Kamtza and Bar-Kamtza: A 3-Act Story

Kamtza and Bar-Kamtza “on one foot”:

This Talmudic story is associated with Tisha B’Av.

Act 1

Context: This is from the Babylonian Talmud, Masechet (Tractate) Gittin, which is about divorce. The Mishnah (5:6) explores the question of buying a field from a couple who is divorcing, and in particular how this might have been affected by the circumstances during the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans. The Gemara then poses the question of why the Romans were destroying Jerusalem in the first place, and it brings this story to explain what happened.

1. Who is at fault here?

2. At what points could the story have been changed?

3. Did anybody make a good decision?

4. What lessons about leadership can be learned from this?

5. Should the other guests have done anything? If so, why might they have not done so?

Act 2

1. Who is at fault here?

2. At what points could the story have been changed?

3. Did anybody make a good decision?

4. What lessons about leadership can be learned from this?

5. What does this text say about our obligation to speak up about injustices in our times now? Do we need to witness a situation to be a “bystander”?

6. According to Rabbi Ed Feinstein, this story shows that “the fate of a community lies in the texture of the fabric of its relationships”. How is that relevant today?

Act 3

1. Who is at fault here?

2. At what points could the story have been changed?

3. Did anybody make a good decision?

4. What lessons about leadership can be learned from this?

5. Is there such a thing as being overly ethical?

6. Kamtza appears to have nothing to do with this story, since he never even got the invitation, yet his name is on the story. Are there modern parallels?

7. Rabbi Zechariah seems to be a perfectionist. What would he say are the benefits of this approach? What would Rabbi Yochanan say are the dangers of perfectionism?

8. Another way of looking at Rabbi Zechariah is that he is religiously cautious. When might that be a valuable trait? When might it be important to override that tendency?

9. Elsewhere in the Talmud, the Rabbis say that the Second Temple was destroyed because of “sinat chinam”, baseless hatred (Yoma 9b:8). Do you see that at work in this story? If so, where? Either way, what would it look like if “baseless love” were being employed in this story?

10. Why would this be a story that the Rabbis told about themselves?

Reader’s Theatre for Kamtza and Bar-Kamtza

(adapted from the Babylonian Talmud, Gittin 55b-56a, by David Schwartz)

Act 1

Scene 1

(Setting: A mansion in Jerusalem)

Narrator: Jerusalem was destroyed on account of Kamtza and Bar-Kamtza

Host: Servant, I’m throwing a feast. Please invite my friend Kamtza.

Servant: Yes, sir!

Scene 2

(Setting: The same mansion in Jerusalem)

Narrator: The servant mistakenly invited the host’s enemy, Bar-Kamtza, instead of his friend, Kamtza.

Host: Bar-Kamtza, what are you doing here, sitting at my feast?! You know I don’t like you. Get up and go away!

Bar-Kamtza: Since I have already come, let me stay and I will give you money for whatever I eat and drink. Just don’t embarrass me by sending me out.

Host: No, you must leave.

Bar-Kamtza: I will give you money for half the feast. Just don’t send me away!

Host: No, you must leave.

Bar-Kamtza: I will give you money for the entire feast, just let me stay.

Host: No, you must leave.

Narrator: The host took Bar-Kamtza by the hand, stood him up, and took him out.

Act 2

Scene 1

(Setting: Just outside the mansion in Jerusalem)

Bar-Kamtza: Since the Rabbis were sitting there and did not protest the actions of the host, even though they saw how he humiliated me, they must be content with what he did. I will go and inform against them to the Roman emperor.

Scene 2

(Setting: The Imperial palace in Rome)

Bar-Kamtza: Your Majesty, the Jews are rebelling against you.

Emperor: Who says that this is the case?

Bar-Kamtza: Go and test them. Send them an offering on behalf of the government and see if they will sacrifice it.

Emperor: I will send with you a choice three-year-old calf.

Scene 3

(Setting: On the road to the Temple)

Bar-Kamtza: I will give the calf a blemish on its upper lip, or maybe on its eyelid. This way it will be blemished according to Jewish law, but not according to Roman law. The Jews won’t be able to sacrifice it, but they won’t be able to satisfactorily explain it to the Roman authorities, and revenge will be mine!

Act 3

Scene 1

(Setting: The Temple)

The Rabbis: Even with this blemish, we should sacrifice the animal as an offering. It’s important to maintain good relations with the government.

Rabbi Zechariah ben Avkolas: If the priests do that, people will say that blemished animals may be sacrificed as offerings on the alter.

The Rabbis: If we don’t sacrifice it, we must prevent Bar-Kamtza for reporting this to the emperor. We should kill him so he cannot inform against us.

Rabbi Zechariah ben Avkolas: If you kill him, people will say that one who makes a blemish on a sacrificial animal ought to be killed.

Narrator: As a result they did nothing, Bar-Kamtza’s slander was accepted by the authorities, and consequently the war between the Jews and the Romans began.

Scene 2

(Setting: Outside Jerusalem)

Rabbi Yochanan: The excessive humility of Rabbi Zechariah ben Avkolas destroyed our Temple, burned our Sanctuary, and exiled us from our land.

Rabbi Elazar: Come and see how great is the power of shame, for the Holy One, blessed be G-d, assisted Bar-Kamtza, who had been humiliated, and due to this humiliation G-d destroyed G-d's temple and burned G-d's sanctuary.

Context: This video is from Bimbam, a now-defunct Jewish video company. They have many excellent videos, both about the weekly Torah portions and about many many other Jewish topics, and these are still available on YouTube. There's another animated video about this story which you can find here (it includes the original Aramaic from the Talmud, translated phrase by phrase): https://www.alephbeta.org/playlist/baseless-hatred-sinat-chinam?fbclid=IwAR331TlhBZrhWEJR_-sE31KgoHKcEzCCkPnm_GPUgTJoETysqwIpKmZ3rHI

With appreciation to Eitan Gutin for the idea of the story as a 3-act play, as well as Rachel Zerin, Yaakov Nadler, Jonathan Bressler, Alana Suskin, Arnie Draiman, Ben Dreyfus, Alicia Jo Rabins, Benji Elson, Rabbi Ed Feinstein, Eliana Light, Sarah Noyo, Ec Smith, Dan Libenson, Deborah Miller, Gavriel Goldfeder,

Appendix: Kamtza and Bar-Kamtza Go to High School

(By: David A. Feder, used with permission)

There was a girl named Sophie. Sophie’s family has a lot of money, and Sophie has a lot of friends. But she was not friends with everybody, and when she threw a party, she had a pretty selective guest list in mind, starting with the popular kids on the dance team. You can imagine what it feels like to get invited to one of Sophie’s parties, and what it feels like to not get invited. Needless to say, all the important people at school were invited, and those who were not, were not.

Sophie texted an invitation to her friend Rachel Green, and told her she really wanted Rachel to come to her party. But there was a problem: Sophie made a mistake. Instead of texting her friend Rachel Green, she texted Rachel Greenberg. Rachel Greenberg had been a friend of Sophie’s in elementary school, but they had a falling out, and Sophie got Rachel kicked off the dance team. Now they don’t even speak. Their friends didn’t even speak to each other.

But Rachel Greenberg got the invitation by mistake, and Rachel Greenberg decided to come to the party. Rachel saw the whole dance team there, and when Sophie found her there eating snacks and looking for someone to talk to, she was outraged. Sophie didn’t realize how Rachel Greenberg found out about the party, and how she thought it would be OK to show up. Sophie demanded that Rachel leave immediately.

Rachel Greenberg was devastated – she thought she was doing this really mature, responsible thing, and repairing this relationship. She offered to pay for all the food she ate at the party, but Sophie turned her down. She offered to pay for half the cost of the whole party, but Sophie turned her down. Rachel offered to pay for the entire party – food, decorations, DJ, everything. But Sophie wouldn’t have any of it, and kicked her out.

As you can imagine, Rachel Greenberg was humiliated, and she felt she had to do something to get back at Sophie, but even more, at Sophie’s friends on the dance team who had watched and laughed as Rachel got kicked out. So the next day, Rachel went to their school principal, and told him that Sophie and her friends were planning to cheat on a test at the end of the week.

The principal wasn’t sure whether to believe Rachel, and decided on a plan. He figured he would do something nice for the dance team, and try to convince them that the school valued them. If they really were planning to cheat on the test, perhaps this nice gesture would win them over, and they wouldn’t cheat after all. If they were not planning to cheat after all, it was simply a nice thing to do for the team.

The principal asked Rachel to deliver a dozen donuts to the team. Rachel took the donuts, and carefully dipped each one in the gutter, and only then, dropped them off at dance rehearsal.

The dance team noticed. The donuts were nasty. But what was this message the principal was sending them? Why send tainted donuts to dance practice? They debated: should they send the principal a thank-you note, in order to preserve their relationship with the principal and show they are not up to anything? Or should they reject it, so people know that you can’t send tainted gifts to the dance team?

Sophie took things one step further – she suspected (rightly, of course) that Rachel Greenberg was behind the nasty donuts. Perhaps the team should accuse Rachel of cheating, and try to get her suspended.

The captain of the dance team was there for the discussion about what to do about the donuts. She decided that the team could not accept the donuts and send the thank-you note. And she also decided they should not try to have Rachel suspended.

The next day, the principal called Rachel, Sophie, and the whole dance team to the office. What should the principal do, and why?
* * *

The rabbis of the Talmud told pretty much this exact story, except in place of the dance team there were rabbis, in place of the donuts there was an animal sacrifice at the Temple, and instead of a school principal there was Caesar, ruler of Rome. Rachel Green’s name was Kamtza, Rachel Greenberg’s name was Bar Kamtza, and the captain of the dance team was Rabbi Zecharia. The rabbis of the Talmud wrote that this story was about sinat hinam – “baseless hatred,” and it illustrated why the Temple deserved to be destroyed. They said that Rabbi Zecharia – the dance team captain in our story – was the source of
the baseless hatred. What led them to that conclusion?

•Was it the decision to not retaliate against Rachel?
•Was it the decision to not send the principal a thank-you note?
•Or was it what the team captain/Rabbi Zecharia did at the party?
Why would the rabbis focus on what the captain of the dance team did, and not Sophie or Rachel?