Nicodemus (Naḳdimon) Ben Gorion

Lived at Jerusalem in the first century C.E.; the wealthiest and most respected member of the peace party during the revolution in the reign of Vespasian. Ta'anit 19b relates that during a pilgrimage he engaged twelve cisterns for the people and promised their owner twelve hundred talents of silver for them. It is supposed that his original name was Buna and that his name of Nicodemus was the result of a pun (ib. 21a). In the war against Titus he, like his two friends Kalba Sabbua' and Ben Ẓiẓit, took the part of the Romans and influenced Bar Giora against the Zealots, who therefore burned the immense quantities of provisions which the three friends had accumulated (see Giṭ. 56a).

Bibliography:

  * Lamentations Rabbah i. 5;
  * Ecclesiastes Rabbah vii. 11;
  * Josephus, B. J. ii. 17, § 10; v. 1, § 4;
  * Grätz, Gesch. 2d ed., iii. 527-528, and note 4.



E. G. H. S. O.