Person
Mar Ukva מר עוקבא
exilarch and judge; the model of hidden charity
He headed the court at Kafri and bore the title of exilarch—but the stories about him are all of one thing. Every day he slipped four coins through a poor man's door; when the man resolved to see who gave, Mar Ukva and his wife fled and hid in a cooling oven—anything not to shame the taker. "Better to throw oneself into a furnace than to shame one's fellow in public."
Before his death he asked for the account of his charity, saw seven thousand dinars and said: "the road is long and the provisions few"—and gave away half his fortune.
On the timeline
Related
Sources
Chazal: Mishnah, Talmud, midrash, Zohar
- Ketubot 67b — the coins in the door and the oven
- Moed Katan 16b — Shmuel and Mar Ukva: how they sat when they studied
Basis: Talmud and midrash.