The story of Kamsa and bar Kam§a and the fall of
Jerusalem. A man had company and had invited Bar Kamsa
who was his enemy, by mistake. He afterwards turned him
out in spite of his offer to pay all the expenses of the feast
rather than be put to shame. Then Bar Kamsa went and
denounced the Jews to the Emperor as having rebelled and as
proof he asserted that they would refuse to accept an offering
sent to the Temple. A lamb was sent which he mutilated on
the way, in a manner not offensive to the Roman sacrificial
laws but contrary to those of the Jews. For the sake of
peace the Jews were inclined to offer it up, but Zachariah
b. Abqulos prevented it as being contrary to the law. Le-
5*
- 68
gions of Romans came to Jerusalem. The General shot
arrows at the the corners and they all fell into Jerusalem.
Asking a boy to say his verse the boy repeated the verse
Ezek. 25. 14. This so impressed him that he became frightened and resigned the command, turned Jew, and became
the progenitor of R. Heir. Then was Aspasianos sent, and
the siege lasted for years. There were three rich men in
Jerusalem: Nakdimon b. Gorion, Ben Kalba-Sabua, and
Ben Sisith Hakaset who would have been able to provide
Jerusalem with food during the whole siege but that the
revolutionary party burned their stores in order that they
might fight to the bitter end. The famine increased terribly
and the people died in the streets. Then R. Johanan Ben
Zakkai was smuggled by a ruse out of the town. Johanan
went to the General who received him harshly. Johanan
greeted him as Emperor. Soon afterwards the message of
his election came. He was just then putting on his sandals,
but he could not get the one on the second foot and he
asked R. Johanan the reason, who said the good news had
so elated him that his body had swollen up; let an enemy
come before him and the foot would soon shrink to its
normal size. The Emperor asked him why he had not
come before. He replied that the rebels would not allow
him to. Then he was asked: “If a snake is wrapped around
a cask of honey, • do you not break the cask?" But he did
not know the answer which should have been: “One takes
pincers and lifts the snake away and so frees the cask
without breaking it." The Emperor asked him what favour
he could shew him and he merely asked to be allowed to
settle in Yabne and that R. Sadok be cured, who had fasted
40 years to avert the destruction of Jerusalem and become
a skeleton in consequence. This was granted him. Then was
sent Titus the Wicked. He went blasphemously into the
Temple and committed an immoral act on the scroll of the
Law; then he took a sword and pierced the curtain in the
middle of the Temple and by a miracle drops of blood oozed
out. He said, “Now I have killed their God." When he re-
69
turned with all the spoil of the Temple a storm arose on the
high seas and he said, “The power of their God is only in
the waters. He has drowned Pharaoh and Sisera and now
He wants to drown me. Let Him come and fight me on dry
land/' And a voice came and said, “O thou wicked one!
any one of my small creatures will suffice to war against
thee." When he landed an insect got into his nostrils and
from there to his brain and it gnawed for seven years. One
day he passed a smith and the noise of the hammer silenced
the insect. Then he called smiths who had continually
to hammer; when the smith happened to be a heathen he
paid him 400 Zuzim but when it was a Jew he said to him,
“It is enough for thee to see the vengeance on your enemy,"
and paid him nothing. After a time the insect got accustomed to the noise of the hammers and there was no longer
any relief. On his death he ordered his body to be burned
and the ashes to be strewn over seven seas so that the
God of the Jews should not be able to find him.
70. The story of Kamsa and bar Kam§a and the fall of
Jerusalem. A man had company and had invited Bar Kamsa
who was his enemy, by mistake. He afterwards turned him
out in spite of his offer to pay all the expenses of the feast
rather than be put to shame. Then Bar Kamsa went and
denounced the Jews to the Emperor as having rebelled and as
proof he asserted that they would refuse to accept an offering
sent to the Temple. A lamb was sent which he mutilated on
the way, in a manner not offensive to the Roman sacrificial
laws but contrary to those of the Jews. For the sake of
peace the Jews were inclined to offer it up, but Zachariah
b. Abqulos prevented it as being contrary to the law. Le-
5*
- 68
gions of Romans came to Jerusalem. The General shot
arrows at the the corners and they all fell into Jerusalem.
Asking a boy to say his verse the boy repeated the verse
Ezek. 25. 14. This so impressed him that he became frightened and resigned the command, turned Jew, and became
the progenitor of R. Heir. Then was Aspasianos sent, and
the siege lasted for years. There were three rich men in
Jerusalem: Nakdimon b. Gorion, Ben Kalba-Sabua, and
Ben Sisith Hakaset who would have been able to provide
Jerusalem with food during the whole siege but that the
revolutionary party burned their stores in order that they
might fight to the bitter end. The famine increased terribly
and the people died in the streets. Then R. Johanan Ben
Zakkai was smuggled by a ruse out of the town. Johanan
went to the General who received him harshly. Johanan
greeted him as Emperor. Soon afterwards the message of
his election came. He was just then putting on his sandals,
but he could not get the one on the second foot and he
asked R. Johanan the reason, who said the good news had
so elated him that his body had swollen up; let an enemy
come before him and the foot would soon shrink to its
normal size. The Emperor asked him why he had not
come before. He replied that the rebels would not allow
him to. Then he was asked: “If a snake is wrapped around
a cask of honey, • do you not break the cask?" But he did
not know the answer which should have been: “One takes
pincers and lifts the snake away and so frees the cask
without breaking it." The Emperor asked him what favour
he could shew him and he merely asked to be allowed to
settle in Yabne and that R. Sadok be cured, who had fasted
40 years to avert the destruction of Jerusalem and become
a skeleton in consequence. This was granted him. Then was
sent Titus the Wicked. He went blasphemously into the
Temple and committed an immoral act on the scroll of the
Law; then he took a sword and pierced the curtain in the
middle of the Temple and by a miracle drops of blood oozed
out. He said, “Now I have killed their God." When he re-
— 69
turned with all the spoil of the Temple a storm arose on the
high seas and he said, “The power of their God is only in
the waters. He has drowned Pharaoh and Sisera and now
He wants to drown me. Let Him come and fight me on dry
land/' And a voice came and said, “O thou wicked one!
any one of my small creatures will suffice to war against
thee." When he landed an insect got into his nostrils and
from there to his brain and it gnawed for seven years. One
day he passed a smith and the noise of the hammer silenced
the insect. Then he called smiths who had continually
to hammer; when the smith happened to be a heathen he
paid him 400 Zuzim but when it was a Jew he said to him,
“It is enough for thee to see the vengeance on your enemy,"
and paid him nothing. After a time the insect got accustomed to the noise of the hammers and there was no longer
any relief. On his death he ordered his body to be burned
and the ashes to be strewn over seven seas so that the
God of the Jews should not be able to find him.
