He was son of Simeon ben Hillel, and grandson of the great Jewish teacher Hillel the Elder, and died twenty years before the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem (70 CE). He fathered a son, whom he called Simeon, after his father, and a daughter, whose daughter (i.e., Gamaliel’s granddaughter) married a priest named Simon ben Nathanael. In Christian tradition, his second son Abibo (also Abibas, Abibus) converted to Christianity and is venerated as a saint. Gamaliel is a Hebrew name meaningreward of God.

In the Christian tradition, Gamaliel is celebrated as a Pharisee doctor of Jewish Law. The Acts of the Apostles chapter 5 speaks of Gamaliel as a man of great respect who spoke in favor of the arrested apostles of Jesus in Acts 5:34,and the Jewish law teacher of Paul the Apostle in Acts 22:3.