Ishmael ben Fabus

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Ishmael ben Fabus also known as Ishmael ben Phiabi and Ishmael ben Phabi (Hebrew: ישמעאל בן פיאבי) was a High Priest of Israel in the 1st century CE.[1][2] He was

Agrippa in 58 CE to 62 CE.[3]

Ishmael ben Fabus not only appears in the writings of the historian

Red Heifer, whose ashes were used in purifying those who had been defiled by corpse uncleanness
.

An oral teaching preserved in the

Red Heifers; the ashes of one used for those who had immersed themselves in a ritual bath that selfsame day, but had not waited till the sun had set - a condition known as "tevul yom", and the ashes of the other used for those who had already immersed themselves and had waited till the sun had set. Ishmael's contemporaries reprimanded him for having required a man to be sprinkled twice by the waters and ashes of the Red Heifer. He stood corrected, conceding that he had erred, seeing that it was only necessary to be sprinkled with the ashes immediately following an immersion in a ritual bath, without the necessity of repeating the process after sunset.[5]

It is said of him that he was "the handsomest man of his time, whose effeminate love of luxury was the scandal of the age."[6]

Although his tenure as High Priest (

Jewish politics, with the role of the high priesthood being contended for by several families of the priestly stock. The Mishnah describes his tenure as High Priest as a successful one: "When R. Ishmael b. Piabi (Fabus) died the splendour of the priesthood ceased."[7] Abba Saul ben Batnit and Abba Jose ben Johanan are said to have composed a ditty satirizing the tyrannical conduct of the high priestly class in the last decades of the Second Temple, and especially during the tenure of the High Priest Ishmael ben Fabus, whose servants were unrelenting in extracting the priestly dues and would use force to do so.[8][9][10]

Ishmael ben Fabus's imaginative appeal has inspired the writing of the fictional novel, Ben-Hur[11]

Family

He was a descendant of

House of Asmoneus.[citation needed] His grandson is believed to have been Rabbi Ishmael of the sages,[12] and he may have been related to the former High Priest, Joshua, son of Fabus
.

References

  1. ^ James C. VanderKam, From Joshua to Caiaphas: High Priest after the Exile (Fortress, 2004).
  2. ^ Robert Killian, The Holy Bible, "Chronicle" of Sequential Biblical Events (AuthorHouse, 2012).
  3. ^ High Priests of the Second Temple Period.
  4. ^ Josephus, Antiquities 18.2.2 (18.29)
  5. ^ The Mishnah with Maimonides' Commentary (ed. Yosef Qafih), Mossad Harav Kook (vol. 3), Jerusalem 1967, s.v. Parah 3:4; 3:6 [p. 261]
  6. Jesus
    , p. 53.
  7. ^ Mishnah (Sotah 9:15; in Danby's edition of the Mishnah, p. 306)
  8. .
  9. Pesahim
    57a)
  10. .
  11. ^ Lewis Wallace, Ben-Hur; A Tale of the Christ (Grosset & Dunlap, 1922) search results.
  12. ^ Elie Wiesel, Sages and Dreamers, pp. 212-213.
Jewish titles
Preceded by High Priest of Israel
15-16 AD
Succeeded by
Eleazar ben Ananus
Preceded by High Priest of Israel
58-62 AD
Succeeded by