A Tragedy of Errors: Bar Qamtza and the Fall of Jerusalem

The story of Bar Qamtza is a famous rabbinic tale that explains the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem. Amram Tropper's book A Tragedy of Errors: Bar Qamtza and the Fall of Jerusalem explores the story's authors and early audiences, illuminating ancient Jewish social ideals, cultural practices, religious beliefs, literary trajectories, historical imaginings, and political inclinations. It serves as a springboard for exploring the interplay of everyday life in antiquity and the overarching architecture of Jewish society under Rome and Persia.

Format: Hardback
Length: 326 pages
Publication date: 01 April 2022
Publisher: Hebrew Union College Press,U.S.

The story of Bar Qamtza is one of the most famous stories in all rabbinic literature. In this tragic tale, a private feud at a Jerusalem banquet triggers a series of events that eventually culminate in the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem. Until the Holocaust, Jews commonly viewed the razing of the Second Temple as the greatest calamity in all Jewish history, and for many Jews through the ages, the story of Bar Qamtza explained why it had happened. In time, the story also became emblematic of the internal strife and divisive infighting that have troubled Jewish communities time and again across the generations.

In A Tragedy of Errors: Bar Qamtza and the Fall of Jerusalem, Amram Tropper enlists this well-known rabbinic tale as a window into the world of its authors and early audiences. Through a close reading and thick description of the story, Tropper illuminates ancient Jewish social ideals and cultural practices, religious beliefs and literary trajectories, historical imaginings and political inclinations, systemic structures and institutional realities. In Tropper's hands, the story of Bar Qamtza serves as a springboard for exploring the interplay of the minutiae of everyday life in antiquity and the overarching architecture of Jewish society under Rome and Persia.

Weight: 687g
Dimension: 235 x 155 x 25 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780878201969