Posts
The Pharisees: Three Questions, Scholarly Responses
The
Pharisees are a prominent topic of interest in biblical and Judaic
scholarship, for they were the predecessors of rabbinic Judaism and the
antagonists of early Christianity. Scholars rely on at least four
sources to reconstruct the first century Pharisees:[1] Josephus, who wrote Jewish War in 79 C.E. and Jewish Antiquities about a decade later;[2] the New Testament, which contains pre-70 C.E. material (Paul) and Gospels that possibly post-date 70;[3] the Dead Sea Scrolls, which has documents from the Hasmonean (152-63 B.C.E.)and Roman (63 B.C.E.-68 C.E.) periods;[4] and Tannaitic literature, such as the Mishnah (ca. 200 C.E.) and Tosefta (ca. 300 C.E.).[5]
There are three questions that scholars have addressed in their use of
the sources. The first question, which I call Question One, concerns
the Pharisees’ power in Judea from 67 B.C.E.-70 C.E.[6] Prior to 1956, the scholarly consensus was that the Pharisees dominated first century Judea,[7] meaning that the vast majority of Judean Jews looked to the Pharisees as the Jewish leaders.[8] Such
a view is now debated, so there is a question: Did the Pharisees really
dominate Judea from 67 B.C.E.-70 C.E.? The second question, Question
Two, asks about the Pharisees’ characteristics. Such a question
encompasses their features as a religious group, their socio-economic
status, and the extent of their political involvement from 67 B.C.E.-70
C.E. The third question, Question Three, concerns the utility of
Tannaitic sources for the reconstruction of first century Pharisaism.
Since Tannaitic sources emerge after 70 C.E., is their portrait of the
pre-70 Pharisees reliable? Such a question has been posed by Jacob
Neusner.[9] My goal is to discuss and evaluate how scholars approach theirsources to answer these questions.
Introduction
Josephus
On the basis of Josephus, Smith’s heirs advance other reasons that the Pharisees were not dominant in 67 B.C.E.-70 C.E. E.P. Sanders, for example, notes that Josephus’s own accounts have the Pharisees waging unsuccessful uprisings against Herod and Rome.[15] If the Pharisees were so powerful, Sanders asks, why did they launch revolts, and unsuccessful ones at that?[16] Sanders also questions Josephus’s claim that the widely popular Pharisees dictated to the priests the content of the temple service (Ant. 18.1.3). According to Sanders, Josephus only mentions one high priest whom he deems incompetent (JW 4.3.8), indicating that the priests in general were not ignorant bumpkins needing Pharisaic guidance.[17] Like Sanders, Lester Grabbe also refers to contradictions between Josephus’s actual history and his characterization of the Pharisees as widely influential. Josephus says, for instance, that the Sadducees contain men of the highest standing, yet they accomplish nothing without the Pharisees’ help (Ant. 18.1.4). Grabbe wonders how men who accomplish nothing can have high standing.[18] Moreover, Grabbe points to Sadducees in Josephus’s narrative who succeed without Pharisaic approval (John Hyrcanus, Ananus), and he states that Josephus’s emphasison priestly leadership in temple worship undermines his claim that the Pharisees dictated the liturgy to priests.[19] Because Josephus tries to portray the Pharisees as widely influential among the masses, Sanders and Grabbe treat any contrary details in his narrative as historical.
Other scholars, such as Daniel Schwartz and Steve Mason, have challenged the view of Smith and his successors. Schwartz, for example, denies that Antiquities 13.10.5 (288) is propaganda by Josephus for the Pharisees’ leadership, while he asserts that Josephus had an ideological reason to suppress their influence in Jewish Wars.[20] According to Schwartz, Antiquities 13.10.5 (288) did not originate with Josephus but rather with Nicolaus, the scribe of Herod, who disliked the Pharisees for inciting revolts against him.[21] Essentially, Schwartz now has within Antiquities a source outside of Josephus that acknowledges significant Pharisaic influence, and the source is anti-Pharisee at that.[22] Therefore, in Schwartz’s reasoning, the portrait of the Pharisees as influential is not propaganda on their behalf. On the other hand, Schwartz does see an ideological motivation behind their rare appearance in Jewish Wars, for Josephus wants to disassociate them from the Judean rebels soon after the 70 C.E. revolt; consequently, “[a]ll of [the] damagingpieces of information which connect Pharisees with rebels come out only in Josephus’ later works.”[23] Unlike Smith and company, Schwartz views the Pharisees’ prominence in Antiquities as historically reliable, while he believes their less visible role in Jewish Wars is designed to protect them from charges ofsubversion. Schwartz also disputes the notion that Jewish Wars downplays Pharisaic religious influence. Accordingto Schwartz, Jewish Wars 2.8.14 (162)mentions thePharisees first in its discussion of the sects, indicating their importance, and it says that they are considered the most skillful interpreters of the laws.[24]
Like Schwartz, Mason does not believe that the Pharisees’ widespread influence in Antiquities reflects Josephus’s desire to promote them for leadership. Mason argues that Antiquities 13.15.5-13.16 (400-432) presents disastrous consequences of Pharisaic authority during Alexandra Salome’s reign.[25]
According to Mason, Josephus in that passage criticizes Alexandra for
siding with the Pharisees to preserve her power, rather than turning the
kingdom over to her younger son, Aristobulus.[26]
For Mason’s Josephus, Aristobulus realized that the Pharisees supported
his incompetent brother, Hyrcanus II, to succeed Salome.[27]
Therefore, Aristobulus had a duty to seize the kingdom for himself, a
task he pursued alongside those unhappy with persecution from the
Pharisees.[28] For Mason, Josephus in Antiquities blames the collapse of the Hasmoneans on the Pharisees, who prevented Aristobulus’ssuccession and instigated the strife that ended the dynasty.[29] Consequently, he was not promoting them for leadership.
There is disagreement on the extent of their political involvement during the first century C.E., about a generation after their power in the Hasmonean era. Some argue that they remained intensely involved, since Rome deemed them qualified for political leadership after 70 C.E.[38] Neusner says that they left politics to focus on religion, while Sanders tempers this claim by asserting that they picked their battles (e.g., the oath they refuse to take to Herod in Antiquities 17.2.4).[39] Ellis Rivkin actually denies that the anti-Herod pharisaoi of Antiquities 17.2.4 (41-45) were the Pharisees. On the basis of etymology, he argues that pharisaoi can refer to any separatistsor abstainers, and he also points out apparent differences between the pharisaoi in Antiquities 17.2.4 and the Pharisees elsewhere in Josephus.[40] For example, unlike the pharisaoi, the Pharisees Pollion and Samaias support Herod (Ant. 15.1.1).[41] While scholars conclude that the Pharisees were a religious group that maintained ancestral customs, whether theycontinued their intense interest in politics after the Hasmoneanera is not entirely clear.[42]
For Question Two, the Pharisees’ characteristics,
Neusner and Sanders find fuel in the New Testament for their
positions. Neusner believes that the Pharisees focused on ritual purity
within an exclusive table fellowship, a view that seems consistent with
passages like Mark 7 (the Pharisees rebuke Jesus’s disciples for not
washing their hands before a meal) and Mark 2:15-16 (they criticize
Jesus for eating with sinners).[49] Incidentally,
Neusner relates the Gospels’ portrayal to Question Three, for it helps
him confirm the pre-70 status of certain rabbinic material on the
Pharisees, material that, for him, largely focuses on ritual purity for
meals.[50]
For Neusner, the historical picture of the Pharisees that he derives
from rabbinic sources is also attested in an independent source, the
Gospels. Sanders disagrees with the view that the Pharisees were
exclusivists who shunned non-Pharisees for fear of defilement.[51]
Matthew 23, after all, says that they move about in the marketplace and
travel the world in search of converts, who are initially not Pharisees
(Matthew 23:7, 15).[52] Neusner
and Sanders believe that the New Testament provides some reliable
details on the Pharisees, so they use it to buttress their
characterizations.[53]
The Dead Sea Scrolls
Schiffman’s
conclusions are relevant to Questions Two and Three. For Question Two,
the Pharisees’ characteristics, they are shown to be a group with
halakhic tendencies that differed from those of Qumran, perhaps because
they had laws outside of the written Torah.[60]
For Question Three, Schiffman points to the congruence between rabbinic
literature and the halakah criticized in the Dead Sea Scrolls,
contending that the rabbis offer more reliable information on the
Pharisees than Jacob Neusner may think; rabbinic oral tradition appears
trustworthy, since as late as 200 C.E. the Mishnah accurately reflects
the Pharisees’ beliefs during the Hasmonean era.[61]
Schiffman does not really apply the Dead Sea Scrolls to Question One
(Pharisaic influence in the first century C.E.), for he believes that
the documents he cites date to the Hasmonean period, which even Neusner
and Sanders see as a time of Pharisaic dominance (at least during
Alexandra Salome’s reign).[62]
For Schiffman, the Qumran community consisted of priests who left
Jerusalem because they disliked the temple’s practice of Pharisaic
halakah.[63]
The departing priests thought the Pharisees were defiling the temple,
Schiffman argues, because they had the wrong purity rules.[64]
Tannaitic Literature (Mishnah and Tosefta)
Rivkin acknowledges that there are Mishnaic passages that seem to portray the Pharisees as exclusivists. For example, Mishnah Hagigah 2:7 says that the “garments of the am ha-aretz are a source of midras uncleanness to the perushim,” the Pharisees.[74] As with the Greek term pharisaoi, however, Rivkin argues that perushim can refer to separatists or abstainers, not always the Pharisees.[75] He cites examples in Tannaitic literature in which perushim are actually set at odds with the Hahamim and halakah (e.g., B. Pes. 70b; T. Ber. 3:25).[76] For Rivkin, scholars can derive information about the Pharisees from Tannaitic literature by considering passages that juxtapose them with the Sadducees.[77] Rivkin states that the Sadducees threw at the Soferim the label of perushim, or separatists, to undermine their authority.[78] Although this point concedes division within first century Judaism, Rivkin on the whole asserts that the Pharisees were dominant in that time. For him, the Pharisees did not separate themselves from the am ha-aretz, for the am ha-aretz obeyed Pharisaic law.[79]
For Question Three, the value of Tannaitic literature to understand the pre-70 Pharisees, Neusner is the main skeptic about the utility of rabbinic material. He concludes from the Tannaitic corpus that “none of the masters prior to Gamaliel I was personally known to post-70 authorities,” indicating that “no one after 70 could claim to have heard precisely what they said.”[95] Moreover, Neusner contends that the 70 C.E. calamity in Jerusalem disrupted the transmission of traditions, since Pharisees died and their political conditions were dramatically altered.[96] Consequently, for Neusner, the rabbis tried to portray pre-70 Judea using the few traditions they had, and they “sometimes invented what they needed.”[97] Neusner definitely believes that ideology played a role in the rabbinic portrayal, for there is a tendency in Tannaitic literature to elevate Hillel (whose party was dominant after 70) at the expense of Shammai, undercutting Shammai’s first century predominance in Pharisaism that the literature sometimes acknowledges.[98] In addition, Neusner views pre-70 Pharisaic beliefs, ideas, and values as “not easily accessible,” for they have been revised by post-70 rabbinic masters with their own theological agenda: to assert that Israel can serve her creator despite the destruction of the temple.[99] While Neusner holds that rabbinic literature contains very few pre-70 traditions, he treats the disputes between Hillel and Shammai as authentic, and he notes that the legal disputes between them are predominantly balanced rather than pro-Hillel.[100] He states, “We may well doubt that Shammai would have been represented after 70 as an authority of equivalent importance to Hillel,” so “these materials are highly credible and may well be authentic traditions of the masters’ or of Houses’ rulings.”[101] In this case, Neusner treats traditions that run counter to post-70 rabbinic ideology as authentic.[102]
Analysis
For
Question One, pre-70 Pharisaic influence, one should consider the dates
of the sources. Josephus, Tannaitic literature, and possibly the
Gospels are post-70 material, so they reflect a time when the rabbis
were powerful, or at least on their way to power. Post-70 ideology
shapes Josephus’s account, in both Jewish Wars and Antiquities. Josephus wants to present the Pharisees in a positive light, either through omission of their role in revolts (as in Jewish Wars) or through emphasis on their political influence (as in Antiquities).
His goal is to disassociate his own party from Jewish troublemakers,
and later to promote it to the Romans for leadership of Judea. Even if
Mason is correct that Josephus’s portrayal of Pharisaic leadership is
not always positive, Josephus still presents the Pharisees as a
significant political force that an occupying power should conciliate.[103]
The Gospels could be Christian reactions to rabbinic/Pharisaic
dominance after 70, and Tannaitic literature seems to project post-70
rabbinic authority onto a pre-70 time, presumably so that the rabbis do
not appear as latecomers to importance.[104]
For
Question Two, the Pharisees’ characteristics, at least four issues are
relevant: their exclusive table fellowship, first century political
involvement, social class, and ancestral traditions. Regarding their
table fellowship, not all Pharisees believed that Jews should eat common
food in a state of ritual purity, for Tosefta Berakhot 5.13, 27 presents a dispute on that issue. Many, however, probably did, since Shammai in Mishnah Tohorot 10.4
has qualms about touching unconsecrated grapes with impure hands;
consequently, Jesus, or his post-70 followers, may have conflicted with
certain kinds of Pharisees. The Pharisees also appear to have
interacted with people outside of their party, and Sanders notes that
they regarded non-Pharisaic Jews as observant of second tithe laws,
explaining why they dealt with them (Mishnah Tevel Yom 4.5).[108]
Still, even Sanders admits that the Pharisees ate with their own kind,
not with those lower in purity. Contra Rivkin, therefore, the Pharisees
did acknowledge the existence of outsiders, meaning that not all of the
am ha-aretz consisted of Pharisees (Mark 2:15-16; Tosefta Shabbat 1.15).[109]
There is little explicit information on why the Pharisees emphasized
eating with the right people, but they appear to have done so.
Regarding first century political involvement, if Antiquities 13.10.5 (288) is from Nicolaus, then there is first century confirmation that the Pharisees were politically concerned.[110]
Neusner says that rabbinic comments on the first century do not focus
on politics, but that is probably because the rabbis after 70 did not
see Herod as relevant, while they did feel a need to preserve some
religious traditions under their new theocracy. The Pharisees’ social
class in the first century was most likely outside of the aristocracy,
for no source portrays them as a rich elite. They also had ancestral
traditions, as Paul, a first century source, confirms.
Conclusion
The
Pharisees were a Jewish religious group with ancestral traditions and
halakhic ideas. They were politically and religiously dominant under
Alexandra Salome from 76-67 B.C.E., prompting certain priests to leave
Jerusalem in protest. While their power and influence were not as
widespread from 67 B.C.E.-70 C.E., they continued to maintain some
interest in politics. Their main focus was religious, however, and they
tended to eat with people of their own group, perhaps as a matter of
ritual purity. They were not total exclusivists, however, for they
interacted with those outside their group and considered them reasonably
observant of some laws, notably second tithe. After the destruction of
the temple in 70 C.E., they emerged as the primary Jewish leaders of
Judea, perhaps with a little help from Josephus, who promoted them to
the Romans. Most of the sources about them date to this time, and they
project Pharisaic influence onto the first century.
[1]A
group of sources I do not consider includes apocryphal and
pseudepigraphal books attributed to Pharisaic authors. As Neusner
points out, the authors of these books do not mention Pharisees, their
beliefs may be more widespread than the Pharisaic sect, and the few
details that appear Pharisaic could be later accretions. See Jacob
Neusner, “Mr. Sanders’ Pharisees and Mine,” Scottish Journal of Theology 44/1 (1991) 77. Hereafter cited as Scottish.
[2]Raymond B. Dillard, “Josephus,” Anchor Bible Dictionary, Volume 3, ed. David Noel Freedman (New York: Doubleday, 1992) 983-984. According to Dillard, the seventh book of Jewish Wars was written toward the end of the first century C.E., at the end of Domitian’s reign.
[3]For New Testament dates, please see Wayne Meeks, ed., HarperCollins Study Bible (United
States: HarperCollins, 1993). Most scholars date the Gospels after 70
because they refer to the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple.
Matthew 24:2, Mark 13:2, and Luke 21:6, however, say all the stones of
the temple would be thrown down; since this did not happen in 70 C.E.,
some say the Gospels may be earlier than that date. See Robert Gundry, Matthew: A Commentary on His Literary and Theological Art (Grand
Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1982). The Gospels may be using
hyperbole, however, so I accept their post-70 date as a genuine
possibility.
[4]Lawrence H. Schiffman, “The Sadducean Origins of the Dead Sea Sect,” Understanding the Dead Sea Scrolls, ed. Hershel Shanks (New York: Vintage, 1993) 38. Hereafter cited as “Sadducean.”
[5]The Mishnah date is from Raymond P. Scheindlin, A Short History of the Jewish People (New York: Oxford, 1998) 62. Strack and Stemberger date the Tosefta a generation later. H.L. Strack and Gunter Stemberger, Introduction to the Talmud and Midrash, trans. Markus Bockmuehl (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991) 150-163.
[6]Both E.P. Sanders and Neusner acknowledge that the Pharisees were powerful under Salome Alexandra. E.P. Sanders, Judaism: Practice and Belief, 63 BCE-66 CE (London: SCM Press, 1992) 401. Jacob Neusner, The Rabbinic Traditions About the Pharisees Before 70, vol. 3 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1971) 305. Hereafter
cited as Neusner III. Her reign ended in 67 B.C.E., and the Pharisees
became dominant after the destruction of the temple in 70 C.E.
[7]Throughout this paper, “first century” will refer to the part of the first century C.E. before 70 C.E.
[8]See,
for example, Sanders’s summary (Sanders 388-389). Prior to 1956,
scholars apparently believed that the vast majority of Judean Jews
accepted Pharisaic authority in halakhic and other matters.
Consequently, under this model, the priests embraced Pharisaic halakah
to appease the masses, and the Pharisees’ influence over the people
granted their party political influence, since they could start a mass
rebellion at will. The Pharisaic leaders also supposedly had the power
to exclude people from the Jewish community, since the people accepted
them as authoritative.
[9]Sources will be cited in my section on Tannaitic literature.
[10]D. Goodblatt, “The Place of the Pharisees in First Century Judaism: the State of the Debate,” Journal for the Study of Judaism 20/1 (1989) 12.
[11]Goodblatt 13.
[12]Goodblatt 13.
[13]Goodblatt 13. According to the index to William Whiston’s Works of Josephus (Peabody: Hendrickson, 1987), there are more references to the Essenes in Jewish War than there are to the Pharisees.
[14]Goodblatt 13.
[15]Sanders 389.
[16]Sanders 389.
[17]Sanders 396.
[18]Lester Grabbe, “The Pharisees: A Response to Steve Mason,” Judaism in Late Antiquity, Part 3, Volume 3: Where We Stand: Issues and Debates in Ancient Judaism, ed. Alan J. Avery-Peck and Jacob Neusner (Leiden: Brill, 2000) 41
[19]Grabbe 41.
[20]Daniel R. Schwartz, “Josephus and Nicolaus on the Pharisees,” Journal for the Study of Judaism 14/2 (1983) 157-171.
[21]Schwartz
notes that the passage is hostile to the Pharisees, whereas Josephus
was part of the group and speaks positively about them elsewhere in Antiquities.
Moreover, it states that the Pharisees are believed when they speak
against “a king or high priest,” a political situation that reflects
Herod’s time rather than that of the Hasmoneans or Josephus’s
composition. Under the Hasmoneans, the two offices were one. During
Josephus’s composition, they no longer existed in Judea. Schwartz also
appeals to discrepancies between 288, in which the Pharisees oppose
Hyrcanus, and the rest of the story in 289-292, where they love him.
For Schwartz, the most likely source for 288 is Nicolaus, for Herod
disliked the Pharisees because they incited the masses against him.
Schwartz 158, 163.
[22]Schwartz 165-166.
[23]Schwartz 169.
[24]Schwartz 165.
[25]Steve Mason, “Josephus on the Pharisees Reconsidered: A Critique of Smith/Neusner,” Studies in Religion 17/4
(1988) 456. Neusner basically acknowledges that the Pharisees were
predominant under Alexandra Salome (see fn. 1). He believes, however,
that Josephus’s account of this time in Antiquities is more positive about the Pharisees than the account in JW 1.5.
In his words, “No longer do the Pharisees take advantage of the woman’s
ingenuousness. Now they are essential to her exercise of power.”
Therefore, he concludes that Josephus in Antiquities wants to portray them positively to the Romans. Mason 461.
[26]Mason 467.
[27]Mason 466.
[28]Mason 466. Interestingly, Ant. 13.10.6 says the Pharisees were lenient in the punishments they recommended to John Hyrcanus (who initially listened to them).
[29]Mason 467.
[30]Ellis
Rivkin actually uses Josephus in a way that bridges Questions One and
Two. According to Rivkin, Josephus presents John Hyrcanus abrogating
Pharisaic law, an act that results in an insurrection (Ant. 13.10-13.16).
This means, for Rivkin, that Pharisaic law must have been in place and
popular with the masses for some time. Rivkin traces the origins of
Pharisaism back to the Hasmonean revolt, when they appealed to their
oral law to install a Hasmonean as high priest. In doing so, they
contradicted the written law, which reserved the priesthood for
descendants of Phinehas (Numbers 25). Ellis Rivkin, “Who Were the
Pharisees?” Judaism in Late Antiquity, Part 3, Volume 3: Where We Stand: Issues and Debates in Ancient Judaism, ed. Alan J. Avery-Peck and Jacob Neusner (Leiden: Brill, 2000) 21-22.
[32]See Sanders 405.
[33]Many
scholars deny that the Pharisees deemed these ancestral customs as
divinely-inspired and from Sinai. Sanders, for example, says that the
Pharisees (and rabbis) distinguished their own rules from those of the
Bible, explaining how Hillelites and Shammaites could intermarry,
notwithstanding their differences. Sanders 471. Moreover, Philo
discusses the ancestral customs without reference to Sinai or divine
inspiration (De Spec. Leg. 4.149-150); they are simply traditions. See Martin Goodman, “A Note on Josephus, the Pharisees, and Ancestral Tradition,” Journal of Jewish Studies 1/1
(Spring 1999) 17-20. Rivkin says the Pharisees believed their
authority to legislate was from Sinai. Rivkin 26. They may have had to
in his scenario, if they were to contradict the written Torah on who
should be high priest.
[34]Saldarini 294.
[35]Sanders 418-419.
[36]Sanders 420.
[37]Some say they were small landowners, while others present them as merchants and traders. Sanders 404.
[38]Schwartz 166-167.
[39]Sanders 187.
[40]Rivkin 9, 32.
[41]Rivkin 32. I have problems with Rivkin’s other distinctions. He says that “among the distinguishing characteristics of these pharisaoi are
their influence with women and their foreknowledge of things to come.
The Pharisees elsewhere in Josephus do not share these
characteristics.” They do influence Alexandra Salome in Josephus,
however, plus Pollio foretells the rise of Herod (Ant. 15.1.1). Rivkin says that “the pharisaoi who
refused to take the oath of allegiance to Caesar and Herod were
punished with a fine, whereas Pollion, Samaias, and their disciples were
not punished at all.” Antiquities 15.10.4 says Pollio was not punished with the rest for refusing to take the oath, since Herod revered Pollio. Taken with Antiquities 17.2.4,
this seems to say that the Pharisees in general refused to take the
oath, but Pollio was the only Pharisee who was not punished, since Herod
liked him.
[42]Another
significant issue regarding Josephus is that his picture of the
Pharisees differs from that of the rabbis. According to Neusner,
rabbinic literature does not mention the pre-70 Pharisees’ beliefs on
predestination and the immortal soul, unlike Josephus. Moreover, while
Josephus presents the Pharisees as affectionate to one another, the
Hillelites refer to Shammai’s persecution of Hillel and his followers.
See Scottish 79. I still believe Josephus is reliable on the
Pharisees’ beliefs, since there are New Testament parallels. Tannaitic
literature may not contain much on predestination and the immortal soul
because its focus is halakhic disagreements among the Pharisees or
rabbis, who most likely agreed on such doctrinal matters. Moreover, the
portrayal of the Pharisees’ inner-relationship by Josephus and the
rabbis could be tainted with bias. Josephus may want to portray the
Pharisees as affectionate to one another to assure the Romans that
Pharisaic rule will not be marked by divisions; the Hillelites possibly
want to make Shammai look like a bad leader.
[43]In
this paper, I do not address the question of whether or not the
Pharisees were hypocrites. I do not know how to historically verify
hypocrisy. Apparently, Christians thought the Pharisees were
hypocrites, whereas the rabbis and Josephus viewed them as basically
good people. The same is true regarding evangelical Christians
today–you will find people who love them and hate them, and I am sure
both sides have their reasons.
[44]Anthony Saldarini, “Pharisees,” Anchor Bible Dictionary, Volume 5, ed. David Noel Freedman (New York: Doubleday, 1992) 294, 296.
[45]Shaye J.D. Cohen, “Were Pharisees and Rabbis the Leaders of Communal Prayer and Torah Study in Antiquity?,” The Echoes of Many Texts: Reflections on Jewish and Christian Traditions, ed. William G. Dever and J. Edward Wright (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997) 109.
[46]Sanders 394.
[47]Sanders 394.
[48]Sanders 394.
[49]Neusner III 305.
[50]Neusner III 305.
[51]Sanders
428. Sanders shows that prominent Christian scholars (e.g., Jeremias)
embraced this position, and he seems to attribute it to Neusner. I do
not know if Neusner believes this, however. The Pharisees could have
contact with non-Pharisees and then wash off any defilement before their
meal.
[52]Sanders 428.
[53]There
is more that can be said about the New Testament’s portrayal.
Regarding the Pharisees’ social status, the New Testament does not
present their vocation, unless one counts their role on the court (e.g.,
Gamaliel in Acts 5). Luke says they love money (Luke 16:4), yet this
may be part of his ideological attempt to present Jesus as the champion
of the poor against the rich (see Saldarini 297). As far as doctrine is
concerned, Acts 23:8 mentions their belief in the resurrection of the
dead. This is historically plausible, for Paul, a former Pharisee,
also believed in the resurrection (I Corinthians 15).
[54]Saldarini 301. “Sadducean” 44.
[55]Saldarini 301.
[56] In
Pesher Nahum, the “seekers after smooth things” invite Demetrius to
enter Jerusalem, Demetrius fails to conquer it, and a lion of wrath
takes revenge on the seekers of smooth things by hanging men alive.
Pesher Nahum then criticizes people who lead astray kings, princes,
priests, people, and strangers with their false teaching and counsel,
and it predicts that these “seekers of smooth things,” or people of
“Ephraim,” will perish so as to mislead the assembly no more. Josephus,
in Antiquities 13 (379-415), refers to seditious Jews who
opposed the Judean ruler Alexander Jannaeus and invited the Greek king
Demetrius III (95-88 B.C.E.) into Jerusalem. Demetrius failed to
conquer it, and Jannaeus crucified eight hundred men. After Jannaeus
died, the Pharisees gained power under his successor, Alexandra Salome,
and sought revenge on Jannaeus’s allies who had supported the
crucifixions. Many scholars see strong parallels between Pesher Nahum
and Josephus’s account, meaning that the “seekers of smooth things” and
“Ephraim” refer to the Pharisees, who exercised political and religious
influence under Alexandra Salome. See Saldarini 301.
What
bothers me is that Damascus Document II.1-2 says God ravaged (past
tense) the seekers after smooth things, whereas the Pharisees existed
longer than the Qumran sect. This may refer to the Pharisees’ loss of
power after the death of Salome Alexandra. Pesher Nahum may acknowledge
that the seekers of smooth things exist in the Roman period, for it
mentions the Kittim and predicts that the seekers will perish (future).
The reference to the Kittim could be a gloss of the Roman period
inserted into a Hasmonean era document, however.
[57]Lawrence Schiffman, “The Pharisees and Their Legal Traditions,” Dead Sea Discoveries 8, 3 (2001) 273-274. Hereafter cited as Schiffman.
[58]Schiffman 271-272. Schiffman shows that the Qumran community looked down on remarriage after divorce.
[59]“Sadducean” 43. His references are Hodayot 2:15, 32; Pesher Nahum 3-4 I 2,7; ii 2,4; iii 3, 7; Damascus Document 1:18. See also Schiffman 268-269.
[60]Schiffman 271-272.
[61]“Sadducean” 44.
[62]“Sadducean” 42.
[63]Schiffman 273.
[64]Schiffman 273.
[65]Neusner
identifies Pharisees in Tannaitic literature in the following way:
“Pre-70 masters are the men named in the chains of authorities down to
and including Simeon b. Gamaliel and masters referred to in pericopae of
those same authorities. The reason why these pericopae are held to
refer to Pharisees and their authorities is that Gamaliel and Simeon b.
Gamaliel are identified by Acts and Josephus, respectively, as
Pharisees. They occur, in Mishnah-tractate Avot and other lists of
authorities, and it is therefore generally assumed that all others of
these same lists or chains of authorities also were Pharisees.” Scottish 78.
[66]Jacob Neusner, “Pre-70 C.E. Pharisaism,” CCAR Journal (Autumn, 1972) 55. Hereafter cited as “Pre-70.”
[67]“Pre-70" 55. Scottish 79.
[68]Rivkin 20.
[69]Rivkin 19.
[70]Rivkin 19.
[71]Rivkin 19.
[72]Rivkin 16.
[73]Rivkin 16.
[74]Rivkin 4.
[75]Rivkin
15. This invites the question of why I believe the Pharisees were
called the Pharisees. I believe that this was their name, since they
are called this in all of the literature about them, both sympathetic
and unsympathetic. They may have seen themselves as separate in the
sense that they tried to maintain a level of ritual purity above and
beyond that of most Jews. See Sanders 440, which discusses how
Pharisees were more concerned about midras purity than other Jews
were. That does not necessarily mean, however, that they totally
excluded themselves from outsiders, as we shall see below.
[76]Rivkin 17-18.
[77]Rivkin 15.
[78]Rivkin 19.
[79]Rivkin 15.
[80]Sanders 437.
[82]Sanders 437.
[83]Sanders 432.
[84]Sander 438.
[85]Sanders 436, 441. Tosefta Shabbat 1.5 is a Hillel/Shammai debate about whether or not a Pharisee who was impure from a genital discharge could eat with an am ha-aretz with
the same impurity. According to Sanders, this presupposes that a
Pharisee would not dine with an ordinary person when he was ritually
pure. A possible reason, for Sanders, is that Pharisees wanted to avoid
midras impurity whenever they could (Mishnah Hagigah 2:7).
Rivkin may question that the Hillel/Shammai discussion concerns the
actual Pharisees, but why would Hillel and Shammai debate about an
abstainer or separatist who is outside of their group?The
Pharisees seem to have valued eating with their own kind in a state of
ritual purity. Maybe they saw the meal as a sacred occasion (Neusner),
or perhaps they simply wanted to avoid ritual impurity (Sanders).
[86]Sanders 441.
[87]Sanders 441.
[89]Neusner III 301.
[90]He chooses to look at this passage rather than Tohorot 2 because he says this passage mentions the Pharisees. Scottish 85.
[91]. Jacob Neusner, The Rabbinic Traditions About the Pharisees Before 70, vol. 2 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1971) 291. Hereafter
cited as Neusner II. I do not entirely know what he means by this.
Does wine not count as food, since a person drinks it? Does the person
plan to sell the wine?
[92]Neusner II 290-291.
[93]Some
of this is interpretation on my part of what he is saying. He says
both would agree the heave offering should be touched with clean hands.
Neusner III 289.
[94]For
Question Two, I should probably say a word about how rabbinic
literature regards the socio-economic status of the Pharisees.
According to Neusner and Sanders, the Mishnah contains many rules about
tithes and agriculture, plus Hillel and Shammai discuss money in terms
of small amounts. For them, the Pharisees were probably small
landowners. Sanders 404-405.
[95]Jacob Neusner, The Rabbinic Traditions About the Pharisees Before 70, vol. 1 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1971) 6. Hereafter cited as Neusner I.
[96]Neusner I 6.
[97]Neusner I 6.
[98]Neusner
I 22-23. “Pre-70" 84. Neusner on Shammaite predominance in the first
century C.E.: “Since the Hillelites told stories both to account for
Shammaite predominance in pre-70 Pharisaism (‘sword in the school
house,’ ‘Shammaites one day outnumbered Hillelites,’ ‘mob in the
Temple’), and also to explain the later predominance of the Hillelites
(‘heavenly echo came to Yavneh’), it stands to reason that the
Shammaites predominated before 70, the Hillelites shortly afterward.
This is further suggested by the one-sided, if limited, evidence that
Gamaliel II and Simeon b. Gamaliel followed Shammaite rules.” Neusner
II 4.
[100]Neusner I 338. Neusner III 319. “Pre-70" 64. Neusner seems to identify other material as pre-70, for example, Yosi’s list in Mishnah Avot 1:4-5 (which resembles Qumran lists in form) and Yochanan the high priest’s abrogations in Mishnah Maaser Sheni 5:15.
The Houses’ disputes play a greater role in Neusner’s characterization
of the pre-70 Pharisees, however, for he notes that three-fourths of the
disputes relate to table fellowship. “Pre-70" 60. Neusner III 318.
[101]Neusner I 338.
[102]Neusner
does not seem consistent on this point. He argues that the post-70
Yavneh community was responsible for organizing the differing Hillelite
and Shammaite opinions into Houses’ disputes that would be transmitted
and memorized. According to Neusner, the Yavneh period was a time when
the Houses were of “roughly equal strength,” so the “form used for the
transmission of their opinions [would] give parity to both sides.” In
other words, the Hillelites were not dominant. He acknowledges that the
Hillelites eventually prevailed, however. Perhaps he believes that the
Houses’ disputes are still authentic because the two groups contributed
traditions that they actually had, rather than making them up
immediately after 70. Neusner III 315-317.
[103]Why
would Josephus need to convey this message to the Romans, who actually
ruled first century Palestine? Could not the Romans say, “We remember
that the Pharisees were not that important”? Maybe the Romans were
detached in certain respects from Judea. They dealt with the priests,
but not really with the non-authorities, so they did not necessarily
know who was influential with the masses. Josephus could be telling the
Romans indirectly that such detachment was part of the problem; they
should have conciliated the Pharisees!
[104]The
sources do contain elements that contradict their overall portrayal of
first century Pharisaic dominance, and scholars are wise to regard them
as historical. In the vast majority of cases, such elements are most
likely accidental. The Gospels, however, acknowledge the
existence of conflict between the Pharisees and the Sadducees (Matthew
22:23-33; Mark 12:18-27; Luke 20:27-40), as well as the priests’
prominent role in Jesus’ crucifixion; such themes are so pervasive that
they are probably not accidents. Why do the Gospels present Pharisaic
dominance, even as they highlight priestly power and division within
Judaism? The Gospels preserve some memory of Jesus’s first century
context, since that is the setting of their narrative. Their authors
also comment on the political situation of the first century, for they
blame the destruction of Jerusalem on both the chief priests and the
Pharisees (Matthew 21:43-46; 23:33-39; Luke 20:9-19), even though the
Pharisees were the only ones in power when they wrote. At the same
time, they address their own post-70 context, when the Pharisees sat in
Moses’s seat as legal authorities (Matthew 23:2). The Gospels are not
the only sources that discuss the time they narrate along with their
present concerns. Josephus and the rabbis do the same thing, but they
generally go further than the Gospels (except John 12:42) in portraying
the priests as subordinate to the Pharisees. The Gospels acknowledge
priestly power and Pharisaic dominance, however, so they preserve
elements of a pre-70 setting while addressing post-70 concerns.
[105]Whiston’s translation.
[106]Sanders 393-395.
[107]Goodblatt. Sanders 398.
[108]Sanders 441.
[109]If this is true in the second century C.E., when the rabbis were in charge, how much more so in the first century!
[110]Schwartz argues convincingly that it is, and his opponent Goodblatt does not dispute him on this point. See Goodblatt 19.
