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Dear Stuart,



I find this very interesting. Could you please elaborate. Thank you.

Alice

Alice,

I'll let Stuart explain - but from what I understand, our Lord probably viewed the Pharisees in a better light than say, the Sadducees. The Pharisees had a lot theologically "right" - Sadducees didn't even believe in the bodily resurrection.

I think in the case of the Pharisees it might be a "to whom much is given, much is expected" sort of thing. They were theologically on the "right track" but some of them failed to put it into practice.

Our Lord seems to have had not as many "doctrinal" disagreements with the Pharisees as He did with other groups (including the Sadducees), but rather how their faith was practiced.

That's my limited take on it anyway. I'll let Stuart explain what he means, which is likely entirely different.

Alexis

I was taught that it was up to the law of Moses - which was very hard to follow in itself, but the Phariseic interpretation of the Law made it literally impossible to follow - that's why they were accused of hypocrisy.

For example I remember that according to the Pharisees a Jew that had touched a gentile accidentally on the marketplace should wash his entire body after returning home.

The Evangelists use the term "Pharisee" as a shorthand for a particular form of Jewish observance, specifically one more concerned with form than with substance. They also use the term monolithically, and in a very simplistic manner, as it also does terms for other Jewish castes and sects, i.e., priest, levite, Sadducee. They are, to a large extent, rhetorical whipping boys, a kind of straw man presented to (a) provide a convenient contrast to the person and teachings of Jesus; and (b) easily identifiable enemies of Jesus.

They could do this because the audience for which they were writing (with the possible exception of Luke, who does a lot of explaining of Jewish terms and customs for his primarily gentile readers) knew all of these groups and recognized that these were, to a large extent, caricatures.

Flavius Josephus for a long time was our main non-Biblical source for the organization and divisions within first century Judaism, but even Josephus simplified. We know a lot more from the Dead Sea Scrolls and the research of scholars like Geza Vermes, E.P. Sanders and N.T. Wright. The most important thing we know is Second Temple Judaism was polyvariant and very different from the rabbinical Judaism that emerged slowly after the Temple was destroyed. Still, it remains commonplace to superimpose what they know or think they know about Judaism today onto first century Jews--including Jesus. The most important thing about first century Judaism was its

The whole situation is very complex, and too much to explain in detail here. But just dealing with the Pharisees, their movement emerged in the later part of the Hasmonean (Maccabee) dynasty out of a concern that the Temple priesthood had become corrupted and that the Temple system was ignoring the spiritual needs of the majority of Jews (sometimes called "the people of the land"). This same concern is what drove the Essenes into effective schism with the Temple and to caused them to establish a parallel priesthood in expectation of the return of the Messiah.

The Pharisees did not abandon the Temple, but they created a new way of being holy outside of the Temple system, based on the study of Torah and the keeping of the Commandments. The elaborate system of rules and prohibitions was not meant to trap people into breaking the Commandments, but to "put a fence around the Law". The Pharisees also went out of their way to make observance of the Law practical for people in their everyday lives (numerous examples can be cited, but to take one, the prohibition on going out of doors on Sabbath, which made it difficult for people to share communal meals, was mitigated by stating that an awning stretching from one building to another was equivalent to staying indoors; to this day, in orthodox Jewish neighborhoods, one can see a special line or wire running from building to building which fulfills the same purpose). The approach taken by the Pharisees is summed up in the saying, "When two or three study Torah together, the Shekinah (the presence of God) sits between them" (compare to Christ's saying, "Whenever two or three of you are gathered together, I am with you"). They also had another saying, "If only Israel could obey the Law for three Sabbaths, the Messiah would come".

The Pharisees were not monolithic. There seem to have been, in the first century, two great "schools" of scriptural interpretation, one headed by Gamaliel the Elder (Saul of Tarsus studied under his son) and the other by Shamai. Gamaliel is probably the lineal antecedent of modern rabbinical Judaism; while he believed in keeping the Law, he was also a pietist who did not believe in using coercion to enforce the Law. Shamai was very different: he believed that those Jews who did not keep the Law were, quite literally, impeding the return of the Messiah and the deliverance of Israel; therefore, it was perfectly reasonable to use force to make people obey the Law.

Most of the Pharisees we encounter in the Gospels are Shamaiites--they would be the kind to follow Jesus and the Twelve out into a field, to make sure they weren't picking grain on a Sabbath. They would be the kind to take objection to healing on the Sabbath. And above all, they would be the kind who would see great danger in someone saying, "The Law says. . . ., but I say to you. . . ", which would appear to be setting up an alternative source of authority beside the law. Such a man would be guilty of leading the people astray, for which the punishment was death--and it should not surprise anyone that one of the few mentions of Jesus in the Talmud speaks specifically of him leading the people astray and being put to death for it.

But most of the Pharisees appear to have been followers of Gamaliel, and many of them would have been attracted to what Jesus had to say--at least, if it did not seem to be either transgressing the Law or inciting rebellion against Rome.

The Gospels also make a distinction between Pharisees and priests which probably did not exist in reality. Priests belonged to a caste, the Cohanim, the descendent of Aaron, while Pharisees belonged to a sect, a group of similar believers. One could be one and the other simultaneously, just as one could be one but not the other. Many of the lower-ranking priests were probably Pharisees, and Acts tells us that many priests became followers of Jesus after the Crucifixion.

Perhaps the greatest misconception about the Pharisees is that they believed in a kind of "works salvation"; i.e., that by keeping the Law, one would be saved. In fact, Jews of the first century tended not to believe in individual salvation, but in a collective salvation through membership in God's chosen people. The real issue of the day was how to tell if one was a member in good standing, and observance of the Law was merely a benchmark. Pharisees as much as anyone else, believed that faith was as essential as deeds in this--rote observance of the Law was meaningless, just as Paul said.

It also has to be said that most modern Christians don't quite understand the whole issue of "justification" that so exercised Paul and occupied the imagination of Augustine, Luther, Calvin and countless others. It is in fact a legal term, but in first century Jewish jurisprudence, there was nothing like a "state prosecutor" or district attorney: there were just two parties, a plaintiff (who brought the charges) and a defendant (who was accused), both of whom were judged by a magistrate. After hearing all the evidence, he would decide which party was in the right; i.e., which one was justified. When Paul speaks of justification in the eyes of God, this is what he means: not an innate personal righteousness, but rather a status bestowed upon one by the judge. In the case of Paul, Christ will judge who is and is not part of the Kingdom. In this, the Pharisees would fully agree--they just would not agree that Jesus of Nazareth was necessarily the one.

I thought the two main streams of Pharasaic thought were centered around the schools of Shammai on the one hand, and Hillel on the other.

Anyway, I just googled Gamaliel; he is apparently a saint in the Catholic Church! Interesting. According to tradition he converted to Christianity. His relics were brought to Pisa.

Alexis

Yes, you are correct. Hillel was the founder, Gamaliel the Elder was his chief disciple; Gamaliel the Younger was the teacher of Saul.

Thanks Stuart for all that background info.

I cannot recommend highly enough the works of Vermes, Sanders and Wright. Of particular interest would be Sanders' Jesus and Judaism and Paul and Palestinian Judaism; Vermes' Jesus the Jew and Jesus and the World of Judaism; and Wright's What the Apostle Paul Meant and his three volume Christian Origins series, The New Testament and the People of God; Jesus and the Victory of God; and The Resurrection of the Son of God.

The only reason I remember Shammai "vs." Hillel is because, in my Judaism class last semester, we highlighted the difference between the two schools by a couple of examples.

My favorite one was the disagreement of the two schools about how much it should cost to get the right to betrothal to a Jewish woman. Hillel says the price is just one perutah, so even a poor man can get a wife. Shammai says the price is one dinar (much more), because Jewish girls shouldn't go cheap! LOL.

Alexis

A fine boy, like a doctor, or maybe a dentist even, he should be able to afford a dinar for a good Jewish girl!

I must admit that I have a cognitive dissonance, because as far as I know the biography of St. Paul his attitude towards Christians, that is persecution and murder, would rather fit into a Shamaiite one. Also the modern Orthodox Jews are very fond of enforcing the Law, at least in Israel. See for example http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8365923.stm . Last year the Orthodox Jews threw stones at my (gentile) friend in Tiberias. I don't remember whether it was sabbath, but he probably was improperly dressed.

Well, all observant Jews are "very fond of enforcing the Law" - they just understand its application in very different ways.

I do think that's a common misunderstanding, i.e. that in Judaism, Reform Jews don't care about following the Law, while Orthodox Jews do. While it's true that in Orthodox Judaism the study of the Tanakh and especially the Talmud is valued "more" than in some Reform (and Conservative) circles, I think it could fairly be said that that's just an outgrowth of the way they look at the Law's application in the first place, not because they care about the actual Law more.

Alexis

Indeed, that is paradoxical. Paul says he was a student of Gamaliel, yet we certainly find him behaving like a Shamaiite. It demonstrates, I think, just how simplistic our understanding of first century Judaism remains, and the fluidity that must have existed amongst the various sects.


Also in parts of Brooklyn, where driving down the wrong street on a Saturday can earn you a rock in your windshield. Such people are described in Scripture as "zealous for the Law", and represent a continuation of the Shamaiite mindset in the present day. But even among Orthodox Jews, such opinions are distinctly in the minority.

Only a minority of Reform Jews could actually be considered "observant"; most, for instance, do not keep Kosher, and mitigate almost all the other Deuteronomic commandments (e.g., they will drive to the synagogue on Sabbath, they will turn on the lights, they will cook hot food, etc.). They also have very relaxed views on sexual morality and have recently taken to electing female rabbis.

Most Reform Jews are well on their way to being nothing more than "cultural" Jews with no particular religious belief at all (other than a belief that any form of religious belief is potentially dangerous). I describe them as "being like Unitarians, but without the theological rigor".

Conservative Judaism is presently slouching into the place where Reform Judaism was perhaps fifty years ago. Significantly, both are declining in numbers, while Orthodox Judaism is growing exponentially. Much of this is demographic: Reform and Conservative Jews have fewer than two children on the average, and half of those marry outside of Judaism, and some 70% of the children of such mixed marriage cease to identify themselves as Jews entirely (as Elliott Abrams has said, "The problem is not that Christians want to kill us, but that they want to marry our children"). In contrast, Orthodox families have an average of four children, and more than 75% of their children marry other Jews and have large families that stay Jewish. In addition, there is a small but steady trickle of converts from Reform and Conservative Judaism into Orthodox ranks. Within two generations, a majority of Jews in the United States will be Orthodox.

Thing is, Stuart, a significant fraction of the current "conservative" jews were raised orthodox, but found an easier path when they moved away from their communities, and many reform were raised conservative. Both conservative and reform get trickle down.

Plus some go off to Qaballah, or to other "wierd" subsects of judaism.

And I've met several reform jews who follow kosher, don't eat hot food on saturdays, etc. They just don't see the need for many of the more extreme restrictions, like driving (is not work), playing board games (is not work) or sports.