Commentary for Nedarim 99:4

אמרה ליה זיל הוי בי רב אזל תרתי סרי שנין קמי דר' אליעזר ור' יהושע למישלם תרתי סרי שנין קא אתא לביתיה שמע מן אחורי ביתיה דקאמר לה חד רשע לדביתהו שפיר עביד ליך אבוך חדא דלא דמי ליך ועוד [שבקך] ארמלות חיות כולהון שנין אמרה ליה אי צאית לדילי ליהוי תרתי סרי שנין אחרנייתא אמר הואיל ויהבת לי רשותא איהדר לאחורי הדר אזל הוה תרתי סרי שני אחרנייתא

[Later] Elijah came to them in the guise of a mortal,<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' Cf. Sanh. 109a, 113b; v. Tosaf. Hul. 6a. s.v. [H]. ');">⁷</span> and cried out at the door. 'Give the some straw, for my wife is in confinement and I have nothing for her to lie on.' 'See!' R. Akiba observed to his wife, 'there is a man who lacks even straw.' [Subsequently] she counselled him, 'Go, and become a scholar.' So he left her, and spent twelve years [studying] under R. Eliezer and R. Joshua. At the end of this period, he was returning home, when from the back of the house he heard a wicked man jeering at his wife, 'Your father did well to you. Firstly, because he is your inferior; and secondly, he has abandoned you to living widowhood all these years.' She replied, 'Yet were he to hear my desires, he would be absent another twelve years. Seeing that she has thus given me permission,' he said, 'I will go back.' So he went back, and was absent for another twelve years, [at the end of which] he returned with twenty-four thousand disciples.<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' Cur. edd.: 'pairs of disciples'. But 'pairs' is absent in the version of Ket. 62b, and should be deleted here. ');">⁸</span>

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