רבי פרידא

Rabbi Perida was an amora whose teaching and conduct are recalled in both the Talmud and the later mussar literature. In Eruvin (54b) it is recorded that he had a student to whom he would repeat each lesson four hundred times until the student grasped it; on one day, when the student was distracted by a matter of mitzvah, Rabbi Perida taught it to him an additional four hundred times. This account became a byword for patience and devotion in teaching Torah.

His mastery of the laws of the Mikdash appears in Menachot (52b), where he asks Rabbi Ami for the source that all the menachot (meal-offerings) are brought as matzah. Beyond his learning, Rabbi Perida is remembered for the pious habits that he attributed his long life to: as cited in Mesillat Yesharim (chapter 19), when his students asked how he had merited length of days, he answered that no one ever preceded him to the beit midrash, that he never recited a blessing before a kohen, and that he never ate from an animal whose priestly gifts had not been separated. His example of humility and reverence is also drawn upon in Orchot Tzadikim.