Every year, in the Yom Kippur Mussaf, we recall the death of the Ten Martyrs in the prayer of ”אלה אזכרה” – ‘These I shall recall’.
One of the reasons revealed to us about their death is expounded on by the prayer itself, quoting the Midrash, that the Ten Martyrs died as an atonement for what the brothers did to Yosef. It’s a beautiful prayeriyut, but the problem is that there were Ten Martyrs and only nine brothers around at the selling of Yosef. This was because Rueven left at that very moment to do T’shuva, Binyamin was a small child, and Yosef probably didn’t want to sell himself. So why do we focus so much on ten when in truth there should only have been nine deaths?
The Nizuztei Shimshon (see Forgiveness – Big Deal) in Parshas Baholoscha answers by saying that after the brothers sold Yosef they made a חירם (excommunication decree) to be applied on anyone who revealed the truth about what happened to their brother to Yaakov Avinu.
But, as mentioned above, there were only nine brothers present and for the חירם to come into effect there would need to be ten male Jews present – a מנין. Thus says the מדרש that Hakodesh Baruch Hu joined together with the nine brothers to be the tenth and to create the official חירם.
Nine Martyrs gave up their lives as a קבלה from the heavens to be an atonement for the nine brothers. One of the Martyrs gave up his life כנגד ה who joined the minyan to complete the חירם as mentioned above. The Nizutzei Shimshon tells us that R’ Akiva was merited to give up his life כנגד ה. Why Hashem joined with the brothers to sell Yosef is a story in its own, but why was R’ Akiva merited to be killed כנגד ה?
In גמרה Bava Kama 41b it discusses how there were two Tanaaim who expounded on all instances of the word ”את” appearing in the torah. “את”, according to these Tanaaim, was always including another rule that was very well hidden in the Torah. Everything was going well until these Tanaaim reached the pasuk of “את ה תראה” – ‘Hashem your G-d you shall fear’. They couldn’t learn anything from this “את” because what could it be adding? What should man be fearing more than G-d himself? Therefore they were unable to complete their entire ‘project’ from lack of being able to expound upon this one “את”.
Generations later Rabbi Akiva figured out that final explanation. He said the “את” was including Talmidei Chachamim, that one must fear the Talmidei Chachamim just as much as he fears G-d. Now we have a basic explanation for why Rabbi Akiva was chosen כנגד ה . Rabbi Akiva brought Hashem and the Talmidei Chachamim to the same level. Not חלילה that they have the same power, but to say that a Talmid Chacham must be revered just as we revere Hashem. With this power that Rabbi Akiva had, to bring the world to recognize the trepidation one must have for his Rav, he merited to be taken כנגד ה.