Background
Gamaliel II was born in Palestine in 40AD.
Gamaliel II was born in Palestine in 40AD.
Assuming office in succession to Johanan ben Zakkai around 80 CE, Gamaliel consolidated the work of religious and national reconstruction that Johanan had undertaken a decade earlier after the Romans laid waste the Temple.
While under suspension, he continued to discharge his ordinary duties with a good grace, believing that every step had been taken “not for his own honor, nor for that of his house, but for the honor of God alone, so that factions might not grow apace in Israel.” At his bidding, therefore, a nineteenth benediction was added to the Amidah prayer, designed to exclude Judeo-Christians and other heretical elements from synagogue worship. At the same time, righteous proselytes were mentioned favorably in a separate Amidah blessing; and the delegation of leading sages, headed by Rabban Gamaliel, that journeyed to Rome (c. 95 CE) apparently aimed to avert a decree outlawing conversion to Judaism, after the Emperor Domitian’s own cousin, Flavius Clemens, had embraced the Jewish faith.
One of the foremost teachers of his generation, renowned for his authoritative judgment and for his broad cultural interests, Gamaliel attained vast prestige as the official spokesman and representative of his people. He was responsible for many enactments that had far-reaching impact on Jewish life: determining the biblical canon; perpetuating remembrance of the Temple in various laws and customs; reformulating the Passover seder ritual; giving a set form to the Amidah prayer, the recitation of which became a daily obligation; and, through his personal example, doing away with elaborate burial rites so as to avoid social distinctions. Above all, he promoted a unification of Jewish legal, theological, and ethical traditions that served as the basis for his grandson Judah ha-Nasi’s later achievement in the Mishnah.
Though somewhat high-handed and domineering in public life, Gamaliel was a modest, saintly, and kind-hearted individual whose consideration for others extended not only to pupils and the Jewish community at large but also to well-intentioned Gentiles and his own faithfbl, pious slave, Tabi.