הרב נחמיה איש שיחין

Nechemia Ish Shichin was a tanna of the third generation who sat in the town of Shichin in the lower Galil. He appears several times in the Yerushalmi and in the midrashim, and from what is brought there he stood in contact with Rav Akiva; in one place Rav Yehuda relates that Nechemia Ish Shichin testified before Rav Akiva in the laws of sotah, that the woman drinks and drinks a second time.

He was known for his open hand, and the account that comes down with his name is a bitter one. He met a man who had escaped from Yerushalayim after the great revolt, who asked him for a single chicken as tzedakah; Nechemia gave him money and told him to buy meat instead. The man ate more than his body could bear at that hour and died, and Nechemia cried out that they should come and eulogize the man he himself had killed.

In Bereishit Rabbah a derasha of his is brought on the pasuk that in six days Hashem made the heavens and the earth and the sea: these three are the foundation of the world, each of them waited three days, and each brought forth three offspring. The earth, made on the first day, waited the first, second and third and brought forth trees, grasses and Gan Eden; the firmament, made on the second, waited the second, third and fourth and brought forth sun, moon and constellations; and the waters, made on the third, waited the third, fourth and fifth and brought forth birds, fish and the Leviathan. Shichin itself is named often in the words of Chazal for its large pottery works and its nearness to Tzippori, and it is identified with the ruin just north of Tzippori, where remains of pottery manufacture were found together with a shul dated to his own days.