says, “ki im b’torat Hashem cheftzo” (his desire is in the Torah of Hashem).

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