Episode 6: “Poisonous Pens and Slanderous Tongues”

What can we learn from the corrupt priestly families of the Second Temple period about our own modern era – when people hide behind the anonymity of their screens and their hands are light on the keyboards?

“Woe is me, through the House of Katros and their pens,” says the Talmud in a poetic listing of priestly families who abused their positions of power. The Katros family is called out for writing slanderous letters to Caesar in Rome, spreading false rumors that defamed their Jewish brethren – and the end is known to us all: the complete destruction of the Temple and the fall of Jerusalem, where the Katros family lived.

Are the Katros’ poisonous pens similar to our modern era keyboards? What is our modern-day takeaway from this social division and fraternal strife that caused our nation to fall?