Samuel was an astronomer, and he is reported to have boasted with truth, that "he was as familiar with the paths of the stars as with the streets of Nehardea." He arranged the Jewish Calendar, his work in this direction being perfected by Hillel II in the fourth century.

Like Simlai, Rab and Samuel had heathen and Christian friends.
Origen and Jerome read the Scriptures under the guidance of Jews.

The heathen philosopher Porphyry wrote a commentary on the Book of Daniel.
So, too, Abbahu, who lived in Palestine a little later on, frequented the society of cultivated Romans, and had his family taught Greek.
Abbahu was a manufacturer of veils for women's wear, for, like many Amoraim, he scorned to make learning a means of living, Abbahu's modesty with regard to his own merits shows that a Rabbi was not necessarily arrogant in pride of knowledge! Once Abbahu's lecture was besieged by a great crowd, but the audience of his colleague Chiya was scanty.

"Thy teaching," said Abbahu to Chiya, "is a rare jewel, of which only an expert can judge; mine is tinsel, which attracts every ignorant eye." It was Rab, however, who was the real popularizer of Jewish learning.

He arranged courses of lectures for the people as well as for scholars.
Rab's successor as head of the Sura school, Huna (212-297), completed Rab's work in making Babylonia the chief centre of Jewish learning.