person · P0143
Rabbi Chanina ben Teradyon רבי חנינא בן תרדיון
Tanna of the Yavneh generation and one of the martyrs of the Hadrianic persecutions: seized for publicly gathering assemblies and teaching Torah, he was burned at the stake wrapped in the Torah scroll he had been teaching from. Father of the scholar Beruriah and thus father-in-law of Rabbi Meir. In Avot he teaches that when two sit together and words of Torah pass between them, the Shechinah dwells among them.
I. Who
- Hebrew
- רבי חנינא בן תרדיון
- Also known as
- Chananiah ben Teradyon, Chanina ben Tradyon
- Era
- tannaim
- Generation
- T3
- Children
- Beruriah
II. When
- Traditional
- c. 3830–3895 AM
- Academic
- c. 70–135 CE
- Lifespan (traditional)
- ≈65 years
- Precision
- approximate
IV. What
- Events
- Bar Kokhba Revolt
V. How do we know
| Claim | Evidence | Confidence | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|
| Taught: "Two who sit together and there are words of Torah between them — the Shechinah dwells among them," as it says, "Then those who fear the Lord spoke with one another." | rabbinic | ★★★★★ | |
| Was executed by the Romans for publicly teaching Torah: burned wrapped in the Torah scroll, with wet wool sponges placed on his heart to prolong his death; to his students he said he saw "the parchment burning and the letters flying free," and the executioner who removed the sponges leapt into the fire with him.
The same sugya records his family's fate and connects his daughter Beruriah with Rabbi Meir, his son-in-law.
|
rabbinic | ★★★★☆ | |
| He was entrusted with communal charity funds; after accidentally mixing Purim funds with charity money, he distributed the combined amount to the poor and reimbursed it from his own property.
The Bavli presents this as evidence concerning his administration of the charity fund.
|
rabbinic | ★★★★★ | |
| The Roman authorities sentenced Rabbi Chanina to burning, his wife to execution by decapitation, and one of their daughters to confinement in a brothel.
Confidence is for what the Bavli reports; the individual Roman ruler and location are not named.
|
rabbinic tradition | ★★★★★ | |
| Beruriah, the wife of Rabbi Meir, is explicitly identified as his daughter, and the woman confined in the brothel as Beruriah's sister.
The sources do not name his wife or the second daughter. |
rabbinic | ★★★★★ | |
| Traditional placement c. 3830–3895 AM (c. 70–135 CE), anchored to his martyrdom in the Hadrianic persecutions following the Bar Kokhba revolt.
Schematic traditional dating. |
tradition reconstruction | ★★☆☆☆ |