The Roman official had one cup too many set before him, and his face twisted unnaturally. A Rabbi knew the cure — rearrange the cups so the even number became odd, and the face would right itself. They did. The face returned to normal. Then the official remembered his errand. "The man I want," he said, "is here." He locked the Rabbi up. "If I could save you by losing only my life, I would. But I fear torture. I have to hold you."
The Rabbi prayed in his cell. The walls gave way. He fled to Agma and sat beneath a tree, and there — Rabbah bar Nachmani, one of the greatest minds in Babylonian Talmud — began to meditate. Bava Metzia 86a picks up the scene.
Above him, in the heavenly academy, a debate was raging. The question was a technical one from (Leviticus 13:25) — a certain kind of leprous hair: clean or unclean? The Holy One, blessed be He, ruled clean. The entire heavenly academy ruled unclean. Deadlock. "Who shall decide?" they asked. "Rabbah bar Nachmani," came the answer, "for he said of himself, 'In the laws of leprosy and tents I stand alone.'"
The angel of death was dispatched. He could not approach — the Rabbi's lips never stopped reciting Torah. So the angel took the shape of a troop of Roman cavalry thundering through the field. Rabbah, terrified of capture, cried out: "Better to die by him than fall into their hands!" At that instant the heavenly voice asked the question. "Clean," said Rabbah — and with the word his soul departed. A voice rang out from Heaven: "Blessed are you, Rabbah bar Nachmani, for your body is clean, and clean was the word on your lips when your spirit departed."
A scroll fell from the sky into Pumbedita announcing his admission to the heavenly academy. His students went to Agma to bury him. Some men die in battle. Some die in bed. Rabbah died mid-sentence, teaching the angels.
before him with one cup only on it, and thus the even number would become odd, and his face would return to its natural position. They did so, and it was as the Rabbi had said. The official then remarked to his host, " I know the man I want is here," and he hastened and found him. " If I knew for certain, he said to the Rabbi, that thy escape would cost my life only, I would let thee go, but I fear bodily torture, and therefore I must secure thee." And thereupon he locked him up. Upon this the Rabbi prayed, till the prison walls miraculously giving way he made his escape to Agma, where he seated himself at the root of a tree and gave himself up to meditation. While thus engaged he all at once heard a discussion in the academy of heaven on the subject of the hair mentioned in Lev. xiii. 25. The Holy One — blessed be He! — declared the case to be " clean," but the whole academy were of a different opinion, and declared the case to be "unclean." The question then arose, " Who shall decide ? " " Ravah bar Nachmaini shall decide," was the unanimous reply, " for he said, ' I am one in matters of leprosy; I am one in questions about tents; and there is none to equal me. ' " Then the angel of death was sent for to bring him up, but he was unable to approach him, because the Rabbi's lips never ceased repeating the law of the Lord. The angel of death thereupon assumed the appearance of a troop of cavalry, and the Rabbi, apprehesive] of being seized and carried off, exclaimed, " I would rather die through that one (meaning the angel of death) than be delivered into the hands of the Government ! " At that very instant he was asked to decide the question in dispute, and just as the verdict " clean " issued from his lips his soul departed from his body, and a voice was heard from heaven proclaiming, " Blessed art thou, Ravah bar Nachmaini, for thy body is clean. ( Clean was the word on thy lips when thy spirit departed." Then a scroll fell down from heaven into Pumbeditha announcing that Ravah bar Nachmaini was admitted into the academy of heaven. Apprised of this, Abaii, in company with many other Rabbis, went in search of the body to inter it, but not knowing the spot where he lay, they went to Agma, where they noticed a
