רבי שמעון ברבי

Rabbi Shimon beRabbi, also called Rabban beRabbi, was a chacham of Eretz Yisrael in the generation of passage from the tannaim to the amoraim, and the younger son of Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi. He learned from his father, who drew him nearer than the rest of his talmidim: men far older than he — Rabbi Chiya, Rabbi Yishmael beRabbi Yosi and Bar Kappara — learned mikra from his mouth, and the last word in choosing which sefer the yeshiva would learn was given to him. His father called him ner Yisrael, the light of Israel, and was exacting about any slight to his honor; before his passing Rabbi called him in and handed over to him the orders of wisdom.

Though he was the wisest of Rabbi’s sons, the nesiut passed to his elder brother Rabban Gamliel beRabbi, since he was not the firstborn; Rabbi Shimon was appointed chacham of the yeshiva in Beit She’arim and served under his brother. He carried his father’s Mishnah to the generations after him: Rabbi had learned it through with him in his youth, and in his father’s old age it was Rabbi Shimon who corrected him from it. He is named once in the Mishnah itself, in Makkot, where he teaches that if a man is given reward for holding back from blood, which a person’s soul recoils from, all the more is he rewarded who holds back from gezel and arayot, which a person’s soul craves. A single halachah of his stands in Yevamot — that all agree the child of a man who takes back his divorced wife is pasul for the kehunah — and the only chacham who gives a reason in his name is Rabbi Acha bar Chanina, in the Yerushalmi.

He dealt in silk in partnership with Rabbi Chiya and is described as a wealthy man. His wedding is told of in both Talmuds; it seems he had been betrothed to a daughter of Rabbi Chiya, who was niftar close to the time of the marriage. Rabbi Chiya praised him for the stratagem by which he removed the stones of a Markulis from the issur of avodah zarah, saying: happy is the mother who has such a son. In a conversation with his father he prevailed on him to quote Rabbi Meir and Rabbi Natan by name, undoing the penalty his grandfather Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel had laid upon them. When Rav Kahana came up from Bavel he found Rabbi Shimon teaching in the name of Rabbi Yishmael beRabbi Yosi, from which some hold that he lived on for decades after his father, into the nesiut of Rabbi Yehudah Nesiah. The Rambam counted thirty-seven generations between himself and Rabbi Shimon beRabbi.