Carried Out in a Coffin
With Yerushalayim starving under siege, Rabban Yochanan had his talmidim carry him out in a coffin so that he could ask the Roman general for Yavneh and its sages.
It is told that while the Romans besieged Yerushalayim, the zealots inside the city burned the stores of food, and the people began to die of hunger. Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai secretly summoned his nephew Abba Sikkara, the head of the zealots. How long will you go on, he asked, killing everyone with hunger? Abba Sikkara answered that if he said a word, his own men would kill him.
Then show me a way to leave the city, said Rabban Yochanan. Perhaps there can be some small salvation.
Abba Sikkara told him to pretend to be ill and then let it be known that he had died. His talmidim Rebbi Eliezer and Rebbi Yehoshua carried him in a coffin, one at the head and one at the feet. At the gate the guards wanted to pierce the body to be sure. Abba Sikkara stopped them: The Romans will say that they stabbed their own teacher.
Outside the walls Rabban Yochanan came before Vespasian and greeted him as king. Vespasian protested that he was no king, but while they spoke, a messenger arrived from Rome: the emperor had died, and the nobles of Rome meant to make Vespasian emperor in his place. Ask something of me, Vespasian said, and I will give it to you.
Rabban Yochanan did not ask for everything, fearing he would receive nothing. He asked for Yavneh and its sages, for the family of Rabban Gamliel, and for doctors to heal Rebbi Tzadok. Those modest requests became the seed from which the whole Torah of the coming generations grew.
Source: Gemara, Gittin 56a–56b (Talmud Bavli); English: The William Davidson Talmud (Koren–Steinsaltz translation), Gittin 56a–b. Parallel in Avos d'Rebbi Nosson 4 (English: A. Cohen, The Minor Tractates of the Talmud, Soncino, 1965).
When something you care about is falling apart, a family tension, a project or a habit you are losing, do not let all-or-nothing thinking freeze you. Ask yourself Rabban Yochanan's question: What small thing can I save today? Write down one modest, realistic step, such as one calm conversation or one learning seder kept, and do it this week. Small salvations, protected faithfully, can rebuild a great deal.