הרב אבוה דשמואל

Abba bar Abba, known for all generations as Avuha deShmuel — “the father of Shmuel” — was a Bavli amora of the generation of passage from the Tannaim to the Amoraim. Born in Nehardea to a distinguished family of kohanim, he learned there under the Babylonian tannaim, went up to Eretz Yisrael to learn under Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi, and returned to Nehardea, where he served as rav and dayan and was the spiritual head of the community. Halachic questions were sent to him by iggerot from Eretz Yisrael, and he sent his own to Rebbi. Among his talmidim were his son Shmuel — who at times differs with him — and Mar Ukva, and Rav Matna and Rabbi Yochanan cite teachings in his name. His close friend was Levi bar Sisi, with whom he learned and davened in the ancient beit knesset Shaf VeYativ in Nehardea — where, the Gemara relates, the two merited gilui Shechinah — and upon Levi’s petirah he was the maspid, saying that Levi was weighed against all of mankind.

He traded in silk, and was a man of great wealth and fields, which he inspected twice a day; his produce he would sell cheaply at the season’s start to bring prices down for the whole year. The Gemara relates that Rabbi Yehudah ben Beteira sent word that he wished to buy silk, and when Abba arrived in Netzivin with the goods, Rabbi Yehudah said he had not sent money and had not truly bound himself. Abba answered that Rabbi Yehudah’s word was trusted by him more than any money, and he set the silk aside for him; Rabbi Yehudah blessed him that he should merit a son like Shmuel HaNavi, of whom it says “and all Yisrael knew… that Shmuel was faithful” — and afterward his son Shmuel, among the greatest of the Amoraim of Bavel, was born.

He was a great chassid. He once returned lost donkeys to their owner more than a year after their loss, beyond the letter of the din. He trained his household in mitzvot: he would give the young Shmuel money to distribute to aniyim, and when Shmuel reported a poor man eating meat and drinking wine, he said — give him more, for he is accustomed to it. He was strict with his daughters in hilchot Shabbat and in tzniut.

Money of yesomim was deposited with him, and he guarded it more faithfully than his own. When he was niftar, Shmuel was not at his side and did not know where the money lay, and people began to speak against him as the son of one who consumed the orphans’ money. The Gemara relates that Shmuel went to the beit hakevarot and spoke with his father, who told him the money lay beneath the millstone — his own coins above and below and the orphans’ money in the middle, so that if thieves took, they would take his and not theirs. He lived long, into the days of Rabbi Yehudah Nesiah, who showed him great honor.