Rabbi Yehoshua ben Gamla רבי יהושע בן גמלא
high priest of the Temple's last years; he set up teachers in every town
A rare case in which both the worst and the best are said of a man, and both judgments stand in the same book.
The worst. The high priests of the last years of the Second Temple changed often and received the office from the authorities; of Yehoshua ben Gamla the Talmud says outright that the office was bought. This is part of the general trouble of those years, and the sages did not hide it.
The best. The same man issued the enactment about schools. Before it, a father taught his children, and orphans and the children of the ignorant did not learn. They tried gathering adolescents in Jerusalem—it did not work. Ben Gamla ordered teachers appointed in every district and every town, and children of six or seven brought to them; it was settled too how many children to a teacher and when to seat an assistant. By this enactment the elementary school became the business of the community rather than the family—and in that form it lasted into our own time.
The end. He was killed in the days of the Great Revolt, together with other high priests, by the zealots and the Idumeans who had entered the city.
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Chazal: Mishnah, Talmud, midrash, Zohar
- Bava Batra 21a — the enactment about schools and the words "remembered for good"
- Yoma 18a — the high priesthood bought for money
Basis: Talmud and midrash.