The Loss of the Temple
The destruction of the Second Temple in 70 C.E., and the concurrent loss of formal independence, was arguably the single most fundamental event affecting the future of the Jewish people during the subsequent centuries. The immediate reaction to the destruction of the Temple among the populace was one of despair and a feeling of a “loss of center,” as is evidenced in some of the post-destruction literature.1
See the pseudepigraphical work 2 Baruch, also known as the Syriac Apocalypse of Baruch, written during the years following the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 C.E., 10:6–19; see James H. Charlesworth, The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (2 vols.; New York: Doubleday, 1983) 1:624–25. The author places in the mouth of the Biblical character of Baruch, Jeremiah's scribe, a bitter lament over the destruction of the Temple, expressing surprise at the continuation of both natural and human life after such a catastrophe. See also 4 Ezra 10:5–24, ibid., 1:546–47. Cf. Gedaliah Alon, The Jews in Their Land in the Talmudic Age (trans. Gershon Levi; 2 vols.; Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1980) 1:46–55.
See t. Sota 15:11 (ed. Saul Lieberman, 243–44), b. B. Bat. 60b, where Rabbi Joshua highlights the unreasonableness of a total denial of life's pleasures in the wake of the destruction, and suggests a middle path: “Not to mourn at all is impossible, because the blow has fallen. To mourn overmuch is also impossible … [Rather,] a man may whitewash his house, but leave a little bare […] A man may prepare a full banquet, and leave out a small item […] A woman may don all her jewelry, but leave off a small item.”
Such as those instituted by Rabban Yochanan ben Zakai after the destruction “in remembrance of the Temple,” including the continued use of the lulav during the entire week of Sukkot, which previously had been limited to the Temple service alone, and the ruling that the priests must remove their sandals before blessing the people, as was done in the Temple. See Alon, The Jews in Their Land, 107–18.
These include the appropriation of duties concerning the fixing of the lunar-solar calendar in the academic center of Yavneh, the abolishment of the need to bring fourth-year fruits to Jerusalem (see Alon, ibid.), and especially the regulation of fixed prayers. On the latter, see Ezra Fleischer, “On the Beginnings of Obligatory Jewish Prayer,” Tarbiz 59 (1990) 397–441 [Hebrew]; idem, “The Shemone Esre: Its Character, Internal Order, Content and Goals,” Tarbiz 62 (1993) 179–223 [Hebrew].
Despite the fact that the Mishnah was finalized at the beginning of the third century C.E., it contains numerous references to Temple ritual as if this ritual were still taking place; see m. Ber. 1.1, Bikkurim 1, Pesachim 5–9, as well as the entire tractates of Yoma, Sheqalim, Sota, Tamid and Middot. The phrase “May the Temple (or: ‘Your city’) be rebuilt speedily in our days” (Tamid, end of ch. 7, and see also the conclusions to Ta‘anit and Avot), was spoken in earnest, with full expectation that the hiatus between the destruction of the Second Temple and its rebuilding would not be much longer than that between the destruction of the First Temple and its rebuilding, i.e., not more than seventy years.
It has become fashionable during recent decades of scholarship to cast serious doubt on the veracity and historical accuracy of rabbinic sources. While this scholarly skepticism has served as an important check against the naïveté of earlier historical studies, I agree with those historians who have argued that, on the whole, the rabbinic data can yield significant insights concerning the worldviews of important segments of the Jewish people during the first centuries of the Common Era, even if, as is certainly the case, many narratives are literary reworkings of historical events. (See the following note.) In any case, I will deal here primarily with narrative texts, and my conclusions should be read as pertaining to the worldview of the authors of these texts, and not necessarily as reflections of the historical events themselves.
However, as time wore on, and as Jewish centers in the Diaspora—particularly, Babylonia—became more important, the attitude to the centrality of the Temple underwent subtle changes. These changes are particularly evident in the retelling of early tales in new historical contexts. In the following analysis of two early Palestinian tales of the destruction, as they are retold in new literary corpora—one story retold in a later Palestinian work, the other resurfacing in the Babylonian Talmud—we shall trace the changing attitudes of the new storytellers to the Temple, as the focus of attention moves from the Temple as center to the increasingly important social, political and religious problems facing the Jewish communities in the periphery.7
As I have been reminded by an anonymous reviewer of this paper, attention should be drawn here to other studies, mostly by historians, concerning the relationship of the Jewish communities living in the peripheries, notably the large Jewish diaspora population in Babylonia, to the center of Jewish life, learning and culture in the Land of Israel. See, as an example, the recent study by Isaiah M. Gafni, Land, Center and Diaspora: Jewish Constructs in Late Antiquity (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997), especially his discussion of a narrative appearing in the Palestinian and Babylonian Talmuds (107–17). See also Gafni's reasoned discussion about the feasability of using rabbinic materials as sources for Jewish cultural and intellectual history of the rabbinic period (ibid., 14–18); and cf. the additional studies cited in note 34 below.
The Destruction of Bethar: From Center to Periphery
The first story is found in the context of a long collection of stories concerning the fall of Bethar, the stronghold of Bar Kochba destroyed during the revolt of 132–135 C.E., appearing in the Jerusalem Talmud to the Mishnah citing the destruction of Bethar:8
y. Ta‘anit 4.8 (Venice ed., 69a).
Rabbi Yose said: Bethar remained intact fifty-two years after the destruction of the Temple.
Why then was it [ultimately] destroyed? Because its [inhabitants] lit candles after the destruction of the Temple.
Why did they light candles?
The bouleutai9
The bouleutai were the elected members of the governing council of the ancient polis, and are mentioned in sources of the Second Temple period as existing in Jerusalem, where they are presumably identical with the members of the sanhedrin; see Josephus, Ant. 20:11, War 2:405 (archontes and bouleutai in charge of levying taxes from the outlying villages!), Luke 23:50 and Mark 15:43. Cf. Gedaliah Alon, Jews, Judaism and the Classical World (trans. Israel Abrahams; Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1977) 51–52 (and notes 11 and 12 there), and 351–53; idem, The Jews in Their Land in the Talmudic Age, 1:78–79, note 64 (where this story is cited); Menahem Stern, Greek and Latin Authors on Jews and Judaism (3 vols.; Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1980) 2:376.
When they would see someone coming up to Jerusalem, they would say to him,
“So we have heard that you want to be made archōnt10
The archontes are the elected magistrates of the city, and are found along with the bouleutai; see previous note. The terminology may reflect a post-destruction reality.
And he would reply, “It never crossed my mind.”
“So we have heard that you want to sell your estate?”
And he would reply, “It never crossed my mind.”
And his companion would say to him, “What do you want from him? Write
[up a deed], and I will sign.”
And he would write [it up] and his companion would sign, and they would send the deed to his housekeeper, saying to him,
“If so-and-so comes to his estate, do not let him in, since it is sold to us.”
And when he would hear this from them, he would say,
“I wish I had broken my leg, and had not gone up to Jerusalem.”
This is what is written:
“They hunt our steps [so we could not] walk in our city squares,
Our end is near; our days are done.” (Lam 4:18)
“They hunt (
) our steps…” – Make desolate (
) the roads to that house!
“Our end is near (
)” – Bring near (
) the end of that house!
“Our days are done (
)” – Complete (
) the days of that house!
They too did not end up well: “He who rejoices over [another's] misfortune will not go unpunished.” (Prov 17:5)
It is important to realize the structure of this passage. It begins with a statement by Rabbi Yose, the second-century sage, about the relatively long period during which Bethar continued to flourish after the destruction of the Temple.11
Rabbi Yose ben Halafta, the assumed author of the ancient chronological work Seder Olam, was especially knowledgeable in historical traditions of the late Second Temple period.
On the lighting of candles as a sign of joy, see y. Sukkah 5.1 (55b) and the parallel in Lam. Rab. to 1:16 (ed. Solomon Buber, 116).
The account itself is told in anecdotal style: It is a fairly detailed anecdote, but the detail, which would seem to relate a single event, is counterbalanced by the constant use of the modal form (
) indicating continual and repeated action in the past—“the bouleutai would sit in the midst of the city, they would see…, they would say to him,” etc. As is the case for many aggadic tales, it is told in the context of a midrashic commentary to a biblical verse, here Lam 4:18: The verse, while using verbs in the past tense, describes a curiously “present” feeling of the end: “They hunt our steps, so that we cannot walk in our streets; our end has neared, our days are fulfilled, for our end has come.” This is reworded in the midrash (through an Aramaic paraphrase of the verse that plays on the form of the verbs) as an imperative: “Destroy the paths to that house (the Temple)!— Bring its end near!—Number its days!” which neatly reflects the feeling of the main protagonist, the one who would “go up” to Jerusalem—obviously for the purpose of visiting the Temple, and who, at the end of the story, regrets that he ever made the pilgrimage: “Would that my leg had broken, and I had never ‘gone up’ to Jerusalem!”
13In the original Aramaic the sentence is formulated in the third person, as is common when characters express self-imprecation.
The rest of the story explains how this change from a balanced society to an imbalanced one took place. What unfolds in front of our eyes is a series of attempts on the part of the city councilors, gradually increasing in intensity and criminality, to receive some type of benefit from the villager. The first query, “we have heard that you are interested in a leadership position,”14
The query is actually skillfully formulated as a declarative sentence, “so we have heard…,” to imply knowledge about which there is no doubt.
The undesirability of holding such offices is aptly described in a statement found in Gen. Rab. 76.6 (ed. Theodor-Albeck, 904), where the Roman government is characterized as an accomplice in providing incentives for avarice and envy: “[The] wicked state [= Rome] casts an envious eye upon a man's wealth: “So-and-so is wealthy, let us make him an archō, so-and-so is wealthy, let us make him a bouleutēs.” Wealth was indeed both a prerequisite and a necessity for such offices, whose occupants were often required to expend much of their wealth for political ends. See Daniel Sperber, The City in Roman Palestine (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998) 96: “[A]n individual's affluence was a significant factor in his election to municipal office, the assumption being that he would contribute funds from his private capital for the construction of public buildings or for the financing of their operation.” See also Saul Lieberman, “Palestine in the Third and Fourth Century,” Jewish Quarterly Review 36 (1946) 346–48. It therefore stands to reason that those already on the council would try to entice other wealthy individuals to join them in sharing the burden of their office.
The storyteller utilizes a set of wordplays to further clinch his message, which pits the cunning bouleutai against the innocent villager: Twice we hear the words “we have heard” in the mouths of the bouleutai, both times a lie. Alongside these words we also here twice “that you want”—also a lie. Through an inversion of these terms, however, the sinister deed is effected, and its consequences felt: In the middle of the story, the friend (presumably of one of the councilors16
This interpretation seems more likely than assuming that the “friend” was associated with the villager himself.
To summarize, we may say that the tale seems to take place in the Jerusalem of pre-destruction days, and can be seen as exemplifying the corruption of the leaders of the holy city, which led to the alienation of the general populace from the Temple. It is not directly connected to Bethar, but has been cited by the redactor of this collection of Bethar traditions, because the depicted alienation seemed to explain well the joy of the Bethar population over the destruction, stated in the introductory statement of Rabbi Yose. Central to the dynamics of the tale is the consequence of the actions of the bouleutai of Jerusalem; namely, their increasing hegemony and control—indeed, outright theft—of the property in the villages. The story starts and ends with scenes setting the pilgrim against the bouleutai, who displace the pilgrim and move from center to periphery.
The entire collection of tales concerning Bethar in the Palestinian Talmud appears also in the fifth-century Palestinian Midrash to Lamentations, also known as Lamentations (or Echah) Rabbati, appended to Lam 2:2.17
The verse of Lam 2:2, “The Lord has swallowed up without compassion all the habitations of Jacob,” is aptly cited as a comment on the disastrous consequences of the Bar Kokhba revolt. This verse is mentioned in the first passage of the long collection of aggadic sayings and narratives on the destruction of Bethar (and Jerusalem) common to the Talmud and Midrash, thus providing the “hook” upon which the editor of the Midrash could hang the entire collection. Although the collection of tales and sayings is duplicated in the midrashic text, it is clear that the collection as a whole, and each of its individual parts, underwent significant re-editing in its later form. Indeed, I have demonstrated elsewhere the dependence of the traditions of Lamentations Rabbati on the earlier Palestinian traditions cited in the Palestinian Talmud, as well as the manner by which the earlier narratives are reworked by the later storytellers/redactors; see Paul Mandel, The Narrative in Midrash Eicha: Text and Style (M.A. thesis; Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1982) especially 1:121–45 [Hebrew]; idem, “Between Byzantium and Islam: The Transmission of a Jewish Book in the Byzantine and Early Islamic Periods,” in Transmitting Jewish Traditions: Orality, Textuality and Cultural Diffusion (eds. Yaakov Elman and Israel Gershoni; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000) 74–106.
Midrash Lamentations Rabbati is known in two textual versions: that of the textus receptus of the regular printed editions (deriving from the texts of the first printed editions, Midrash to the Five Megillot, Constantinople 1514 [?] and Pesaro [?] 1519), and a manuscript version printed by Solomon Buber, Midrash Echah Rabbati (Vilna, 1899). The two versions, while reflecting the same work, vary significantly, neither of them presenting a flawless text; see Mandel, The Narrative in Midrash Eicha; idem, Midrash Lamentations Rabbati—Prolegomenon, and a Critical Edition to the Third Parasha (Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1997) [Hebrew]. The following translation is based on a comparison of all the manuscript versions of this midrash with the printed versions. In this case neither of the printed versions presents an accurate text, although Buber's text (103), after deleting spurious lines, is close to the version presented here.
The place of the bouleutai of Jerusalem was located in the center of the city.
When someone from Bethar would come up to Jerusalem to pray, they would say to him,
“Stay with us, and we shall appoint you [to the office of] an important person.”
And he would reply, “I do not want that.”
One of them would say to him, “Will you sell me your vineyard? Will you sell me your estate?”
And he would reply, “No.”
And his companion would say to him, “Leave him alone. Let him go, and I shall write [up a deed], and sign it.”
Upon his departure, he [the bouleutēs] would write a deed and go down there
[to his estate].
He [the villager] would attempt to enter his vineyard or estate, but he would not let him, saying, “This is not your vineyard; this is not your estate. I have already purchased it from you.”
They would go to the town magistrate (tav karta), and he [the bouleutēs] would produce the deed.
The town magistrate would say to him [the villager], “What can I do for you?
He holds the deed!”
And he would say,
“Would that my leg had broken, and I had not gone up [to Jerusalem] to pray.”
And they desisted from going up to pray.
While at first we may suppose this to be a parallel version, perhaps just one of many variants of the tale as it traveled through the scholarly and popular circles of third to fifth century Palestine,19
See Joseph Heinemann, Aggadot wetoldotehen [Aggadah and Its Development] (Jerusalem: Bet Hotsa'ah Keter, 1974) on the tendency of aggadic tales to be retold in variant forms, at times seemingly the result of inadvertent variants typical of oral versions, and in other instances the result of conscious changes by a subsequent storyteller. See also Avigdor Shinan, “The Aggadic Literature: Written Tradition and Transmission,” Jerusalem Studies in Jewish Folklore 1 (1981) 44–60 [Hebrew], who suggests that the variant versions in the aggadic works may reflect parallel and contemporary oral performances of the text. Here, however, the model of Jonah Fraenkel seems more apt. Fraenkel posits a linear literary development in the narrative poetics of the aggadic tale appearing in earlier and later redacted texts; see “Prominent Trends in the Transmission History of the Text of Aggadic Narratives,” The Aggadic Narrative: Harmony of Form and Content (Tel Aviv, 2001) 51–74 [Hebrew] = Proceedings of the Seventh World Congress of Jewish Studies. Vol. 3: Studies in the Talmud, Halacha and Midrash (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1981) 45–69 [Hebrew].
See note 17 above.
This refocus directs our attention away from Jerusalem as the center of the tale: Our secondary author, in accenting the local scene as a mirror of the original scene of deception, clearly calls into question the actions of the village leadership. Without branding these actions the result of conscious deceit (indeed, our author refrains from explicitly branding any of his characters), the storyteller intimates that the tav karta is a partner to the crime. Whereas the previous author quite clearly describes a scene from pre-destruction Jerusalem, our author is more willing to distance himself from that period. This is evident in a seemingly small variant in the phrase appearing in the beginning and end of the tale: “A person from Bethar would go up to pray,” and “Would that my leg had broken, and (I) had not gone up to pray” (not “to Jerusalem,” as in the first story!). Although destroyed and partially desolate, Jerusalem continued to be the center for prayer for Jews throughout the first centuries of the Common Era; and indeed, there exist a number of tales concerning second and third century Rabbis who, it is told, “went up to Jerusalem to pray.”21
See on Rabbi Jonathan (Gen. Rab. 32.10 [ed. Theodor-Albeck, 296], and Rabbi Ishmael ben Rabbi Yose (Gen. Rab. 81.3 [974])—both lived near the end of the second century C.E. Cf. Shemuel Safrai, “Pilgrimage to Jerusalem after the Destruction of the Second Temple,” Jerusalem in the Second Temple Period: Abraham Schalit Memorial Volume (ed. Aharon Oppenheimer, Uriel Rappaport, and Menahem Stern; Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi, 1980) 376–93 [Hebrew].
Kamza and Bar Kamza: National Conflict and Rabbinic Indictment
We now turn to another story describing the reasons for the destruction of the Temple, this one a well-known tale, albeit usually told in its Babylonian version, to which we shall turn after first reading the version found in Midrash Lamentations Rabbati.22
See Paul Mandel, “Tales of the Destruction of the Temple: Between the Land of Israel and Babylonia,” Center and Diaspora: The Land of Israel and the Diaspora in the Second Temple, Mishna and Talmud Periods (Jerusalem: The Zalman Shazar Center for Jewish History, 2004) 141–58 [Hebrew], where the story is analyzed against the background of the question of the historical character of Rabbi Zechariah ben Avkulos. See also Jeffrey L. Rubenstein, Talmudic Stories: Narrative Art, Composition, and Culture (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999) 139–55, 163–64.
The fragment, Cambridge University Library, Taylor-Schechter series, C1 folio 69, was published by Zvi M. Rabinovitz, Ginzé Midrash (Tel-Aviv: Chaim Rosenberg School for Jewish Studies, 1976) 144–54. The following translation is based on my transcription of the actual fragment; my readings vary in several places from those of Rabinovitz. In some places I have corrected the text, based on a comparison to the other versions.
A tale is told of one of the wealthy men of Jerusalem who made a banquet, inviting everyone.
He said to his servant, “Go and bring me my friend, Bar Kamza.”
He went and brought him his enemy, Bar Kamzora.
He entered [the banquet] and found him sitting among the guests.
He said to him, “Get up and get out of here.”
He replied, “I will pay the cost of the meal; but don't throw me out in shame.”
He said to him, “You have no choice but to get out of here.”
He replied, “I will pay the cost of the entire banquet; but don't throw me out in shame.”
He said to him, “You have no choice but to get out of here.”
He replied, “I will pay double [the cost of the banquet]; but don't throw me out in shame.”
He said to him, “You have no choice but to get out of here.”
Rabbi Zechariah ben Avqulos was present; and although he had the ability to protest, he did not protest.
Upon leaving, he said, “Shall I get thrown out in shame and let them sit there in peace?!”
He went down to the king, and said to him,
“Those sacrifices that you send them—they eat them.”
He rebuked him, saying, “That is slanderous; you wish to denigrate them.”
He said to him, “Send the sacrifices with me, and send along a trustworthy man, and you shall find out the truth.”
He sent a trustworthy man with him along with the sacrifices.
He [Bar Kamzora] arose at night and placed unnoticeable blemishes on [the sacrifices].
When the priest saw them, he did not offer them as sacrifice, saying,
“I cannot offer them [now]; tomorrow I will offer them.”
A day went by, and he did not offer them; another day went by, and he did not offer them.
Directly he [the messenger] sent word to the king, “What that Jew told you is true.”
Immediately he sent [an army] to destroy the Temple.
This is what people say, “Between Kamza and Kamzora was the sanctuary destroyed.”
Rabbi Yose said, “The timidity (anvetanut) of Rabbi Zechariah ben Avqulos burned down the Temple.”
Historians have tried to connect the names and elements of this tale to certain accounts of the major revolt preceding the destruction of the Second Temple as found in the writings of Josephus.24
See the brief discussion by Yitzhak Baer, “Jerusalem in the Times of the Great Revolt,” Zion 36 (1971) 169–71 [Hebrew], and the references there.
War 2:409; cf. ibid. 2:197, Against Apion 2:77.
War 4:226.
Josephus, Vita 33. Cf. Joseph Derenbourg, Essai sur l'histoire et la géographie de la Palestine(Paris: Imprimerie impériale, 1867) 267.
On the question of the identification of the Zechariah mentioned by Josephus with the rabbinic Zechariah mentioned in this story, see: Isaak Marcus Jost, Geschichte der Israeliten seit der Zeit der Maccabäer bis auf unsre Tage (10 vols; Berlin: Schlesingerschen, 1821) 2:99, note 14; Heinrich Graetz, Geschichte der Juden 3/2 (ed. Marcus Brann; Leipzig: Leiner, 19065) 820–22, note 29; Baer, “Jerusalem in the Times of the Great Revolt.” For a recent discussion of this topic, including an analysis of the character of the rabbinic Zechariah, see: David Rokéach, “Zechariah ben Avkules: Humility or Zealotry?,” Zion 53 (1988) 53–56 [Hebrew]; Daniel R. Schwartz, “More on ‘Zechariah ben Avkules: Humility or Zealotry?’ ” Zion 53 (1988) 313–16 [Hebrew]; David Rokéach, “Word-Play Nonetheless: A Rejoinder,” ibid., 317–22 [Hebrew]. Zechariah ben Avkulos (the patronym meaning “easily satiated” in Greek, which may of course be significant in the context of our tale—see the following note) is mentioned in only one more context in rabbinical sources, as one who would not take sides in a halakhic dispute between Beit Hillel and Beit Shammai; see t. Shabbat 16.7 (and cf. m. Shabbat 21.3). Rabbi Yose's statement about Zechariah's “humility” being responsible for the destruction of the Temple is also appended to that account. While most scholars and commentators assume that Rabbi Yose is referring obliquely to our story about Bar Kamza, his comment may also have arisen as a hyperbolic statement decrying Zechariah's abstinence and diffidence in halakhic matters, which was then later incorporated into an already known tale about the reasons for the destruction. See our discussion below, and see Mandel, “Tales of the Destruction of the Temple.”
If Zechariah's name was indeed known as ben eukolos = “easy-going,” “diffident,” then the mention of the avetanut (“diffidence”) of a zealot with such a name would, of course, be doubly ironic. See Schwartz, “More on ‘Zechariah ben Avkules: Humility or Zealotry?’ ” 313. The matter is complicated, though, by the fact that Zechariah's actions, at least in the Tosefta and midrashic versions, although reflecting an improper response in the dramatic contexts, may be interpreted as truly diffident and non-combative. This may be the result of a secondary use of the original, historically related statement. As will be seen, the exact significance of this statement is not crucial to an understanding of the two tales about (Bar) Kamza.
But whatever the historical origins of our story we shall see that, in its present state (after a small correction), the storyteller has created a tale of subtle, nuanced political understanding. But first it should be noted that the presence of Rabbi Zechariah at the banquet, while providing an interesting and sharp barb, is not dealt with or related in the rest of the story, except for the final statement, which ‘doubles’ the first appended statement concerning the cause of the destruction of the Temple. Moreover, its placement interrupts the narrative flow (note the following sentence: “Upon leaving he said,” clearly referring to Bar Kamzora mentioned before the line about Rabbi Zechariah), and is the only line in the tale in Hebrew, the rest of the tale told in Palestinian Aramaic.30
The first line also appears in Hebrew, but it is a common phenomenon that a tale told in Aramaic begins with Hebrew. The presence of a line in Hebrew in the middle of the tale, however, is a clear sign of an addition.
See note 28 above.
The tale presents a series of ethical mistakes or bad judgments, each of which, had it been avoided, would have stopped the not inevitable process leading to Rome's sack of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple. But a closer look at the structure of the story reveals greater subtlety: We notice that the first part of the story, in which Bar Kamzora pleads three times to remain in the banquet hall and eat—each time his plea being rejected—is paralleled in the final section of the tale by the thrice-refused offer of the blemished animal by the representative of the Roman emperor. Indeed, this parallel is an inversion: While the guest wishes to eat and is rebuffed, the Roman representative—also a ‘guest’ at the Temple—wishes, as it were, to feed his sacrifice.32
The motif of eating/feeding is one that appears in all three parts of the tale, with Bar Kamzora introducing the idea of the sacrifices as food (for the Jews instead of for the deity) in the second section. (I thank an anonymous reviewer of this paper for drawing my attention to this point.)
See the aggadic commentary of Rabbi Samuel Eliezer Halevi Edels (Maharsha) to b. Git. 55b, who suggests that Bar Kamza (in the Babylonian version) would have understood the invitation to the banquet as an attempt at reconciliation; his eviction from the banquet would then have come all the more as an affront.
But while the first half of the story moves from an express hatred between two individuals—the host and Bar Kamzora—which, through distrust and misunderstandings, leads to revenge, the second half moves in the opposite direction. We are told, in the important middle section, that Rome and Israel are, in fact, in a state of relative mutual harmony: The Jews offer sacrifices in the name of Rome, and the Roman emperor clearly has no reason to believe Bar Kamzora's slander at first: “You are insulting them, just wishing to slander them!” Only the mistrust between the two peoples—so typical of individual pettiness—turns this balanced reciprocity into blind hatred and destruction of the weaker by the more powerful.
By setting up individual conflict as a paradigm for national conflict, our author has personalized our understanding of the international scene: The Temple, originally a symbol of mutual acceptance, trust and peace, becomes the locus of and, indeed, the catalyst for the national stand-off. On the one side stands the representative of Rome, on the other, the priest. The sacrifice, meant to be a vehicle for bringing a person closer to God and to one's fellow human beings, is not offered, thus breaking the ties that bind nations together despite widely diverging origins, customs and ranks. The destruction of the Temple is the stated and (now) inevitable result of such a break.
As I have surmised, this is the story which circulated in Palestine of, perhaps, the third or fourth century C.E., before a later editor brought in an earlier, known tradition of Rabbi Zechariah's timidity being responsible for the destruction of the Temple, and on the basis of that tradition included him among the guests at the banquet. This Palestinian tradition, as told by the redactors of Midrash Lamentations Rabbati (including mention of Rabbi Zechariah), then traveled—as did many other Palestinian statements and traditions—in the mouths of scholars who moved frequently between the two great centers of Jewish learning, in Palestine and Babylonia.34
It is well-known that the Babylonian Talmud contains numerous parallels to Palestinian traditions occurring in the Palestinian Talmud and the early midrashic collections (almost all of Palestinian provenance). Especially in the case of narratives and traditions describing persons and events originating in the Land of Israel, these traditions often become modifi ed in the Babylonian versions. For a recent comparative study of narratives in the Palestinian and Babylonian Talmuds, see Rubenstein, Talmudic Stories, and the bibliographical references mentioned there. See also Joshua Efron, “Bar-Kokhva in the Light of the Palestinian and Babylonian Talmudic Traditions,” in The Bar-Kokhva Revolt: A New Approach (eds. Aharon Oppenheimer and Uriel Rappaport; Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi, 1984) 47–105 [Hebrew], for a detailed comparative analysis of the Palestinian and Babylonian historical traditions concerning the Bar-Kokhba revolt, including a discussion of the methodological and historical ramifications of the study; and cf. Gafni, Land, Center and Diaspora, 108–17. The present analysis comes to similar conclusions to those presented by these scholars regarding the evolution of historical narrative accounts from the Palestinian to the Babylonian redacted works. It should be noted that, for the present comparative study, we need not posit a direct literary connection between Lamentations Rabbati and the Babylonian Talmud (a moot issue); the narrative appearing in Lamentations Rabbati is a representative of the Palestinian narrative tradition, and can be assumed to have circulated some time before the redaction of this midrash in the fifth or sixth century C.E. From the inclusion of Rabbi Zechariah ben Avkulos in the Babylonian version we may infer that the tale in its later form was the one that circulated in Babylonia, resulting ultimately in the narrative as found in the Babylonian Talmud.
See note 40 below on the formal connection between these three tales as found in the Babylonian Talmud.
b. Git. 55b–56a. The text is based on a comparison of the manuscript versions; see Meyer S. Feldblum, Dikdukei Soferim: Gittin (New York: Horeb, 1966).
On account of Kamza and Bar Kamza was Jerusalem destroyed.
There was a man whose friend was Kamza, and whose enemy was Bar Kamza.
He made a banquet, and said to his servant, “Go and bring me Kamza.”
He went and brought him Bar Kamza.
He came and saw him sitting there, and said to him,
“Since you are my enemy, what are you looking for here? Get out!”
He said to him, “Since I am already here, let me alone, and I shall pay you for what I eat and drink.”
He replied, “No.”
He said to him, “I shall pay you half the cost of the banquet.” He replied, “No.”
He said to him, “I shall pay you the entire cost of the banquet.” He replied, “No.”
He picked him up and threw him out.
He said, “Since those Rabbis were sitting there and did not protest, I shall go and slander them.”
He went and said to the king, “The Jews have revolted against you!”
He said, “How can this be proven?”
He said, “Send them a sacrifice, and see if they will offer it.”
He sent with him a three-year-old calf.
On the way he placed a blemish on the lip (some say, the eyelid)
—a place which is a blemish for us, but not for them.
The Rabbis considered offering it as a sacrifice for the peace of the kingdom.
Rabbi Zechariah ben Avqulos said to them, “They will say, ‘Blemished animals are [permitted] to be offered on the altar'!”
They considered killing him, so that he should not go and tell.
Rabbi Zechariah ben Avqulos said to them, “They will say, ‘He who puts a blemish on a sacrificial animal deserves the death penalty'!”
Rabbi Yohanan said, “The timidity of Rabbi Zechariah ben Avqulos destroyed our house, burned our Temple, and exiled us from our land.”
Note that while the first part of the story is essentially the same as the Palestinian version, the Babylonian author has given up on mirroring the altercation at the banquet in a description of the conflict at the Temple. In fact, he has completely rewritten the second half of the story, and, instead of the two august representatives of the two peoples, the priest and the Roman representative, the main disputants here are Rabbi Zechariah and the Rabbis: Rabbi Zechariah, who, as surmised above, had already made his appearance at the banquet in the (late) edited Palestinian version, is now taken out of that scene and placed in the court of the Temple; in his stead, those very same Rabbis are seated, and they are equally silent and passive in the face of the embarrassing and uncomfortable spectacle. But their passivity in the presence of ethical shortcomings at the banquet gives way in the Temple scene to brazen assertiveness in matters of ritual law and polity: They are willing either to sacrifice the blemished animal, or, alternatively (and with seemingly equal aplomb), to kill the dangerous collaborator Bar Kamza. Their plans are thwarted by an equally assertive Rabbi Zechariah,37
It is only here that his actions are truly assertive, thus producing a biting irony regarding his “diffidence” (anvetanut) in the appended statement. While it has been suggested that here, too, Zechariah abstains from taking a position (similar to the accounts in the Tosefta and Lamentations Rabbati), and is “diffident” vis-à-vis public criticism (see the commentary of Rashi to the Talmud ad loc., and see Schwartz, “More on ‘Zecharia ben Avkules: Humility or Zealotry?’ ” 314–15), an analysis of the use of “they will say” in other places in the Babylonian Talmud leads to the conclusion that the force of this idiom is the fear that improper halakhic conclusions will be reached by the lay populace, and not the fear of popular criticism. See the following note.
Cf. b. Shabb. 108b, Eruv. 24b, 91a, Pesach. 37a, Moed Kat. 11a, Git 18a, and Hul. 76b. As an example we may cite the passage in b. Shabbat, where the Mishnaic ruling forbids the production of brine in large quantities for pickling purposes (the preparation of foods being forbidden on the Sabbath), but allows small quantities for table use. Rabbi Yose objects to this distinction, however, on the grounds that “they will say, work of major proportions is prohibited, but work of minor proportions is permitted.” The phrase thus introduces the fear of a possible false conclusion drawn by the populace from a halakhic ruling. So too here, Rabbi Zechariah's objections to the halakhic ruling proposed by his colleagues is based on a fear that the ruling (not necessarily wrong itself) might lead to faulty legal conclusions on the part of the populace.
Where is the Temple in all this? Indeed, this story does not even explicitly mention the destruction of the Temple by the Roman emperor, as did the Palestinian version; in fact, we have completely forgotten about Rome (there is no Roman representative present at the Temple, as Bar Kamza brings the animal himself), as well as any mention about a priest. The Temple recedes into the background, as the disputing Rabbis take center stage. For this is not a story about international conflict, about Rome and Israel, but about the Jewish rabbinic leadership and its misplaced emphases. The story becomes a test case for moral leadership, and the rabbis, as depicted by this author, fail in that test as they bring legal reasoning to new heights of absurdity.
Of course, this is exactly what we would expect as the focusing interest of a sensitive Babylonian leader and reader: For these Easterners, residing over a thousand miles away from the Palestinian Jewish-Roman conflict and lacking a living tradition of the Temple destroyed hundreds of years before, lived in a highly structured society, where the academies, the rabbinic leadership, and the exilarch were the unquestioned spokesmen and leaders of the community.39
See Jacob Neusner, A History of the Jews in Babylonia (vol. 3 [of 5]: From Shapur I to Shapur II; Leiden: Brill, 1968) ch. 4 (“The Rabbinical Academy and Popular Culture”), 195–271, ch. 5 (“The Rabbinical Court and Daily Life”) 272–338; idem, Talmudic Judaism in Sassanian Babylonia: Essays and Studies (Leiden: Brill, 1976) ch. 7 (“The Rabbi and the Jewish Community”) 87–107; Isaiah M. Gafni, The Jews of Babylonia in the Talmudic Era: A Social and Cultural History (Jerusalem: Merkaz Zalman Shazar letoldot Yisrael, 1990) ch. 3 (“Jewish Life in Talmudic Babylonia: National Leadership and Local Communal Structures”) 92–125, esp. 101–2, 113–15 [Hebrew]; idem, “ ‘Staff and Legislator’: On New Types of Leadership in the Talmudic Era in the Land of Israel and in Babylonia,” in Priesthood and Monarchy: Studies in the Historical Relationships of Religions and State (ed. Isaiah Gafni and Gabriel Motzkin; Jerusalem: Merkaz Zalman Shazar letoldot Yisrael, 1987) 79–91 [Hebrew]; idem, Land, Center and Diaspora, 17–18, 108–20; Richard Kalmin, “Relationships Between Rabbis and Non-Rabbis in Rabbinic Literature of Late Antiquity,” Jewish Studies Quarterly 5 (1998) 156–70.
But it would be a mistake to believe that national conflict does not interest these authors. For, indeed, while the national conflict is taken out of the Temple court, the stage for such national mistrust as depicted in the Palestinian story is reset in another, altogether different setting. The last two stories in the Babylonian trilogy, which have no parallel in Palestinian sources, seem to have been expressly created to fill the void left by the absence of the national conflict in the retelling of the Kamza and bar Kamza tale:40
b. Git. 57a. These two small tales, while embedded in the context of other tales of destruction and separated from each other and from the tale of Kamza and Bar Kamza found on folios 55b–56a, originally formed one unit: this is clear from the introductory phrase on 55b, “On account of Kamza and Bar Kamza was Jerusalem destroyed; on account of a rooster and a hen was Tur Malka destroyed; on account of a carriage axle was Bethar destroyed,” as well as from the occurrence of the phrase, “The Jews have revolted against you” (meradu bakh yehudaei) in all three tales. I therefore feel justified in imputing a commonness of purpose in the formation of the three tales.
On account of a rooster and a hen was Tur Malka destroyed.
They had the custom that when a groom and bride were married, they would send out in front of them a rooster and a hen, as if to say, “Be fruitful as the fowl.”
One day Roman troops passed by, and took them from them.
They attacked them, striking [and killing] them.
They came and told the king, “The Jews have revolted against you!”
He rose against them.
On account of a carriage axle was Bethar destroyed.
They had the custom that when a baby boy was born they would plant a cedar, when a baby girl was born they would plant an acacia tree; and when they would marry, they would cut these down and make a wedding chamber for them.
One day the king's daughter passed by. The carriage axle broke, and they cut down a cedar and inserted it [in the carriage].
They attacked them, striking [and killing] them.
They came and told the king, “The Jews have revolted against you!”
He rose against them.
These stories are actually twins, and present two sides of one coin. The one story tells of young men and women who, upon marrying, are greeted by fowl to symbolize the soon-to-become family with children. These young people and their guests are bothered by what is perhaps an overly boisterous, maybe even sneering, group of other young men, Roman soldiers. The questionably innocent prank of the soldiers is taken very seriously by the popular village crowd, and their mistrust is matched by the exaggerated misreading by the emperor, leading to their siege and ultimate destruction.
In the second story a complementary picture is drawn: Young children are symbolically set up with a botanical “trust fund” (here the flora complements the fauna of the first story). This fund is liquidated by what seems to be a quite innocent mistake concerning another child, the emperor's daughter. Again, mutual misunderstanding and distrust lead to attack and counterattack, and ultimately to the destruction of Bethar. In both cases, the natural, pastoral, continuation of life for the local, village population—from childhood to adulthood and back again—is threatened and effectively cut off by the very same elements of the surrounding, dominating power.
In a fascinating mirroring of the development of our first tale, which took us away from an early depiction of Jerusalem and the Temple as political and religious center towards a new focus on the village (the same Bethar!) and its leadership in a late Palestinian tale (of the fourth or fifth century C.E.), our second Palestinian story of national conflict is similarly transformed in the Babylonian milieu into a story of local conflict, where the centrality of the Temple gives way to a dual view of the problems of religious and political leadership on the one hand, and, on the other, popular village life and its conflicts with a more diffuse, almost innocent—but equally dangerous—foreign domination. Instead of depicting the stand-off between the representatives of the two nations in the Temple, the international conflict is relocated to the village, indeed, to the most primary elements of village life. The sensitive depiction of the national crisis as a projection of private conflict, hatred and distrust inherent in the Palestinian tale is here transformed into an equally sensitive, but widely divergent description of the complex relationship between the foreign ruling power (the army and the emperor) and the populace. Neither element, ruler or ruled, is portrayed in unambiguous hues: the message imparted through these small stories consists of a warning to the local population of the dangers of living under occupation of a sometimes benign, sometimes threatening power, and the necessities of accommodating to the unpleasant and not altogether innocent demands and capriciousness of the wielders of that power.
The Loss of Center
The loss of the Temple as a center (through its destruction) was not an immediate and complete loss, as long as it lived on in the collective memory of the Jewish people as a symbol of the centrality and fragility of moral leadership, and as a representation of the great national conflict between Israel and Rome. What we have seen is how chronological and geographic distance from the Temple caused the centrality of the Temple, and the memories of the rituals of sacrifice so central in its day, to recede, so to be replaced by the more immediate concerns of the populace and its leaders: the political and moral temper of the local leadership, the continuation of life under what should be a leadership equally concerned with the wider questions of law and ritual as with the more personal concerns of the individual in his daily life, and, finally, the trials and tragedy of a subjugated class living without center, but with its own sense of the continuation of life's most basic elements, through custom and group identity. It is significant that the storytellers of the two major geographic centers of Jewish life provide divergent perceptions of the move from center to periphery: While the Palestinian redactor focuses on a description of the general social fabric of society in its myriad interactions (landowners and banqueteers, city councilors and mayors, representatives of the king and Temple priests), the Babylonian author divides his focus of attention, here providing an invective of rabbinic activity through a veritable parody of halakhic discourse, and there painting an idyllic, if tragic, picture of popular “village” life.41
It is worth pointing out that the three stories of Palestinian provenance—both versions of the tale concerning Bethar, and the (restored original) tale of Bar Kamza and Bar Kamzora in Lamentations Rabbati—do not involve any members of the so-called “rabbinic” class. While all of these tales appear in Amoraic texts (edited in final form no earlier than the last half of the fourth century C.E.), they may, of course, reflect much more ancient traditions. Recent studies of the Jewish society of the first centuries after the destruction of the Second Temple have suggested that the rabbinic society may have had a much smaller influence than previously assumed on the general Jewish populace, which included landowners, city councilors, artisans and peasants who did not necessarily view the rabbinic class as their leaders. (See the recent account of Seth Schwartz, Imperialism and Jewish Society, 200 B.C.E. to 640 C.E. [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001] ch. 3 [“Rabbis and Patriarchs on the Margins”], 103–28, and see, ibid., 129–76, and especially, on the city councils, 140–142, 175–176; see the literature cited there, passim, and especially Shaye J.D. Cohen, “The Place of the Rabbi in Jewish Society of the Second Century,” The Galilee in Late Antiquity [ed. Lee I. Levine; New York: Jewish Theological Seminary, 1992] 157–73.) In this context it is interesting to note that the Palestinian tales, even as they are transmitted within rabbinic circles, preserve what may be an authentic “non-rabbinic” flavor. (The interpolation in the tale of Bar Kamza and Bar Kamzora, placing Rabbi Zechariah ben Avqulos at the scene of the banquet, simply puts into relief the attempt to introduce rabbis into a decidedly non-rabbinic tale!) As mentioned above, it is only in the Babylonian version of the Kamza and Bar Kamza tale that the rabbis attain center stage in a drama concerning the destruction of Jerusalem and its Temple that, paradoxically, omits specific reference to the Temple and its priests, and only obliquely mentions its destruction. See Kalmin, “Relations Between Rabbis and Non-Rabbis,” on the difference in depictions of the relationships between rabbis and non-rabbis in Palestinian and Babylonian rabbinic literature.
