We now move to mishnah 8 in chapter 4 (in some versions it is numbered as mishnah 6), where we meet the next generation of Tannaim - most of them students of Rabbi Akiva. The first of them is Rabbi Yosi, and his words in the mishnah are: "Kol hamechabed es haTorah gufo mechubad labriyos, vechol hamechalel es haTorah gufo mechulal labriyos" - whoever honors the Torah is himself honored by people, and whoever treats the Torah with contempt and disgraces it is himself disgraced in the eyes of others.
Rabbi Yosi and His Generation:
The Rabbi Yosi mentioned here is Rabbi Yosi ben Chalafta, the very same Rabbi Yosi who appears throughout the mishnayos. He is one of the five later students of Rabbi Akiva, and this fact is important for understanding the transmission of Torah. Rabbi Akiva had twelve thousand pairs of students, and they all died around the time of the Bar Kochba revolt, during the period of Hadrian's decrees (the precise details are not clear to us). Even so, afterward Rabbi Akiva took on five additional central students from the next generation, and it was from them that Torah was essentially rebuilt. These are the students who became the central names appearing in the Mishnah:
Rabbi Yosi - the one before us here in our mishnah.
Rabbi Meir - the star of the Mishnah.
Rabbi Yehudah - who disagrees with him throughout the mishnayos.
Rabbi Shimon - who appears in Maseches Berachos.
Rabbi Elazar ben Shamua.
These five are the ones who revived Rabbi Akiva's Torah, and their students were the teachers of Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi, the author of the Mishnah. This is the line through which Torah reached us. In this connection there is the well known Gemara in Sanhedrin 14 about Rabbi Yehudah ben Bava, who gave semichah during the period of the Roman decrees in order to preserve the continuity of the chain of transmission, before he himself was killed. All of this takes place roughly between the years 135 and 138 CE, after the end of the Bar Kochba revolt and after the passing of Rabbi Akiva, and these five students are the ones who carried on. It is worth noting that Rabbi Yosi is also credited with the work 'Seder Olam', a historical account of the Jewish people from the beginning until Hadrian's decrees.
What Is Honoring the Torah?
Rabbi Yosi says: "Kol hamechabed es haTorah" - whoever shows the Torah its proper honor, Divine providence arranges that he himself will receive the honor he deserves. But what does it mean to honor the Torah? There are three types of honor, and they carry a halachic character:
Honor for the Torah itself: that a person learns Torah, takes it seriously and strives to fulfill its instructions. One who is able expounds the Torah and shows how every single word in it is meaningful. In this way he shows that the Torah is important to him and relates to it accordingly, in terms of the Torah itself in the abstract: in learning, in teaching and in observance.
Honor for the Torah scholars: honor for the rabbis, who are the storehouse of Torah - to rise before them and treat them with the respect due to them because of the Torah within them. And one who is himself a rabbi has a responsibility to make sure that the institution of the rabbinate is respected: to pay attention to how he speaks, how he dresses and how he conducts himself, so that people will respect him and the Torah.
Honor for holy books: not to leave scrolls or books on the floor, upside down, or on chairs that people sit on; not to write a Sefer Torah with a poor quill so that it does not look beautiful; and to learn Torah with clean hands - physically clean, so that they do not dirty the pages - and so on.
And the reward for this: the fitting recompense and justice of relating to the Torah with honor is that Heaven arranges that the person himself will receive honor and appreciation from others, in accordance with the verse we have already discussed: "Ki mechabdai achabed" - those who honor Me, I will honor.
And the reverse is true as well: "Vechol hamechalel es haTorah gufo mechulal labriyos" - one who acts in the opposite manner, and does not conduct himself properly with regard to Torah study, respect for rabbis or respect for holy books, falls into the category of one who profanes the Torah, and therefore the result is that he will be disgraced before people, as the verse continues: "Uvozai yekalu" - those who scorn Me will be lightly esteemed in the eyes of others.