A man once overheard his wife telling her daughter that, though she had ten sons, only one of them could fairly claim her husband as his father.  After the father’s death it was found that he had bequeathed all his property to one son, but that the testament did not mention his name.  The question therefore, arose, which of the ten was intended?  So they came one and all to Rabbi Benaah and asked him to arbitrate between them.  “Go,” said he to them, “and beat at your father’s grave, until he rises to tell you to which of you it was that he left the property.”  All except one did so; and he, because by so doing he showed most respect for his father’s memory, was presumed to be the one on whom the father had fixed his affections; he accordingly was supposed to be the one intended, and the others were therefore excluded from the patrimony.  The disappointed ones went straight to the government and denounced the Rabbi.  “Here is a man,” said they, “who arbitrarily deprives people of their rights, without proof or witnesses.”  The consequence was that the Rabbi was sent to prison, but he gave the authorities such evidence of his shrewdness and sense of justice, that he was soon restored to freedom.

Bava Bathra, fol. 58, col. 1.

Till ten generations have passed speak thou not contemptuously of the
Gentiles in the hearing of a proselyte.

Sanhedrin, fol. 94, col. 1.

The ten tribes will never be restored, for it is said (Deut. xxiii. 28), “God cast them into another land, as it is this day.”  As this day passes away without return, so also they have passed away never more to return.  So says Rabbi Akiva, but Rabbi Eleazar says, “‘As it is this day’ implies that, as the day darkens and lightens up again, so the ten tribes now in darkness shall in the future be restored to light.”  The Rabbis have thus taught that the ten tribes will have no portion in the world to come; for it is said (Deut. xxix. 28), “And the Lord rooted them out of their land in anger, and in wrath, and in great indignation.”  “And he rooted them out of their land,” that is, from this world, “and cast them into another land,” that is, the World to come.  So says Rabbi Akiva.  Rabbi Shimon ben Yehuda says, “If their designs continue as they are at this day, they will not return, but if they repent they will return.”  Rabbi (the Holy) says, “They will enter the world to come, for it is said (Isa. xxvii. 13), ’And it shall come to pass in that day that the great trumpet shall be blown, and they shall come which were ready to perish.’”

Sanhedrin, fol. 110, col. 2.

Ten things are detrimental to study:—­Going under the halter of a camel, and still more passing under its body; walking between two camels or between two women; to be one of two men that a woman passes between; to go where the atmosphere is tainted by a corpse; to pass under a bridge beneath which no water has flowed for forty days; to eat with a ladle that has been used for culinary purposes; to drink water that runs through a cemetery.  It is also dangerous to look at the face of a corpse, and some say also to read inscriptions on tombstones.