Aḥa (Aḥai) B. Ḥanina

A Palestinian amora of the third and fourth centuries. He collected rare Baraitot among the leading scholars of Daroma in southern Judea, which he communicated to his colleagues elsewhere, even as far as the Babylonian academies. Often he reports Halakot on behalf of Joshua b. Levi (Ber. 8b; Suk. 54a; Yeb. 57a; Soṭah, 24b; Ḥul. 132b); also many Haggadot (see Bacher, "Ag. Pal. Amor." iii. 540-546). R. Levi, the famous haggadist of the second and third amoraic generations, received from Aḥa b. Ḥanina the reason for the collocation of the ninth and tenth benedictions in the Prayer of Benedictions, known by the name of "Shemoneh 'Esreh" (Yer. Ber. ii. 5a). He recommends visiting the sick as a means of facilitating a cure, declaring that every one who calls on a patient relieves him of one sixtieth part of his suffering (Ned. 39b).

S. M.