Rabbi Akiva’s Unthinkable Journey: From Illiterate Shepherd to the Father of the Oral Torah

From Humble Beginnings to the Pinnacle of Torah

In Avot DeRabbi Natan (Chapter 6), we read of Rabbi Akiva’s dramatic transformation. At age forty, knowing nothing of Torah, he sat in a classroom alongside his son, learning the alef-bet from scratch. Slowly, letter by letter, verse by verse, he mastered the entire Torah. Determined and undeterred by poverty, he would collect wood each day, selling half for food and using the other half for light and warmth. Even his neighbors complained about the smoke, but he persevered, studying by candlelight.

The Midrash says Rabbi Akiva will one day “obligate the poor in judgment,” for when they claim they were too impoverished to learn Torah, they will be reminded: Rabbi Akiva was poorer still—and he became the pillar of Torah.

Rabbi Akiva, who once admitted, “When I was ignorant, I hated Torah scholars so much that I wished to bite them like a donkey,” underwent a transformation that was not just intellectual—it was spiritual, emotional, and total.

A Yeshiva of 24,000 and the Strength to Begin Again

After 24 years of uninterrupted Torah study, Rabbi Akiva emerged as the leader of the largest and most prestigious yeshiva in the world—24,000 students strong. “Imagine a yeshiva with 24,000 students,” writes Rabbi Ganot, in his column in an Israeli Hareidi newspaper. “How long would it take just for them to wash their hands for Mincha?”

And then, in the span of a few short weeks between Pesach and Shavuot, they were gone. All 24,000 students died in a plague. It was a staggering loss for Rabbi Akiva and the entire Jewish people.

And yet, the yeshiva did not close. Rabbi Akiva began again with five students: Rabbi Meir, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, Rabbi Yehuda, Rabbi Yosi, and Rabbi Elazar ben Shamua. Later, Rabbi Yochanan HaSandler and Rabbi Eliezer ben Yaakov joined their ranks. Through them, “the entire Land of Israel was once again filled with Torah.”

Chazal teach (Bamidbar Rabbah 19:4): “That which was not revealed to Moshe was revealed to Rabbi Akiva.” When Moshe ascended to heaven and saw Hashem affixing crowns to the letters of the Torah, he asked, “For whom is this?” Hashem answered, “For a man who will be born generations from now, Akiva ben Yosef, who will derive countless halachot (Jewish laws) from each crown” (Menachot 29b).

The Talmud (Sanhedrin 86a) further emphasizes his influence: “Anonymous Mishnayot follow Rabbi Meir, anonymous Tosefta follow Rabbi Nechemia, Sifra follows Rabbi Yehuda, Sifrei follows Rabbi Shimon, and all of them follow the teachings of Rabbi Akiva.” According to Seder HaYuchasin, the entire Torah SheBe’al Peh (Oral Torah) is rooted in Rabbi Akiva.

Torah Must Continue

During this period of the Omer, we mourn the deaths of Rabbi Akiva’s students and reflect on the importance of treating other people with respect and dignity. But Rabbi Ganot points to an even deeper message: Rabbi Akiva teaches us the power to begin again.

What’s harder, he asks: transforming from an ignorant shepherd into a master of Torah, or starting over after losing 24,000 brilliant students? Rabbi Akiva did both. For him, the numbers didn’t matter. Whether teaching tens of thousands or five, he felt that Torah is Torah. The Jewish people need it like fish need water, as Rabbi Akiva famously said.