Shimon ben Azzai (early 2nd c.)שמעון בן עזאי

Akiva's most brilliant student, and never ordained — the sources call him ben Azzai, not Rabbi, all his life. He said he was betrothed to the Torah and could not manage a household as well; the Talmud lets the remark stand next to his own teaching that a man who does not have children diminishes the divine image, without smoothing it over.

Two stories about him, and this house runs on both.

The orchard. Four entered the Pardes; Ben Azzai gazed and died. He is the first casualty in the tradition's most famous warning about looking at what should not be looked at — and this app's primary mode is named after that orchard.

The fire. He sat and strung verses together and the flames came round him, and when his teacher asked whether he had been up in the chambers of the Chariot he said no — he had been joining Torah to Prophets to Writings, and the words were as glad as they had been at Sinai. ⭐ The same man, then: the one the tradition holds up as the danger of ascent is also the one it holds up as the joy of connection. He did not need to leave the room to set it on fire.