For the source text click/tap here: Gittin 57
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It was stated earlier that the city of Beitar was destroyed on account of a shaft from a carriage. The Gemara explains that it was customary in Beitar that when a boy was born, they would plant a cedar tree and when a girl was born, they would plant a cypress [tornita]. And when they would later marry each other, they would cut down these trees and construct a wedding canopy for them with their branches. One day the emperor’s daughter passed by there and the shaft of the carriage in which she was riding broke. Her attendants chopped down a cedar from among those trees and brought it to her.
Owing to the importance that they attached to their custom, the residents of Beitar came and fell upon them and beat them. The attendants came and said to the emperor: The Jews have rebelled against you. The emperor then came against them in war.
We continue our exploration of how our agaric legends formed the theology underlying the Hurban in our collective spiritual psyche compared with objective accounts from Josephus and Roman historians.