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Reish Lakish Spoke and the Study Hall Shook

Rabbi Yochanan handed the eulogy to Reish Lakish. He called the dead man a garden that God walked into. Yochanan chose shrouds neither white nor black.

Curated by Arthur · Told by Maggid ·
Table of Contents
  1. Let Reish Lakish Go
  2. Where Will Wisdom Be Found
  3. Neither White nor Black
  4. How the Academy Buries Its Own
  5. Irreplaceable Minds
Reish Lakish Spoke and the Study Hall Shook Click for full size

Let Reish Lakish Go

When Hiyya bar Ivya, sister's son of bar Kappara, died, the community asked Rabbi Yochanan for the eulogy. Yochanan refused the honor and pointed to a disciple who knew the dead man's virtues from the inside. "Let Reish Lakish go," he said. Humility sent the speech down one rung of the academy, and that rung held.

Reish Lakish stood and spoke a short line from the Song of Songs: "My beloved went down into his garden." God, knowing the worth of the scholar, had walked into His own garden and taken what He loved. The study hall heard a love song turned into a death notice. No long inventory of titles. A garden. A beloved. A descent that was also a claim.

Where Will Wisdom Be Found

Another death, another voice. When Rabbi Simon bar Zavdi died, Rabbi Ila eulogized him from the Book of Job. Wisdom, where will it be found? The deep says it is not in me. The sea says it is not with me. It is vanished from the eyes of all living. Silver has a mine and gold a place of refining. Iron comes from dust and copper from rock. When those are lost, the earth still yields more. When a Torah scholar dies, where is the replacement?

Rabbi Levi tightens the dread. Jacob's sons feared when they found money returned in their sacks, though free silver should be joy, because the world had stopped making sense. So too a generation that loses its wise man feels the order of things slip. Grief is not only tears. It is the question that has no quarry and no smelter.

Neither White nor Black

When Rabbi Yochanan felt his own soul preparing to leave, he gathered his students and gave a last order about color. Do not clothe me in bright dyed garments, he said, nor in pure white, nor in deepest black. Bury me in something in between. White is the garment of the righteous who walk in radiance. Black is the garment of the wicked who stand in shame. He would claim neither.

"If on the great Day I am found among the righteous," he said, "I do not wish to be ashamed in the dark clothing of the guilty. If I am found among the wicked, I do not wish to be humiliated in the white of the pure." He chose a middle hue that would not lie in either direction. Even at the threshold of death he left the verdict in Heaven's hands.

How the Academy Buries Its Own

One sage's death becomes a garden God enters. Another's becomes a mine that will not yield a second vein. A master's own burial becomes a refusal to costume the soul in advance. The academy does not only argue law. It learns how to speak when speech is almost useless, and how to dress a body when the body's story is not finished until judgment.

Reish Lakish's short poem and Yochanan's careful cloth answer each other. Love claims the dead for God's garden. Humility refuses to claim the dead for a party of the saved or the damned. Between them the study hall learns to mourn without arrogance.

A eulogy is not a resume read aloud. In these halls it is a theology of absence: God harvesting a garden, the earth refusing to replace a mind, a dying master refusing to dress his corpse as a verdict. The living are left with work that feels smaller and more urgent at once, because silver can be mined again and a teacher cannot.

Irreplaceable Minds

Silver has a source. Gold has a place of refining. Iron and copper return from rock and dust. The eulogy's power is the break in that list. A scholar is not an ore. When Simon bar Zavdi dies, Rabbi Ila cannot point to a hill where another such mind can be dug. The academy feels the shortage immediately. Questions that person would have answered hang in the air. Arguments that person would have sharpened go dull.

Reish Lakish's garden line answers shortage with intimacy. God did not lose the dead man. God harvested him. "My beloved went down into his garden" turns death into a visit Home, which does not stop the tears and does reframe the ownership. The disciple who knew the virtues was the right mouth for that sentence. A stranger's eulogy would have listed titles. The student could risk a love song.

Yochanan's mid-colored shrouds complete the set. If the dead are God's harvest, the dead still do not get to costume themselves as already judged. White and black are verdicts. The middle cloth is a deferral. The same Rabbi Yochanan who stepped aside so Reish Lakish could speak also steps aside before his own coffin, refusing to declare which company he will keep on the Day. Humility in speech and humility in linen: two sides of one academy ethic.

Reish lakishYochananEulogyDeathShroudsJudgmentScholarMourningKoheletTorah StudyKnowledgeWealthHalakhah
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From the tradition

Sources

2 sources

The texts behind this telling. Some cards carry a translation of the source; others are our own retelling of it, and each card says which. Every card links out to the original.

Shir HaShirim Rabbah 2:5Shir HaShirim Rabbah

Retold in our words. Read the original at the link below.The Sefaria Midrash Rabbah, 2022 · CC-BY

First, we have the story of Ḥiyya bar Ivya, the son of bar Kappara’s sister. When he passed away, the community turned to Rabbi Yoḥanan, asking him to deliver the eulogy. But Rabbi Yoḥanan, with remarkable humility, suggested Reish Lakish, also known as Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish, instead, saying, "Let Reish Lakish go, as he is his disciple and he knows his virtues.”

What did Reish Lakish say? A simple, yet profound statement: “My beloved went down into his garden” – a poetic way of saying that God, knowing the worth of Rabbi Ḥiyya bar Ivya, took him from this world. The Zohar echoes this sentiment, reminding us that God knows the actions of every person. It's a bittersweet acknowledgment of divine will, tinged with the pain of parting.

Then comes the story of Rabbi Simon bar Zavdi's death. This time, Rabbi Ila steps forward to eulogize him, and he chooses a different path, one steeped in philosophical questioning. He quotes from the Book of Job: “But wisdom, where will it be found, and where is the place of understanding?”

He continues, drawing out the lament: “The deep says: It is not in me; and the sea says: It is not with me… It is vanished from the eyes of all living and hidden from the birds of the heavens.” It's a powerful expression of the void left by the loss of wisdom.

Rabbi Ila then makes a striking analogy. He says that the world depends on essential elements, and when those elements are lost, there are replacements. “For there is a source of silver and a place where gold is refined. Iron is taken from the dust, and copper is smelted from rock.” But, he asks, when a Torah scholar dies, where will we find their replacement? This is the crux of the matter. The loss of a scholar, a wise and learned individual, feels uniquely devastating.

Rabbi Levi adds another layer to this grief, referencing the story of Jacob's sons in Genesis. As we find in Midrash Rabbah, the tribes were fearful when they found their money returned to their sacks, even though finding money is generally cause for celebration. Why? Because it disrupted their understanding of the world, it suggested something was deeply wrong. So too, Rabbi Levi suggests, we who lost Rabbi Simon bar Zavdi, from where will we find his replacement? That is, “but wisdom, where will it be found?”

These two eulogies, preserved in Shir HaShirim Rabbah, offer us a glimpse into how the Rabbis wrestled with loss. They understood that grief isn't just about sadness; it's about the disruption of order, the questioning of purpose, and the profound recognition of irreplaceable value.

And isn't that true for us as well? When we lose someone we cherish, we don't just mourn their absence. We mourn the unique light they brought to the world, a light that can never truly be replicated. And perhaps, in remembering them, in studying their teachings, in carrying forward their values, we can keep that light alive.

Full source
Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Vayechi 6:3Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Vayechi

Translation of the source text.Midrash Tanchuma (Buber), Public Domain, on Sefaria · CC-BY-SA

Rabbi Yochanan, when he was departing from the world, said to his disciples: Do not bury me except in colored garments, not in white garments, [and not in black garments], so that if I stand among the righteous I will not be ashamed, and among the wicked I will not be put to shame.

Full source