רבי חנינא בן גמליאל

Rabbi Chanina ben Gamliel — his name appears also as Chananya — was a tanna of the third and fourth generations and, according to Rashi and Tosafot, a son of Rabban Gamliel of Yavneh. He is mentioned five times in the Mishnah and dozens of times in the Talmud. Two other sons of Rabban Gamliel of Yavneh are named in the sources: Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel, who succeeded his father as Nasi and appears in the Talmud far more often than Rabbi Chanina, and Rabbi Yehuda ben Gamliel. The Sifra on parshat Emor brings a remark of his about the Kohen Gadol Pinchas ish Habata — “Was he a stonecutter? Why, he was our son-in-law!” — which Tosafot explains as referring to a son-in-law of his forefathers in the days of the Beit HaMikdash, not of Rabbi Chanina himself.

A beraita in Megillah 25 relates an act of his that the sages praised. He came to the town of Kabul, and the chazan of the shul was reading the passage “And it was, when Israel dwelt in that land,” which tells the episode of Reuven and Bilhah. Rabbi Chanina ben Gamliel told the meturgeman to stop, and to translate only the closing words, “and the sons of Yaakov were twelve,” out of concern for Reuven’s disgrace. So the Mishnah rules there: the incident of Reuven is read but not translated.

In another beraita he addresses the view that on motzaei Yom Kippur, because of the strain at the close of the fast, one may fulfill Ma’ariv with the abridged “Havineinu” — the first three and last three berachot in full, with a single middle berachah in place of the twelve. “Rabbi Chanina ben Gamliel says in the name of his fathers: one prays the full eighteen berachot, because Havdalah must be said in Chonen HaDa’at” — the “Atah Chonantanu” inserted there on every motzaei Shabbat and Yom Tov, which the abridged form cannot carry. The halachah follows this view. The phrase “in the name of his fathers” is very rare in the Talmud, and apparently reflects his belonging to the house of the Nesi’im: his father Rabban Gamliel, his grandfather Rabban Shimon, his great-grandfather Rabban Gamliel HaZaken, and their fathers before them all held this ruling. Rav Nachman bar Yitzchak notes that he said it only in their name, for another beraita brings his own view that Havdalah is said in the berachah of thanksgiving, which is recited in full even in Havineinu.

The amora Rabbi Abahu cites him in six places in the Talmud — more than any other amora cites him, and Rabbi Abahu cites no other tanna by name in this way — and most of what he brings concerns incidents from Rabbi Chanina’s life, even his personal life.