Is there a way to make the Tkinter text widget read only?

Very easy solution is just to bind any key press to a function that returns "break" like so:

import Tkinter

root = Tkinter.Tk() 

readonly = Tkinter.Text(root)
readonly.bind("<Key>", lambda e: "break")

The tcl wiki describes this problem in detail, and lists three possible solutions:

1. The Disable/Enable trick described in other answers
2. Replace the bindings for the insert/delete events
3. Same as (2), but wrap it up in a separate widget.

(2) or (3) would be preferable, however, the solution isn't obvious. However, a worked solution is available on the unpythonic wiki:

 from Tkinter import Text
 from idlelib.WidgetRedirector import WidgetRedirector

 class ReadOnlyText(Text):
     def __init__(self, *args, **kwargs):
         Text.__init__(self, *args, **kwargs)
         self.redirector = WidgetRedirector(self)
         self.insert = self.redirector.register("insert", lambda *args, **kw: "break")
         self.delete = self.redirector.register("delete", lambda *args, **kw: "break")

text = Text(app, state='disabled', width=44, height=5)

Before and after inserting, change the state, otherwise it won't update

text.configure(state='normal')
text.insert('end', 'Some Text')
text.configure(state='disabled')

You have to change the state of the Text widget from NORMAL to DISABLED after entering text.insert() or text.bind() :

text.config(state=DISABLED)