Pharisees

Jewish society becomes Hellenized despite priestly rule, except in its generally staunch adherence to monotheism.

Rural life is relatively unchanged, but cities such as Jerusalem rapidly adopt the Greek language, sponsor games and sports, and in more subtle ways adopt and absorb the culture of the Hellenes.

Even the high priests bear such names as Jason and Menelaus.

Biblical scholars have identified extensive Greek influence in the drafting of commentaries and interpolations of ancient texts during and after the Greek period.

The most obvious influence of the Hellenistic period can be discerned in the early literature of the new faith, Christianity, from the second century CE.

Judah under the Hasmonean Dynasty becomes comparable in extent and power to the ancient Davidic dominion.

Internal political and religious discord run high, however, especially between the Pharisees, who interpret the written law by adding a wealth of oral law, and the Sadducees, an aristocratic priestly class who call for strict adherence to the written law.

Dynastic contenders for the throne in 64 BCE appeal for support to Pompey, who is establishing Roman power in Asia.

The next year Roman legions seize Jerusalem, and Pompey installs one of the contenders for the throne as high priest, but without the title of king.

Eighty years of independent Jewish sovereignty end, and the period of Roman dominion begins.

The Essenes, a religious sect or brotherhood, had fled to the Judaean desert wilderness around Qumran during Antiochus IV Epiphanes' persecution of Palestinian Jews.

Like the Pharisees, the Essenes meticulously observe the Law of Moses, the Sabbath, and ritual purity.

They also profess belief in immortality and divine punishment for sin.

Unlike the Pharisees, the Essenes deny the resurrection of the body and refuse to immerse themselves in public life.

With few exceptions, they shun Temple worship and are content to live ascetic lives of manual labor in seclusion.

The Sabbath is reserved for daylong prayer and meditation on the Torah.

Oaths are frowned upon, but once taken they cannot be rescinded.

…Shechem, significantly increasing his regional influence.

Hyrcanus annexes the regions of present Transjordan, Samaria, Galilee, and Idumea (also known as Edom), and, in the first example of conversion imposed by the Jews in their history, forces Idumeans to convert to Judaism.

According to Josephus, "Hyrcanus...subdued all the Idumeans; and permitted them to stay in that country, if they would circumcise their genitals, and make use of the laws of the Jews; and they were so desirous of living in the country of their forefathers, that they submitted to the use of circumcision, and of the rest of the Jewish ways of living; at which time therefore this befell them, that they were hereafter no other than Jews.”

In internal policy, however, Hyrcanus commits the grave error of quarreling with one of the two main Jewish ecclesiastical parties, the Pharisees—who follow the Law with great strictness and with whom the Maccabean movement has in origin close affinity—and siding with their opponents, the more liberal Sadducees.

The Pharisees, who had emerged as a clearly defined party during the revolt of the Maccabees, oppose Hyrcanus because of his assumption of both the royal and high-priestly titles and because of the general secularism of the court.

Unlike the priestly and aristocratic Sadducees, the Pharisees believe in resurrection and the immortality of the soul.

The Sadducees, who oppose the use of Oral Law by the Pharisees, hold only to the Pentateuch, and are affronted by the growth of Greek, or pagan, influence that had developed over the past eighty years in the Jewish kingdom.

The Hasmonean kingdom of Judaea has attained power and great prosperity under the reign of John Hyrcanus.

The Pharisees, a scholarly sect with popular backing, and the Sadducees, an aristocratic sect that comprises the priesthood, become well-defined religious parties.

Hyrcanus is worldly, agnostic, and urbane in outlook, utterly unlike his grandfather.

In spirit, he has become a Sadducee, an upper-class conservative who accepts only the Written Law as divinely revealed and authoritative.

The first of the Biblical books of Maccabees, a pro-Hasmonean historiography, is written in about the latter part of the second century BCE.

1 Maccabees, originally written in Hebrew by a Jewish author and surviving in a Greek translation contained in the Septuagint, relates the history of the Maccabees from 175 BCE until 134 BCE.

The book is held today as canonical scripture by some Christian churches (including Catholic, Orthodox and Coptic churches), but not by most Protestant groups, who consider it to be an apocryphal book.

In modern-day Judaism, the book is often of great historical interest, but has no official religious status.

Hyrcanus has consolidated the gains of his father and uncles; his reign is to be be the last under which Judaea is a powerful, united state.

The remainder of Hyrcanus' long and disturbed reign over Judaea has been marked by his efforts to punish his enemies, ward off the Syrians, and enlarge Judaea's boundaries.

Although he has struggled in vain to destroy Ptolemy, he has successfully thwarted Syrian incursions by alliance with Rome and conquered the unfriendly neighboring territories of Samaria and Idumaea (Edom).

According to his will, the government of the country after his death is to be placed in the hands of his wife, and his eldest son, Aristobulus, is to receive only the high-priesthood.

Upon the death of Hyrcanus in 104, Aristobulus, with the help of his brother Antigonus, seizes the throne from his mother and jails or kills his other three brothers.

Aristobulus, who actually calls himself Philhellene (a lover of Hellenism), is said to have assumed the title of king (basileus), although on his coins he appears, like Hyrcanus I, as high priest.

Like his father, Aristobulus is a Sadducee who takes actions to erode Jewish identity.

Under Aristobulus’ reign, the name of the Jewish community or counsel of the Jews becomes “Hever ha-Yehhdim” and in the Greek, the “Sanhedrin.” The identity of ‘the community of the Jews’ may have been on his coins, but their title, like his crown, is seen and spoken in Greek terms.

At the death of Aristobulus in 103 BCE, his widow, Salome Alexandra, liberates his brother Alexander Jannaeus, who had been held in prison.

Jannaeus succeeds Aristobulus as the Judaean king and high priest; and marries Salome Alexandra, whose brother is Shimon ben Shetach, a leading Pharisee.

After a failed siege against Gaza, Jannaeus strikes a phony league of friendship with the Egyptian co-ruler Ptolemy Lathyrus.

In reality Jannaeus seeks the assistance of Lathyrus’ mother, Cleopatra III, against her son.

When Lathyrus learns of this treachery, he takes out his fury on Judea.

After defeating Jannaeus near the Jordan River, Lathyrus’ soldiers slaughter fleeing Jewish troops.

Afterwards, Lathyrus attacks a small village in Judea with utter malice.

The Egyptian troops strangle women and children.

Then the deceased are cut into pieces, boiled in cauldrons, and eaten as a sacrifice.

This act of cannibalism is used to terrify the Judean people and their military.

After this massacre, Jannaeus is in no position to stop the onslaught of Lathyrus.

However, Cleopatra III, who is probably swayed to support Jannaeus through two Jewish commanders in her military, steps in to prevent Lathyrus from sacking Jerusalem.

Alexander Jannaeus, whose reign over Judea is long and largely filled with wars, imposes his rule rigorously over an increasingly large area, including both the cities of the coast and the area east of the Jordan River.

Still more clearly than Hyrcanus I, he attests the change in direction and aim of the Hasmonean house.

He is the bitter enemy of the Pharisees, he hires Greek mercenaries, his coins bear Greek as well as Hebrew legends, and his title on them is simply “King Alexander”.

During the Hasmonean period, the Sadducees and Pharisees functione primarily as political parties.

The Sadducees, are avid supporters of Jannaeus.

The Pharisaic opposition to Jannaeus had continued with his marriage to his brother’s widow, which is forbidden by Torah law.

Furthermore, Jannaeus has established himself as a ruler concerned mainly with conquests rather than his religious obligations.

Although the Pharisees had opposed the wars of expansion of the Hasmoneans and the forced conversions of the Idumeans, the political rift between them became wider when Pharisees demanded that the Hasmonean king choose between being king and being High Priest.

In response, the king openly sided with the Sadducees by adopting their rites in the Temple.

One year during the Jewish holiday of Sukkot, Jannaeus, while officiating as the High Priest (Kohen Gadol) at the Temple in Jerusalem, had demonstrated his support of the Sadducees by denying the law of the water libation.

The crowd had responded with shock at his mockery and showed their displeasure by pelting Alexander with the etrogim (citrons) that they were holding in their hands.

Unwittingly, the crowd had played right into Alexander's hands: he had intended to incite the people to riot and his soldiers fell upon the crowd at his command.

The soldiers killed more than six thousand people in the Temple courtyard.

This incident during Tabernacles was a major factor leading up to the Judean Civil War by igniting popular opponents of Jannaeus.

A Qumran document sheds further light on another opponent of Jannaeus.

The scroll 4Q390 was written by an adversary of Jannaeus seeking popular support to overthrow the Hasmonean King.

The author called for an end to the dispute between Jannaeus and the Pharisees.

According to the author, the only acceptable solution was an end to the Hasmonean Priesthood and secular control.

The Judean Civil War initially began after the conquest of Gaza by Jannaeus.

Due to Jannaeus’ victory at Gaza, the Nabatean kingdom no longer controls their trade routes to Rome and Damascus.

Therefore Nabatean king Obodas I launches an attack on the Hasmonean state in the Golan.

Potentially, the war with the Nabateans is the last straw against a warmongering king and an incompetent High Priest.

After Defeated in battle against Obadas, Jannaeus returns to fierce Jewish opposition in Jerusalem.

A civil war breaks out between Pharisaic-supported Jewish rebels and Jannaeus.

Alexander Jannaeus, on his deathbed, calls in 76 BCE for a reconciliation between the Sadducees, who he has always supported, and the rival Pharisees.

His son Hyrcanus II is appointed high priest; Alexander's widow, Salome Alexandra, reverses anti-Pharisaic policy and is guided by powerful religious advisers, members of the Pharisaic movement.

Judea under the Hasmonean Dynasty has become comparable in extent and power to the ancient Davidic dominion described in the Bible.

Internal political and religious discord runs high, however, especially between the Pharisees, who interpret the written law by adding a wealth of oral law, and the Sadducees, who call for strict adherence to the written law.

Salome Alexandra dies in 67 and her son assumes the rulership of Judaea as Hyrcanus II, but after a troubled reign of three months, his warlike brother Aristobulus drives him from power.

Herod, confirmed by the Roman Senate as king of Judah in 37 BCE in the period of wars subsequent to the Roman occupation of the country, reigns until his death in 4 BCE.

Nominally independent, Judah is actually in bondage to Rome, and the land is formally annexed in 6 BCE as part of the province of Syria Palestina.

Rome does, however, grant the Jews religious autonomy and some judicial and legislative rights through the Sanhedrin.

The Sanhedrin, which traces its origins to a council of elders established under Persian rule (333 BCE to 165 BCE) is the highest Jewish legal and religious body under Rome.

The Great Sanhedrin, located on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, supervises smaller local Sanhedrins and is the final authority on many important religious, political, and legal issues, such as declaring war, trying a high priest, and supervising certain rituals.

Scholars have sharply debated the structure and composition of the Sanhedrin.

The Jewish historian Josephus and the New Testament present the Sanhedrin as a political and judicial council whereas the Talmud describes it as a religious, legislative body headed by a court of seventy-one sages.

Another view holds that there were two separate Sanhedrins.

The political Sanhedrin was composed primarily of the priestly Sadducee aristocracy and was charged by the Roman procurator with responsibility for civil order, specifically in matters involving imperial directives.

The religious Sanhedrin of the Pharisees was concerned with religious law and doctrine, which the Romans disregarded as long as civil order was not threatened.

Foremost among the Pharisee leaders of the time are the noted teachers, Hillel and Shammai.