Was "Kezazah" a Jewish custom?

Question

Was there a Jewish custom (that has been called by some a Kezazah) in which, if a Jewish son squandered his inheritance among Gentiles, when he returned to his people, the community met him at the outskirts of the village and threw pottery at his feet to break it--signifying that he was cut off from his community?

Answer

 

Shalom! 

Thank you for your question. 

The Kezaza ceremony is found in the Talmud in Ketubot 28b. 

It was a ceremony in which family members would sever their connection with a member of the family who married a person below their social status. As the Talmud says: 

"How is the keẓaẓa performed? If one of the brothers married a woman unsuitable for him, members of the family come and bring a barrel filled with fruit and break it in the town square, saying, 'O brothers of the House of Israel, listen, our brother so-and-so has married an unsuitable woman and we are afraid lest his seed mingle with our seed. Come and take yourselves a sign for the generations [which are to come], that his seed mingle not with our seed'" 

A variation of this could also be done for a family member who sells away the family estate. 

It was not widely practice even in Talmudic times and is not done at all nowadays. 

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