רבי ירמיה

Rabbi Yirmeya is an amora whose teachings appear repeatedly throughout the aggadic Midrash, especially in the aggadic collections on the Five Megillot. He is cited with particular frequency in Kohelet Rabbah, where he offers expositions on verses of Eicha — for example interpreting the alternation of masculine and feminine grammatical forms in Kohelet’s speech as a reflection of the ruach hakodesh, and transmitting teachings in the name of Rabbi Shmuel bar Rav Yitzchak. His comments also surface in Eichah Rabbah, and the cited passages place him in the company of contemporaries such as Rabbi Tanchuma, Rabbi Menachma, and Rabbi Meyasha.

The library passages also preserve aggadot attributed to a Rabbi Yirmeya bar Elazar — for instance the teaching that Hashem made conditions not only with the sea but with everything created at the very inception of the world, and reflections on episodes such as the making of the golden calf (Eigel Hazahav) and the destruction wrought against Sodom.