The Foundation of Modern Judaism

Of the tannaim, first was Johanan ben Zakai, who used Hosea 6:6 to explain away their sacrement of sacrifice with prayer. Who escaped Jerusalem in a coffin to negotiate Jamnia with Vespasian. Then it was Akiva ben Joseph, an illiterate shepherd man who only began his academic pursuit at age 40, by which time, he already had great family and wealth. Whose well-known blunder was to support the Bar Kochba rebellion.