(22) Rabban Jochanan ben Zakkai was known as the least of the
disciples of Hillel. He was a contemporary of the historian
Josephus. Escaping in a coffin from Jerusalem, when it was
besieged by the Roman general Vespasian, and predicting the
latter's elevation to the imperial dignity, Jochanan was
allowed by Vespasian to go to Jabneh (Jamnia), where he
founded the celebrated academy which became the centre of
learning in Palestine, as Jerusalem had previously been. He
was the most important scribe in the first decade after the
destruction of the Temple (70 C.E.). See Strack, _Einleitung
in den Talmud_, p. 86 _et seq._, Bacher, _Agada der Tanaiten_,
pp. 25-46, Myers, _Story of the Jewish People_, I, pp.
151-160, and Danziger, _Jewish Forerunners of Christianity_,
pp. 55-72.

10. Rabban Jochanan, the son of Zakkai, had five disciples (23), and
these are they: Rabbi Eliezer, the son of Hyrcanus; Rabbi Joshua, the
son of Hananiah (24); Rabbi Jose, the Priest; Rabbi Simeon, the son of
Nataniel; and Rabbi Eleazar, the son of Arach. 11. He used thus to
recount their praise: "Eliezer, the son of Hyrcanus, is a cemented
cistern, which loses not a drop (25); Joshua, the son of Hananiah,
happy is she that bare him (26); Jose, the Priest, is a pious man
(27); Simeon, the son of Nataniel, is a fearer of sin; Eleazar, the
son of Arach, is like a spring flowing with ever-sustained vigor"
(28). 12. He used to say, "If all the sages of Israel were in one
scale of the balance, and Eliezer, the son of Hyrcanus, in the other,
he would outweigh them all." Abba Saul (29) said in his name, "If all
the sages of Israel were in one scale of the balance, and Eliezer, the
son of Hyrcanus, also with them, and Eleazar, the son of Arach, in the