Judah ben Tabbai

rdf:langString Judah ben Tabbai

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rdf:langString Heinrich Graetz in History of the Jews

rdf:langString Pirkei Avot 1:8

rdf:langString Do not act as an advisor among judges. When the litigants are before you, see them as criminals. And when the litigants have taken their leave, see them as innocent, should they have accepted the decision.

rdf:langString With the help of Simon [Judah] undertook the reorganization of the [Sanhedrin], the improvement of the administration of the law, the re-establishment of neglected religious observances, the furthering of education, and generally the fashioning of such regulations as the times required. Like Ezra and Nehemiah of old, these two zealous men insisted upon a return to the strictest form of Judaism; and, if they were often obliged to employ severe and violent measures, these are not to be accounted to any personal malice, but to the sterness of the age itself. They were indeed scrupulously strict in their own conduct, and in directing those closely connected with them. From the days of Judah ben Tabbai and Simon ben Shetach, the rule of Judean Law, according to the view of the Pharisees, may be said to have begun, and it grew and developed under each succeeding generation. These two celebrated men have therefore been called "Restorers of the Law", who "brought back the Crown its ancient splendor."

rdf:langString Judah ben Tabbai (Hebrew: יהודה בן טבאי Yehuda ben Tabbai) was a Pharisee scholar, av beit din of the Sanhedrin, and one of "the Pairs" (zugot) of Jewish leaders who lived in the first century BCE. Judah ben Tabbai was associated by some medieval writers with what later came to be known as Karaite Judaism.