“In what way does a dead man who has been hanged manage to free himself from the rope that holds him in the air by the neck?”
The sage demanded eight days to ponder over the question, at the termination of which he replied:
“He can not do it.”
Then they propounded this second question:
“A thief, unsuccessful in stealing while alive, and having been condemned to death for stealing, can he steal after his death?”
The sage replied:
“Yes.”
He was asked how it could be done. He replied that he knew nothing about it.
He was the greatest sage of his time.
They sent him home and contented themselves with believing, for those were the days of witchcraft, that the thief was a wizard.