Eliezer Ben Hurcanus - His Death

His Death

When his former colleagues heard of his approaching dissolution, the most prominent of them hastened to his bedside at Cæsarea. When they appeared before him he began to complain about his long isolation. They tried to mollify him by professing great and unabated respect for him, and by averring that it was only the lack of opportunity that had kept them away. He felt that they might have profited by his teaching. Thereupon they besought him to communicate to them laws concerning certain points, particularly touching Levitical purity and impurity. He consented, and answered question after question until all breath left him. The last word he uttered was "tahor" ("pure"), and this the sages considered as an auspicious omen of his purity, whereupon they all rent their garments in token of mourning, and Joshua ben Hananiah revoked the sentence of excommunication.

Eliezer died on a Friday, and after the following Sabbath his remains were solemnly conveyed to Lydda, where he had formerly conducted his academy, and there he was buried. Many and earnest were the eulogies pronounced over his bier. R. Joshua is said to have kissed the stone on which Eliezer used to sit while instructing his pupils, and to have remarked, "This stone represents Sinai, and he who sat on it represented the Ark of the Covenant". R. Akiba applied to Eliezer the terms which Elisha had applied to Elijah, and which Joash subsequently applied to Elisha himself, "O my father, my father, the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof".

Though excommunicated, Rabbi Eliezer is quoted in the Mishnah, the Baraita, and the Talmud more frequently than any one of his colleagues. He is also the putative author of a work known as The Ethics of Rabbi Eliezer.