Eliezer ben Hyrcanus was the son of a wealthy landowner who wanted nothing more than for his boy to work the fields. But Eliezer wanted Torah. At the age of twenty-two — far older than students usually began — he ran away from home to study at the academy of Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai in Jerusalem.
Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer (Chapter 1) tells the story in vivid detail. Eliezer's father, Hyrcanus, was furious. He traveled to Jerusalem to disinherit his son publicly. When he arrived at the academy, he found the greatest men of Jerusalem gathered — including the legendary Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai himself — and his son Eliezer was standing before them all, teaching Torah.
Rabban Yohanan saw Hyrcanus enter and said: "Your son Eliezer — sit him at the head, for one day he will be the greatest sage in Israel." When Hyrcanus heard this, his anger melted. Instead of disinheriting Eliezer, he declared: "I came here to disinherit my son. Now I disinherit all my other sons and give everything to Eliezer."
Eliezer refused the inheritance. He did not want wealth — he wanted wisdom. The son who abandoned the plow for the scroll became Rabbi Eliezer the Great, whose knowledge the sages compared to a plastered cistern that never lost a single drop. His father's fields produced grain for a generation. Eliezer's Torah has fed souls for two thousand years.