Gamliel the Elder

Important in rabbinic literature and known also from the book of Acts as a Pharisee and Paul's teacher: a link between the rabbis and the Pharisees.

A grandson of Hillel, Gamliel I, the Elder, carries weight in rabbinic literature: he is credited, for instance, with the rule that a widow could marry again on the strength of a single witness to her husband's death, and Gamliel II and Judah ha-Nasi descend from him. He also appears in the New Testament: in Acts 5 he is a Pharisee esteemed as a legal teacher, and in Acts 22 he is Paul's instructor.1