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JillianRose
Guest
a Pharisee and a Sadducee?
Please and Thank you!!
Jillian Rose
Please and Thank you!!
Jillian Rose
- Status
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ahs
Guest
Mainly that the Saducees did not believe in a resurrection, if I remember correctly. I believe they also recognized fewer writings as Scripture. I’ll leave this post as is and double check myself…
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ahs
Guest
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LB_in_TX
Guest
This may help answer your question:
morrisgieselman.wordpress.com/2008/05/04/pharisees-sadducees-and-the-sanhedrin/
morrisgieselman.wordpress.com/2008/05/04/pharisees-sadducees-and-the-sanhedrin/
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George_Stegmeir
Guest
The Pharasees and the Saducees were the two major sects of Judaism at the time of Christ. In ancient Israel, the Pharasees were in the majority and controlled the Sanhedrin, which was the religious (and secular) Supreme Court of Israel and was headed by the High Priest.
Pharasaic thought and practice, which believed in a soul and an afterlife, provided much of the base of belief upon which Christianity is built, whereas the Saducees did not believe in an afterlife and can be considered the ancester of much of modern Rabinical Judaism.
Christ, in condemning the Pharasees did not condemn their beliefs. Rather, he condemned their over concern with the overt practices of ritual and the ostentatious observance of Talmudic Law without paying attention to the spiritual essence of Judaism.
In moderlance, they were “all show and no go”.
Pharasaic thought and practice, which believed in a soul and an afterlife, provided much of the base of belief upon which Christianity is built, whereas the Saducees did not believe in an afterlife and can be considered the ancester of much of modern Rabinical Judaism.
Christ, in condemning the Pharasees did not condemn their beliefs. Rather, he condemned their over concern with the overt practices of ritual and the ostentatious observance of Talmudic Law without paying attention to the spiritual essence of Judaism.
In moderlance, they were “all show and no go”.
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triumphguy
Guest
The Pharisees believed in Life after death. The Sadducees didn’t - so they were sad you see!
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JillianRose
Guest
Thank you so much. I see you on many threads and that is so simple to remember now!!The Pharisees believed in Life after death. The Sadducees didn’t - so they were sad you see!
Jillian
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JillianRose
Guest
also, didn’t one believe that Elijah would return? OR thought that John the baptist was Elijah? Refresh my old mind please.
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patrick457
Guest
This is one of those questions I really like answering, so please stay tuned. 
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patrick457
Guest
This is going to be one long post (or rather, a series of posts), so if you have any difficulty please let me know.a Pharisee and a Sadducee?
Please and Thank you!!
Jillian Rose
It is commonly thought that the Pharisees and their rivals the Sadducees first existed during the Hasmonean period (140 BC-37 BC), when they primarily functioned as political parties. It would seem that the Pharisees are one of the successor groups to the so-called Hasideans (Ḥasidim) or the ‘pious’, a Jewish religious party which commenced to play an important role in political life during the time of the Maccabean wars (though they had apparently already existed for quite some time) because of their resistance to the influx of Hellenism during the reign of the Seleucid king Antiochus IV.
They apparently supported the Maccabean revolt (1 Maccabees 2:42), at least at first; their alliance increasingly grew weaker as the Maccabees continued to fight for political autonomy and the advancement of their own family. Jonathan’s (aka Apphus, Judah Maccabee’s brother) acceptance of the high priesthood as a gift from Alexander Balas in 152 BC proved to be very controversial, since while the Maccabees were priests, they were not of the legitimate Zadokite line and thus had no claim to the office. Furthermore, the office was bequeathed to Jonathan by a pagan ruler whose questionable authority rested in claiming to be the son of the persecutor Antiochus Epiphanes. Most of the ḥasidim however seem to have acquiesced to this settlement when “the yoke of the gentiles was removed from Israel” (1 Maccabees 13:14) in 141 BC, and in the following year a national assembly confirmed the high priesthood and kingship of Simon (aka Thassi, Judah Maccabee’s other brother) and his family “till there should arise a faithful prophet” (1 Maccabees 14:41). For one, the main line of the former high-priestly family of Zadok had already gone to Egypt and installed themselves in a new temple in Leontopolis.
It was during the time of Simon’s son John Hyrcanus that relations between the ḥasidim and the ruling Hasmoneans became completely disrupted. Curiously, it is also the time when the Pharisees begin to appear in the historical record: one theory about the origin of the name Pharisee is that was originally a derogatory name meaning ‘separated’, in other words one who broke alliance with the Hasmoneans. (You do notice this trend in history where a given group accepts a slur given them, making it non-pejorative, a process known as amelioration: for example, you have the Mormons, Quakers, Methodists, punks, etc.) The Talmud relates a legend about how John Hyrcanus, who once supported the Pharisees, was told off by a Pharisee named Eleazar that he cannot be king and high priest at once and demanded him to give up the office of high priesthood. Hyrcanus naturally took offence at this remark, and, goaded by a Sadducee named Jonathan, began to withdraw his favor away from the Pharisees.
The legend is most likely an over-simplification of the historical fact, but in any case, it is probably certain that until the death of Alexander Jannaeus (who was very anti-Pharisee, even hanging/crucifying 800 Pharisaic rebels at one point) in 76 BC, the Sadducees, who first appear in the records as the party supporting and advising the Hasmoneans, were the party in power and the Pharisees were in opposition. They seem to have enjoyed a miniature golden age during the reign of Jannaeus’ widow, Salome Alexandra, who favored their party. From her time onwards the Pharisees came to have a secure position within within the high council (synedrion in Greek, where we get the word ‘sanhedrin’ from).
When Herod became King of the Judaeans, both the high priest and his council of advisors lost most of their authority, though the Pharisees’ popular prestige increased, because they did not shrink from opposing Herod publicly when the situation called for it. When Herod’s kingdom was broken up among his sons and the tetrarchy of Judaea became a Roman province in AD 6 (after Archelaus, whose share the area formerly was, was deposed for being incompetent), high priest and council resumed control of internal affairs - since Rome preferred an indirect way of rule - though they were directly responsible to the prefect. During the next sixty years the high priests were regularly selected from the wealthy Sadducean families, and these families dominated the high priest’s council. The Pharisees were officially back in the minority, though this time they enjoyed huge popularity among the masses.
Most of the Pharisees were lay teachers (though some were priests), while a good number of the Sadducees were priests (though there would have been some lay members). We do know that some ordinary priests were Pharisees and some aristocratic priests were Sadducees, but for the most part priests and Levites, like much of the population, did not have a specific party affiliation and simply belonged to ‘common’ Judaism.
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patrick457
Guest
To put it in simple words, the main difference between the Pharisees and the Sadducees were that each had their own interpretation of being a Jew (‘Judaism’). The Pharisees were the religious liberals (and political conservatives) at the time, and the Sadducees were the traditionalist ‘old believers’ (and political left-wingers) of a sort. While the Sadducees tried to keep the old ways fossilized and seem to have had a narrow outlook: they held a more primitive form of religion centered on the Temple and the priesthood without perceived ‘innovations’ like clearly defined angelic and demonic hierarchies, the doctrine of bodily resurrection and the allocation of rewards and punishments in a judgment after death. The Pharisees (which held all of the above), meanwhile, had a more liberal, practical and grassroots approach towards Judaism which focuses more on laypeople: they were of the opinion that the Jewish people as a whole, and not just a select few, are “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation,” just as Scripture says, and so all Jews, even the humblest one, must therefore act like priests and keep themselves pure, even in daily life.
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Petersmate
Guest
That’s interesting that Jesus condemned the Pharasees for being all show and no go. Reminds me of current day politics in the western world. Non conservatives are mostly the bad guys but conservatives can be all show and no go. It seems to tie in with " be hot or be cold but don’t be lukewarm."
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patrick457
Guest
Nope, it’s actually the reverse. The Sadducees were the ones which had close connections with the aristocratic Temple priesthood.
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patrick457
Guest
A little summary on the subject from E.P. (Ed) Sanders’ The Historical Figure of Jesus (pp. 44-47):
The Pharisaic party seems to have originated fairly early in the Hasmonean period (before 135 BCE), consisted largely but not entirely of non-priests. [13: Josephus’ principal descriptions of the Pharisees are in *War 2.162-6; Antiq. 18.12-15. See further P&B, chs. 18 and 19.] At the time of Herod, there were about 6,000 Pharisees (Antiq. 17.42). Theologically, the Pharisees shared common Jewish orthodoxy (one God, the election of Israel, the divine origin of the law, and repentance and forgiveness). The Pharisees, like most other first-century Jews, also believed in some form of existence after death, an idea that is hard to find in the Hebrew Bible (the only clear reference is Daniel 12.2.) Moreover, they developed a substantial body of non-biblical ‘traditions’ about how to observe the law. Some of these traditions made the law more difficult, but some made it less repressive. For the most part, the Pharisees made special rules only for themselves and did not try to force them on everybody. (During the Hasmonean period they probably did try to enforce their views, but apparently not during the Herodian and post-Herodian periods.) In either case, the Pharisees were known for the precision with which they interpreted the law and the strictness with which they kept it. According to Josephus, they practiced ‘the highest ideals both in their way of living and in their discourse’ (Antiq. 18.15).
Since the Pharisees play an even larger role in the New Testament than does the high priest, I shall give two examples of Pharisaic non-biblical ‘traditions’ in order to put a little flesh on a very bare-bones description. One has to do with Sabbath law. The prophet Jeremiah had forbidden Jews to carry burdens out of their houses on the Sabbath (Jer. 17.19-27). This made festive dining very difficult, since the easiest way for friends to dine together was for each family to bring a cooked dish, and sabbaths were the only days when socializing was possible (because the demands of daily work were so heavy). The Pharisees decided that, when several houses were next to each other along an alley or around a court, they could make them all into one ‘house’ by joining them with a series of doorposts and lintels. They could then carry pots and dishes from one part of the house to another, and thus dine together on the Sabbath. The Pharisees knew that this and other symbolic actions that altered the sabbath limits – actions that are technically called ‘eruvin – had no support in the Hebrew Bible, but they made it a ‘tradition of the elders’ and observed it. Some Jews though that they were transgressing the law, since they carried vessels out of what most people would call a house.
The second example is handwashing. The Mosaic law requires bathing to remove certain impurities before entering the Temple. The Pharisees added a purity rule. They washed their hands before Sabbath and festival meals. Probably handwashing before meals on holy days made the day a little more special. Eventually Jews began to wash their hands before all meals. [14: The history of handwashing is extremely complicated. See *JLJM, pp. 228-31, 262f.]
These small Pharisaic adjustments to the law reveal how carefully people thought about the law and about observing the will of God. The law in principle covers all of life. Pious first-century Jews thought through every detail, so as to observe God’s will in every possible way.
Because of their devotion and precision, the Pharisees were respected and liked by most other Jews. In the Hasmonean period, the Pharisaic party had been a major political force. It was so no longer. Under Herod, no one else had any political power, and those who sought it were promptly executed. The Pharisees lay low. In Galilee, Herod was succeeded by Antipas, who was no more inclined than his father to give authority to a group of pious religious teachers. And in Jerusalem, after Archelaus was deposed, the high priests were in charge, backed by the awesome power of Rome. The Pharisees continued to lie low. They worked, studied, taught and worshipped. Probably they increased in general popularity, but they had no actual power.
To understand the Pharisees’ role in society in Jesus’ day, we can best fix our attention on the beginnings of the revolt against Rome a few decades after Jesus died. As relations between the procurator and the Jewish populace deteriorated, the aristocratic priests and laymen continued to plead for calm and moderation – with some success, but not enough. At the last minute, the chief priests called in the leading Pharisees to help. Even they could not calm the Jerusalem mob, and full revolt broke out. In the war itself, Pharisees played a leading part (as did the chief priests). These events show that the Pharisees had no public responsibility during the rule of Rome’s governors. The high priest and his advisers were the responsible parties in the eyes of Rome. The Pharisees, however, were still around and they still commanded public attention. Thus in a dire emergency the ruling aristocrats called on them. When conditions were right – when they were no longer held in check by Herod or Rome – the Pharisees stepped forward to play a substantial role in Israel’s political and military affairs. But during Jesus’ lifetime, they must be regarded as principally religious teachers and experts, deservedly popular and respected.
The Pharisaic party seems to have originated fairly early in the Hasmonean period (before 135 BCE), consisted largely but not entirely of non-priests. [13: Josephus’ principal descriptions of the Pharisees are in *War 2.162-6; Antiq. 18.12-15. See further P&B, chs. 18 and 19.] At the time of Herod, there were about 6,000 Pharisees (Antiq. 17.42). Theologically, the Pharisees shared common Jewish orthodoxy (one God, the election of Israel, the divine origin of the law, and repentance and forgiveness). The Pharisees, like most other first-century Jews, also believed in some form of existence after death, an idea that is hard to find in the Hebrew Bible (the only clear reference is Daniel 12.2.) Moreover, they developed a substantial body of non-biblical ‘traditions’ about how to observe the law. Some of these traditions made the law more difficult, but some made it less repressive. For the most part, the Pharisees made special rules only for themselves and did not try to force them on everybody. (During the Hasmonean period they probably did try to enforce their views, but apparently not during the Herodian and post-Herodian periods.) In either case, the Pharisees were known for the precision with which they interpreted the law and the strictness with which they kept it. According to Josephus, they practiced ‘the highest ideals both in their way of living and in their discourse’ (Antiq. 18.15).
Since the Pharisees play an even larger role in the New Testament than does the high priest, I shall give two examples of Pharisaic non-biblical ‘traditions’ in order to put a little flesh on a very bare-bones description. One has to do with Sabbath law. The prophet Jeremiah had forbidden Jews to carry burdens out of their houses on the Sabbath (Jer. 17.19-27). This made festive dining very difficult, since the easiest way for friends to dine together was for each family to bring a cooked dish, and sabbaths were the only days when socializing was possible (because the demands of daily work were so heavy). The Pharisees decided that, when several houses were next to each other along an alley or around a court, they could make them all into one ‘house’ by joining them with a series of doorposts and lintels. They could then carry pots and dishes from one part of the house to another, and thus dine together on the Sabbath. The Pharisees knew that this and other symbolic actions that altered the sabbath limits – actions that are technically called ‘eruvin – had no support in the Hebrew Bible, but they made it a ‘tradition of the elders’ and observed it. Some Jews though that they were transgressing the law, since they carried vessels out of what most people would call a house.
The second example is handwashing. The Mosaic law requires bathing to remove certain impurities before entering the Temple. The Pharisees added a purity rule. They washed their hands before Sabbath and festival meals. Probably handwashing before meals on holy days made the day a little more special. Eventually Jews began to wash their hands before all meals. [14: The history of handwashing is extremely complicated. See *JLJM, pp. 228-31, 262f.]
These small Pharisaic adjustments to the law reveal how carefully people thought about the law and about observing the will of God. The law in principle covers all of life. Pious first-century Jews thought through every detail, so as to observe God’s will in every possible way.
Because of their devotion and precision, the Pharisees were respected and liked by most other Jews. In the Hasmonean period, the Pharisaic party had been a major political force. It was so no longer. Under Herod, no one else had any political power, and those who sought it were promptly executed. The Pharisees lay low. In Galilee, Herod was succeeded by Antipas, who was no more inclined than his father to give authority to a group of pious religious teachers. And in Jerusalem, after Archelaus was deposed, the high priests were in charge, backed by the awesome power of Rome. The Pharisees continued to lie low. They worked, studied, taught and worshipped. Probably they increased in general popularity, but they had no actual power.
To understand the Pharisees’ role in society in Jesus’ day, we can best fix our attention on the beginnings of the revolt against Rome a few decades after Jesus died. As relations between the procurator and the Jewish populace deteriorated, the aristocratic priests and laymen continued to plead for calm and moderation – with some success, but not enough. At the last minute, the chief priests called in the leading Pharisees to help. Even they could not calm the Jerusalem mob, and full revolt broke out. In the war itself, Pharisees played a leading part (as did the chief priests). These events show that the Pharisees had no public responsibility during the rule of Rome’s governors. The high priest and his advisers were the responsible parties in the eyes of Rome. The Pharisees, however, were still around and they still commanded public attention. Thus in a dire emergency the ruling aristocrats called on them. When conditions were right – when they were no longer held in check by Herod or Rome – the Pharisees stepped forward to play a substantial role in Israel’s political and military affairs. But during Jesus’ lifetime, they must be regarded as principally religious teachers and experts, deservedly popular and respected.
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patrick457
Guest
(Continued)
We know the titles of two other parties in first-century Palestine: the Essenes and the Sadducees. The Essenes are described by both Josephus and Philo; [15. *War 2.120-61; Antiq. 18.18-22; Philo, Every Good Man is Free 75-91; Hypothetica 11.1-18.] most scholars identify them as the group responsible for the Dead Sea Scrolls. If this identification is correct, and I think it is, we know a great deal about the Essenes. The Essenes formed a small party, divided into at least two branches and numbering about 4,000 altogether. [16. Philo, *Every Good Man is Free 75; Josephus, Antiq. 18.20.] The party consisted of both lay people and priests, but the priests were dominant. When the Hasmoneans came to power in 142 BCE, they deposed the previous high-priestly family, the Zadokites. Some of the displaced aristocratic priests joined what became the Essene party, and they seem to have been largely responsible for governing it. Nevertheless, the laymen who were members also studied the Bible and the special rules of the party, and they could become as expert as the priests. The Essenes, as far as we know, played no direct role in Jesus’ life and work, and so I shall not offer a description. Those who are interested will find that the Essene literature is now relatively easy to study, thanks to good translations and a reliable body of introductory material. [17, Geza Vermes, *The Dead Sea Scrolls: Qumran in Perspective, 1977; The Dead Sea Scrolls in English, tr. Geza Vermes, 3rd ed., 1987; Michael Knibb, The Qumran Community, 1987; Philip R. Davies, Behind the Essenes: History and Ideology in the Dead Sea Scrolls, 1987. My own most recent account of the Essenes is P&B, chs. 16 and 17.]
I do wish, however, to employ the Essenes to make a point about the Pharisees. The Essene literature reveals intense study of the Hebrew Bible and a wealth of community rules in addition to those in the Mosaic law. The Essenes were far stricter than the Pharisees in almost every conceivable way. If the Pharisees were thought the ‘strictest’ observers of the law (as Josephus says), the word ‘strict’ bears the connotation of ‘most accurate’ rather than ‘most extreme’. [18. Josephus, *War 2.162; Life 191 and elsewhere.]
The Sadducees were the third party for which we have a name. We know little about them, except that most Sadducees were aristocratic, did not believe in any form of life after death, and did not accept the Pharisees’ special traditions. Most scholars suppose that a lot of the high priests during the Roman period were Sadducees, but we have direct information from Josephus about only one: Ananus, who was high priest in 62 CE (when he illegally had James the brother of Jesus executed) and who was one of the leaders in the revolt against Rome, was a Sadducee. [19: *Antiq. 20.199.] The reader of the New Testament meets the Sadducees only a few times; it confirms their close association with the aristocratic priesthood and the fact that they did not believe in the resurrection. [20: They are mentioned with no description in Matt. 3.7 and 16.1-12. The passage about the resurrection is Matt. 22.23-33 // Mark 12.18-27 // Luke 20.27-40. For the same point, also see Acts 23.6-8. Acts 5.17 closely connects the high priest and the Sadducees, and their public responsibility for good order is implied in Acts 4.1.]
We know the titles of two other parties in first-century Palestine: the Essenes and the Sadducees. The Essenes are described by both Josephus and Philo; [15. *War 2.120-61; Antiq. 18.18-22; Philo, Every Good Man is Free 75-91; Hypothetica 11.1-18.] most scholars identify them as the group responsible for the Dead Sea Scrolls. If this identification is correct, and I think it is, we know a great deal about the Essenes. The Essenes formed a small party, divided into at least two branches and numbering about 4,000 altogether. [16. Philo, *Every Good Man is Free 75; Josephus, Antiq. 18.20.] The party consisted of both lay people and priests, but the priests were dominant. When the Hasmoneans came to power in 142 BCE, they deposed the previous high-priestly family, the Zadokites. Some of the displaced aristocratic priests joined what became the Essene party, and they seem to have been largely responsible for governing it. Nevertheless, the laymen who were members also studied the Bible and the special rules of the party, and they could become as expert as the priests. The Essenes, as far as we know, played no direct role in Jesus’ life and work, and so I shall not offer a description. Those who are interested will find that the Essene literature is now relatively easy to study, thanks to good translations and a reliable body of introductory material. [17, Geza Vermes, *The Dead Sea Scrolls: Qumran in Perspective, 1977; The Dead Sea Scrolls in English, tr. Geza Vermes, 3rd ed., 1987; Michael Knibb, The Qumran Community, 1987; Philip R. Davies, Behind the Essenes: History and Ideology in the Dead Sea Scrolls, 1987. My own most recent account of the Essenes is P&B, chs. 16 and 17.]
I do wish, however, to employ the Essenes to make a point about the Pharisees. The Essene literature reveals intense study of the Hebrew Bible and a wealth of community rules in addition to those in the Mosaic law. The Essenes were far stricter than the Pharisees in almost every conceivable way. If the Pharisees were thought the ‘strictest’ observers of the law (as Josephus says), the word ‘strict’ bears the connotation of ‘most accurate’ rather than ‘most extreme’. [18. Josephus, *War 2.162; Life 191 and elsewhere.]
The Sadducees were the third party for which we have a name. We know little about them, except that most Sadducees were aristocratic, did not believe in any form of life after death, and did not accept the Pharisees’ special traditions. Most scholars suppose that a lot of the high priests during the Roman period were Sadducees, but we have direct information from Josephus about only one: Ananus, who was high priest in 62 CE (when he illegally had James the brother of Jesus executed) and who was one of the leaders in the revolt against Rome, was a Sadducee. [19: *Antiq. 20.199.] The reader of the New Testament meets the Sadducees only a few times; it confirms their close association with the aristocratic priesthood and the fact that they did not believe in the resurrection. [20: They are mentioned with no description in Matt. 3.7 and 16.1-12. The passage about the resurrection is Matt. 22.23-33 // Mark 12.18-27 // Luke 20.27-40. For the same point, also see Acts 23.6-8. Acts 5.17 closely connects the high priest and the Sadducees, and their public responsibility for good order is implied in Acts 4.1.]
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patrick457
Guest
I would again post an answer on this, this time in a little more detail.
As mentioned earlier, it is true that the Pharisees did hold political power during the Hasmonean period, but by the time of Jesus, they (in Sanders’ words) “probably…increased in general popularity, but they had no actual power.” Authority, at least in Judaea province, was effectively in the hands of aristocrats and leading citizens: the high priest, his council of advisers and the Sadducees who had connections with the priesthood, all backed by Rome. There may have been Pharisees in the advisory council, but I expect that they are in the minority.
Part of the problem I think is the all-too-common conflation of the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Temple priesthood in popular Christianity. Case in point: sometimes you can see people who say that “the Pharisees killed Jesus,” without any further qualification. In some popular depictions (like certain movies), you could hardly tell a common Pharisee from the chief priests because they all tend to look and dress alike (bearded old men in black robes
) and hang out with each other. This is slightly misleading: while many of the pericopes in the gospels (especially the Synoptics) do focus on conflicts between Jesus and “the Pharisees” for a good half of the story - many of which usually end with a note about how the Pharisees began plotting to kill Jesus (we are never told specifically why) - the situation changes when Jesus arrives in Jerusalem. They either disappear from the scene entirely (as in Mark and Luke) or are pushed into very minor, token roles (so in Matthew): in the context of the Passion, “the chief priests, and the scribes, and the elders of the people” assume the role story-wise of Jesus’ active, primary opponents. They are the ones who pay Judas, have Jesus arrested and hand Him over to Pilate. John’s gospel is probably the source of the confusion in this regard: in a few places, the gospel (and Matthew’s) has a tendency to lump “the chief priests and the Pharisees” together (although note that John still distinguishes the two groups). There is some truth to this: we know that some ordinary priests were Pharisees and that some aristocratic priests were Sadducees, but for the most part, the Temple priests and Levites did not have any specific party affiliation but simply subscribed to ‘common’ Judaism shared by all Jews. In other words, some Pharisees and Sadducees were priests, but not all priests were either. So the “priests equals Pharisees” or “priests equals Sadducees” identification is I daresay only a half-truth.Now to be honest, I’m currently more of the opinion that applying the description of the Sanhedrin as seen in later rabbinic literature (such as the Mishnah and the Talmud) in a 1st century context should be taken with a grain of salt. From Martin Goodman’s Rome and Jerusalem: The Clash of Ancient Civilizations (pp. 311-12):
Among the courts mentioned in the ancient sources, the composition and functions of the Jerusalem Sanhedrin of seventy-one judges is the most difficult to pin down in the history of judicial operations among Jews in antiquity. The institution is not found in the Hebrew Bible, and the fact that the name in Hebrew was derived from the Greek synhedrion, “council,” suggests that it originated in Jewish society some time after the fourth century BCE, when Judaean Jews first came under Greek influence. The rabbis envisaged a court of sages like themselves, presided over by a rabbinic nasi, “patriarch” or “prince.” This picture runs counter to the description of the Sanhedrin to be found in the New Testament, where the presiding officer was presumed to be the High Priest, as after the arrest of Peter, when “the high priest came, and they that were with him, and called the Sanhedrin and all the council of the children of Israel, and sent to the prison to have them brought,” and the Sanhedrin before which Paul was brought was envisaged as including in its membership both Pharisees and Sadducees. Josephus also assumed that the Sanhedrin could be convened by a High Priest—in 62 CE the High Priest Ananus son of Ananus “convened a Sanhedrin of judges and brought before it the brother of Jesus called the Christ, by name Jacob, and certain others”—but elsewhere he uses the term synhedrion to refer to the advisory council of Agrippa II and even of the Roman emperor Augustus. It may be that an advisory council was all that the term implied: for important decisions it was important for Jewish leaders, like Roman aristocrats, to take appropriate advice. Thus when the High Priest Caiaphas needed to decide what to do with Jesus, he was surrounded by “all the chief priests and the elders and the scribes,” just as a Roman magistrate would surround himself with his trusted friends and in the same way as Josephus “obtained their approbation of the sentences which I pronounced” from his seventy assessors in Galilee. The Sanhedrin thus played a judicial role in first-century Jerusalem, but only as adjunct to the High Priest, about whose role as judge Josephus was explicit: “with his priestly colleagues, he [the High Priest] will sacrifice to God, safeguard the laws, adjudicate in cases of dispute, punish those convicted of crime. Any who disobey him will pay the penalty as for impiety towards God himself.” [10. On the Sanhedrin: M. Goodman, *The Ruling Class of Judaea (Cambridge, 1987), 112-16; Acts 5;21 (Peter), 23:6 (Paul); Joseph. AJ 20.200 (“Jacob,” i.e. James); AJ 20.216 (Agrippa II); BJ 2.25 (Augustus); Mark 14:53 (Caiaphas); Joseph. Vit. 79; Ap. 2.194.]
Nope. Modern Rabbinic Judaism is actually descended from Pharisaic Judaism. The Sadducees apparently died out after AD 70.
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patrick457
Guest
Ben Witherington said it best IMHO (The Jesus Quest: The Third Search for the Jew of Nazareth):
In the course of this book we will see that Jesus and the Pharisees had many things in common and certain notable differences. Both Jesus and the Pharisees were deeply concerned about the Jewish people and focused their ministries on those who lived within the land. Neither set out to convert Gentiles on other lands. Jesus’ activities seem to have been mostly centered in Galilee, while the Pharisees’ activities seem to have been predominantly centered in Judea. Unlike the Qumran sectarians, neither Jesus nor the Pharisees believed that withdrawal into the desert from a corrupt society to wait for its imminent end was the way forward. Rather, both Jesus and the Pharisees saw it as their task, borrowing a phrase from my own Wesleyan heritage, to “spread Scriptural holiness throughout the land.”
In other words, Jesus and the Pharisees were concerned with the renewal and redemption of the Jewish people, who under foreign occupation had become acculturated, tainted and in some cases even lost. The Jesus tradition is quite explicit as this point, stating that Jesus was sent specifically to the “lost sheep of Israel” (Mt 15:24), though whether this meant all Israel or the lost among Israel has been debated.
It seems clear however that Jesus and the Pharisees disagreed on who was lost and needed redemption and who did not, and perhaps even about who was redeemable. They also disagreed on the proper means for hallowing or sanctifying God’s people. The Pharisees seem to have wanted all of Israel to become like Levitical priests, keeping all the purity laws, both ritual and moral, as found in the Levitical code in the Old Testament. Jesus’ view of holiness and purity seems to have been rather different.
Another striking similarity between Jesus and the Pharisees was that they shared some common theological beliefs regarding angels, resurrection and new oral teachings not found explicitly in the Torah. They seem to have agreed that the Torah was the foundation of their Jewish faith and that there was a need for fresh, even novel, interpretation of it, as well as the addition of some teachings it did not explicitly contain. Yet Jesus was perceived as a threat by some of the Pharisees because he refused to accept their oral expansions of the Torah at various points calling these oral traditions the traditions of humans and not the Word of God.
The Pharisees "by claiming to have the correct interpretation and ability to explain (and expand) the law according to oral tradition to meet new situations, … asserted implicit and sometimes explicit authority over all Jewish people. Not surprisingly, they did not easily tolerate anyone who threatened the assumptions upon which that authority was based.” Jesus presented a threat because he claimed that his authority came directly from God, not through the accumulated knowledge of human oral traditions.
Apparently, neither Jesus nor the Pharisees were committed to going the route of the Zealots in advocating armed resistance and the ultimate violent overthrow of the occupying forces. This does not mean that either Jesus or the Pharisees were quietistic and advocated total withdrawal from the fray, like the Qumran sectarians, nor does it mean that their teachings had no social or political implications. Rather, both Jesus and the Pharisees believed that the way forward was to renew or redeem the populace as a means of changing the social situation in the land and create a holy community. But what amounted to holiness? What did God require of the chosen people in this new situation? How were they to react to the inroads of Hellenization and Romanization, of Greco-Roman culture? On these subjects Jesus and the Pharisees disagreed, indeed they disagreed strongly.
Jesus bound his followers to himself, and it was his person, his teaching and his actions that were the essence and heart of the matter. For the Pharisees, no one teacher, scribe or, in later days, rabbi had this function. Nor did any one set of teachings by one Pharisee ever assume the status that the Jesus tradition did for his followers. In anticipation of later discussion, I would suggest it is because the Jesus movement was a messianic one that believed and consciously acted on the assumption that God’s dominion was already breaking into the midst of God’s people in the person and work of Jesus.
Some Pharisees might have believed that they were preparing the way for the end times, not unlike the way John the Baptist seems to have done, but they did not have the sort of realized eschatology that we find in the teachings of Jesus and his followers. The Pharisees did not see themselves as inaugurating a new covenant, but rather they were bent on fully implementing the old Mosaic one.
That is quality!The Pharisees believed in Life after death. The Sadducees didn’t - so they were sad you see!
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patrick457
Guest
“Sad you see.” Hmm, not too far I see. He’s really a zealous genius, isn’t he? (Fourfold pun attack)That is quality!
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patrick457
Guest
While it is an often-parroted idea that the Sadducees accepted only the Torah, this view is in reality far from certain. Some Church Fathers like Hippolytus, (Refutation of all Heresies 9.24), Origen (Contra Celsum 1.49), and St. Jerome, (Commentary on Matthew 22:31f.) claimed that the Sadducees accepted only the Torah as scriptural, though they are too late to be reliable in this regard: their statements might just as well indicate a later confusion of the Sadducees with Samaritans. A passage in Josephus’ Antiquities (13.297 [10.6]) is sometimes read as evidence for this, but in context what he was actually talking about was the Sadducean rejection of Pharisaic traditions, without any indication of Scriptural canon:
What I would now explain is this, that the Pharisees have delivered to the people a great many observances by succession from their fathers, which are not written in the laws of Moses; and for that reason it is that the Sadducees reject them, and say that we are to esteem those observances to be obligatory which are in the written word, but are not to observe what are derived from the tradition of our forefathers.
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