The real story of Marta bat Baitus
In Masechet Gitin (56a) we find a series of agadot relating to the churban, like the famous story of Kamzta and Bar Kamtza. Tucked away amongst them is the story of Marta bat Baitus. The Gemara paints a tragic picture of the desperate situation in Yerushalayim during the Roman siege.
"Marta bat Baitus was the richest woman in Yerushalayim. She sent her servant to the market to buy some “solet” (semolina) flour to bake bread. The servant returned to say that there was no more solet and all that was left was white flour. So Marta sent him back to buy the white flour. When the servant got back to the market, the white flour also was gone. The servant returned to tell her that the white flour was gone, but there was dark flour. She sent him back to buy the dark flour, but when he returned to the market, even the dark flour was gone. The servant yet again returned to tell her that the only flour left was barley flour. Marta sent him back to buy the barley flour, but by the time he got back the barley was also gone. So Marta said “I will go myself and see what I can find to eat”. So she took off her sandals and left her house barefoot. As she was walking in the street, she stepped in some cow dung. Because she was so delicate, she died from the disgust of it. Another opinion says that she died from eating the dried figs of Rebi Tzadok. Rebi Tzadok had been praying and fasting for 40 years to try prevent the churban and he was so thin that whatever he ate, you could see it going down. After his fasts, they would bring him figs and he would suck the juice out of the figs and throw away the outer shells. As Marta was dying she took out all her money and threw it in the air in the market exclaiming “What good did all this money do me?”
Chazal relate these legends to capture the grim reality during the time of the churban. On the one hand they can be understood according to the pshat, but they also harbor a hidden message.
Let us first examine the story on the level of the pshat by filling in some of the blanks.
The Baitusim were a breakaway sect of ultra-rich, aristocratic Kohanim, similar to the Tzdukim, who refuted the Torah she’be’al peh and only adhered to the Torah she’bichtav. From the descriptions given by Chazal, these sects did not believe in Olam Habah and led a hedonistic lifestyle, enjoying the pleasures of this world to extreme. They were disconnected from the “common people” who mostly remained loyal to the Perushim, chachmei Chazal.
The Baitusim were notorious for using their wealth and influence to “buy” the position of the Kohein Gadol with money. In masechet Yevamot (61a) it describes how Marta bat Baitus married a kohen by the name of Yehoshua ben Gamla and then proceeded to pay the king (some say Yanai, some say Agrippas II) a vast sum of money to appoint him to the position of Kohein Gadol. There is a discrepancy in the Gemara whether Yehoshua ben Gamla was good guy or not. For example in Bava Batra (20b) it credits Yehoshua ben Gamla with instituting “cheiderim” for teaching Tinokot shel Beit Rabban in the “chatzeirot” despite the noise they involve which may disturb the neighbors. Various reasons are given to clarify the lack of propriety in appointing him Kohein Gadol. Some say that he was a great man, but there were greater Kohanim than him for the position. Others say that he was not fitting because the Sanhedrin never nominated him. Some even say that there were two Yehoshua ben Gamla’s and the one that married Marta was not the tzaddik.
Either way, Marta bat Baitus was one of the elite and totally detached from her people and the reality going on around her, as we see from the story.
The story seems totally absurd - the whole part of the servant repeatedly going to the market on the behest of his mistress and not wising up. OK, perhaps the first time or the second time we can dan oto lekaf zchut, but already after the first two times that he saw that the food was depleting quickly, why did he not just use his own common sense and buy the “next best thing” – JUST IN CASE! But no, the repetitive story is like a comedy of errors until its tragic end. Why did Marta, who certainly was no fool, not tell the servant – “if there is no solet – just buy the next best thing”, rather than dying of starvation?
On the surface the story conveys the extent of the rift and disassociation that existed between the aristocratic elite, the common folk and the reality on the ground. Marta lived in an ivory tower world in which not getting what she wanted was not an option. A servant of such a person does not have the “freedom” to use his own judgment, but must blindly obey his mistress or face dire consequences. Marta’s tragic end is a collapse of her ivory tower existence and a rude awakening that she cannot, in her delicate condition, bear.
Finally the Gemara introduces a nexus and collision of two sharply contrasting worlds. The morally decrepit, surreal and detached world of Marta and that of Rebi Tzadok, a great tzaddik whose entire existence was sharply focused on preventing the tragedy of his people, at the expense of his own health.
The story is of great interest to a baker like me, as it provides rare historical insight to the varying qualities of the different flours available during the period. Solet, semolina flour used for the Menachot in the Mikdash, was considered the most prestigious. It was followed by white flour, which today is considered the highest quality flour for making bread. White flour, unlike solet which is grainy like sea sand, is powdery fine in consistency, like talc. Following that was dark flour, or flour that contains the outer parts of the grain – the bran and the germ. Today, dark (or whole grain) flour is considered healthier than white flour, but back them it was considered inferior and suited to the lower class. The lowest level was barley flour, barley at the time was considered fit for animal fodder, not human consumption.
There is however a much deeper dimension to this story and Chazal, while using a true story that is understandable on a mundane level, wanted to hint at something much more profound.
Let’s start with the name מרתא, which hints to מרנא דבשמיא, HKB”H, who is the true wealth of Yerushalayim עתירתא דירושלים. He sent his servant Moshe Rabbeinu and commanded him to build a Midkash in which korbanot of pure “solet” were to be offered.
The purpose of building a Mikdash was to restore the spiritual state of Am Yisrael to that of the Avot. Avraham told Sarah – take three se’im of “solet” flour and make bread for the three angels (lechem abirim – food fit for angels is made with solet). We also know of the miracles that were indicative of their great spiritual stature, a bracha rested in Sarah’s dough and the Shechina rested on her tent.
This was the plan, to elevate Am Yisrael to the pure stature of “solet” and in fact was the way things started out. After a while however, as Moshe had warned - in the context of the period of Bayit Sheini - וישמן ישרן ויבעט, Am Yisrael sank to a lower level and there was no longer any pure “solet”, only white flour חיורתא.
In a Mishna in Menachot (8,2) it describes how the gizbar of the Mikdash checks a shipment of solet for quality –
כיצד הוא בודק? הגזבר מכניס את ידו לתוכה, עלה בה אבק פסולה עד שינפנה.
The Mishna here calls white flour אבק. This hints to fact that Am Yisrael had deteriorated to stage where they became involved with אבק לשון הרע. In parshat Devarim Moshe begins with words of rebuke אלה הדברים, Chazal say אלה are rashei teivot for אבק לשון הרע. Avak lashon harah is the precursor to full blown lashon harah. For example, it is when someone says to his friend “if only you knew what I know about ploni, it would make your ears sizzle”. He hasn’t actually said anything bad about him, but he is hinting that he has something bad to say and the friend’s ears prick up and want to know more. When someone speaks lashon harah and embarrasses his neighbor, it is called מלבין פני חברו – all the blood drains from the face of the person being maligned and his face turns white. The term the Gemara uses for white flour in our story is חיורתא.
It starts with אבק לשון הרע but eventually leads to full blown lashon harah and מוציא שם רע and is likened to פסולת. Rashi in masechet Shabat (20b) uses the same word in our story for dark flour גושקרא in reference to פסולת. The gematria of גושקרא is the same as שם רע. Once Am Yisrael deteriorates to full blown lashon harah, they are likened to פסולת.
Once lashon harah becomes the norm, the next step in the deterioration process is sin’at chinam. At this point Am Yisrael are likened to a sotah, a woman (Am Israel) accused of betraying her husband (HKB”H). As in the case of a sotah, she is required to bring a minchat sotah consisting of barley flour.
Chazal by relating the story of מרתא also wanted to hint to when Am Yisrael left Egypt ויבאו מרתה. According to the mefarshim, at Marah Am Yisrael were subjected to the bitter waters of the sotah and passed the test. None of the women in Am Yisrael sinned with adultery with the Egyptians, excepting for one – Shlomit Bat Divri who is specifically mentioned. Chazal want to contrast the high level of Am Yisrael when they left Egypt with the low level prior to the churban, as is reflected in the piyut “בצאתי ממצרים – בצאתי מירושלים” which appears as part of the Kinnot.
Am Yisrael in this decrepit state was likened to a widow היתה כאלמנה with no offspring. Normally in a case like this, the גואל (the dead husband’s brother) should do Yibbum, but HKB”H was so angry at Am Yisrael that He refused to do Yibbum and save the Mikdash. HKB”H instead did Chalitza, he removed His sandal and the Mikdash became בית חלוץ הנעל to the disgrace of a disgraced nation.
Finally, Am Yisrael had failed the test of the sotah and the “dried fig” caused Marta’s belly to swell and she died.
These are the stages of the spiritual deterioration of Am Yisrael during Bayit Sheini.
HKB”H did not sit idly by however while all this was going on, He repeatedly sent His servant to the “market” – to Am Yisrael with a specific mission. This servant was not allowed to use his own judgment, but had to blindly follow his Master’s bidding. These were the Nevi’im sent to warn Am Yisrael, but their words fell on deaf ears.
This is the hidden meaning behind the story of Marta bat Baitus and is a sharp critique of the spiritual deterioration of Am Yisrael during Bayit Sheini.
The story ends with a description of Rebi Tzadok.
We all ask ourselves – “What about Chazal, what about the Gedolei Hador, the Tannaim? Where were they? Why did they not try to prevent this?”
When one reads the agadot of Kamtza and Bar Kamtza, the fall of Har Hamelech and Beitar, etc., a repeating theme emerges. Am Yisrael had been settled (almost uninterruptedly) for almost 1000 years in Eretz Yisrael and they had a feeling of invincibility. This was in part justified, when you read about the fall of Har Hamelech (Tur Malka) it describes a really tough fellow named Bar Daroma, who single handedly kept the Romans at bay, until he lost his self-confidence and things fell apart.
Am Yisrael were not afraid of the Romans and all their military might. The Jews attacked the Romans, without fear, when they stole their chickens and cedar trees. The Romans in fact were petrified of Am Yisrael. Bar Kamtza went to snitch to Emperor Nero that Am Israel had rebelled and Nero was so afraid of attacking Yerushalayim that he converted and was the ancestor of Rebi Meir (the Gemara paints a different picture of Nero than the regular history books). Nevuzar’adan, who butchered untold numbers of Jews during the churban, eventually converted. Even during Bayit Rishon, Nebuchadnezzar was reluctant to attack Yerushalayim and only did so after being railroaded by the Moavim.
The goyim were fearful of Am Yisrael and rightly so, because as long as they were doing HKB”H’s bidding – they were invincible. The source of Am Yisrael’s invincibility was their devotion to HKB”H and when this weakened, so did the wellspring of their self-confidence and this gave the goyim an opening and the bravado to attack us.
Am Yisrael were split into three factions in this regard. There were those who continued to believe in their invincibility, even though their spiritual status had deteriorated, like the Kanaim. Then there were those who, like seismologists, could feel the tremors of an impending earthquake, the low spiritual state of Am Yisrael and understood they no longer benefited from HKB”H’s protection and invincibility, but decided to deal with it in different ways.
We see this in the mention of the three Tannaim in the aggadot.
Firstly you had Zecharia ben Avkulas in the story of Kamtza and Bar Kamtza, the head of the Sanhedrin, who refused to allow the korban of the Romans to be offered because it had a blemish, knowing full well what the consequences of such an action would be. He truly believed in Am Yisrael’s continued invincibility and belonged in that respect to the Kanaim’s school of thought.
Then you have Rabi Yochanan be Zakkai who understood that Am Yisrael no longer merited Divine protection and decided on the path of negotiation and saving what he could.
Finally you have Rebi Tzadok, who spent 40 years prior to the churban fasting and praying that Am Yisrael would do tshuva and reverse the gzeira. Rebi Tzadok was not someone who shut himself in a room and nobody ever saw him. He went amongst Am Yisrael, like (lehavdil) a Mahatma Ghandi, and everyone could see his love and devotion to Am Yisrael. He staged a peaceful, non-violent protest aimed at bringing the warring factions within Am Yisrael at the time together (it was mamash a state of civil war, with thousands of dead, e.g. in the time of Yannai).
Why figs? Why did they not give him oranges or kiwi fruit to suck the juice from? It was symbolic. In the story of Adam and Chava when they sinned with the eitz hada’at, it says that they covered themselves in fig leaves to hide their shame at their betrayal of HKB”H. The word בגד – clothing, is also the root for the word בגידה – betrayal. The bigdei kehuna were a kapparah for the sin of Adam and Chava. However, when the only thing that is important to you is the exterior clothing – the position, the honor then bigdei kehuna are meaningless. Without the inner level of spirituality they are mere shells to be discarded. It was a was a slap in the face to Marta bat Baitus who choked on one of Rebi Tzadok’s fig shells, because all she was interested in was station and honor, the inner spirituality of the kehuna had no interest to her.
After Rabi Yochanan ben Zakkai understood that the die had been cast, he set out on a mission to save what he could and rebuild. One of his requests from Emperor Vespasian was to heal Rebi Tzadok. Once the gzeira had been given, there was no more point to Rebi Tzadok fasting. The Gemara describes the healing process of Rebi Tzadok, and it is a reverse process of Marta bat Baitus’ search for flour. First soak bran (dark flour) in water and give him to drink for a day or two. Then soak white flour in water and give him to drink. Instead of deterioration as with Marta, we have an elevation.
This is a message of hope and nechama. From the ashes and ruins of the churban, it is possible to rebuild and commence the restoration process of Am Yisrael, albeit slow and fraught with suffering of almost 2000 years of galut, but which will eventually culminate in Am Yisrael becoming pure “solet” once again and rebuilding the Beit Hamikdash בבי"א.
