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What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? - Religion - Nairaland

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What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by PastorAIO: 8:55am On Apr 21, 2009
We all know about the pharisee from the gospels in the new testament.  However what do we really know about them?   Apart from the fact that they were hypocrites.  There are many hypocrites in the world in every faith, ideology or society. 

What I'm asking is "What are the Doctrines of the Pharisees"?.  I'm sure their doctrines were not Hypocrisy, ie if you want to be a pharisee you must be as hypocritical as possible.  Hypocrisy was not the definition of a Pharisee, so what was it that defined the Pharisees?  What were their beliefs.  For instance we know that the Sadducees did not believe in life after death in the sense of the resurrection of the body.   And we know that they took the bible literally rather than figuratively.

What doctrine or belief marked out the pharisees?  And when Jesus attacked the pharisees was he attacking the belief system or was he only attacking the way certain pharisees practiced their belief system.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by KunleOshob(m): 10:50am On Apr 21, 2009
Matthew 23:2:
2 “The teachers of religious law and the Pharisees are the official interpreters of the law of Moses.

Pharisees were the religious leaders of that time, i think a better header for this topic would have been "what is the difference between a pastor/preacher and a pharisee?" since pastors are now our religious leaders and most of them have that hypocritical attribute of pharisees.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by PastorAIO: 12:05pm On Apr 21, 2009
KunleOshob:

Matthew 23:2:
2 “The teachers of religious law and the Pharisees are the official interpreters of the law of Moses.

Pharisees were the religious leaders of that time, i think a better header for this topic would have been "what is the difference between a pastor/preacher and a pharisee?" since pastors are now our religious leaders and most of them have that hypocritical attribute of pharisees.

I'm not sure of that interpretation of the verse.  There is nothing about official interpreters in the original greek.  It says literally that the scribes and pharisees ( οἱ γραμματεῖς καὶ οἱ Φαρισαῖοι. -oi grammateis kai oi pharisaioi) sit (ikathisan) in moses' chair (kathedras). 
There were different groups of religious leaders in Israel at the time.  Religious authority was being wrested away from the priesthood based in the temple in Jerusalem and judaism was being centered more around the synagogues which were led by Rabbis. 


[size=15pt]The emergence of the Sadducees, Essenes, and Pharisees[/size]

The rift between the priests and the sages grew during the Hellenistic period, when the Jews faced new political and cultural struggles. Around this time the Sadducee party emerged as the party of the priests and allied elites (the name Sadducee may come from Zadok).
The Essenes may have emerged as a sect of dissident priests. They are believed to have rejected either the Seleucid appointed high priests, or the Hasmonean high priests, as illegitimate. Ultimately, they rejected the Second Temple, arguing that the Essene community was itself the new Temple, and that obedience to the law represented a new form of sacrifice.
The Pharisee ("separatist"wink party emerged largely out of the group of scribes and sages who harked back to Ezra and the Great Assembly. The meaning of the name is unclear; it may refer to their rejection of Hellenic culture or to their objection to the Hasmonean monopoly on power. It is difficult to state at what time the Pharisees, as a party, arose. Josephus first mentions them in connection with Jonathan, the successor of Judas Maccabeus ("Ant." xiii. 5, § 9). One of the factors that distinguished the Pharisees from other groups prior to the destruction of the Temple was their belief that all Jews had to observe the purity laws (which applied to the Temple service) outside the Temple. The major difference, however, was the continued adherence of the Pharisees to the laws and traditions of the Jewish people in the face of assimilation. As Josephus noted, the Pharisees were considered the most expert and accurate expositors of Jewish law.

From here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharisees

The way I understand the history is that the Sadducees where the elite and they controlled the priesthood and the temple.  Meanwhile the Pharisees were based mainly in the synagogues.  (Another group wresting power away from the temple were the Essenes who claimed that their community was the new temple and not the physical building in jerusalem - there are traces of all these themes in the gospels).  The Sadducees took the Tanakh literally while the Pharisees had a system for interpreting it.  This interpretation is what they called the Tradition of the elders or the Oral Tanakh and this was partly what Jesus took umbrage with.  Some pharisees were taking the interpretations too far and ranking it over the written Tanakh.


During this period serious theological differences emerged between the Sadducees and Pharisees. Although the Essene lack of concern for the Second Temple alienated them from the great mass of Jews, their notion that the sacred could exist outside of the Temple was shared and elevated by the Pharisees.
Many, including some scholars, have characterized the Sadducees as a sect that interpreted the Torah literally, and the Pharisees as interpreting the Torah liberally. R' Yitchak Isaac Halevi (who takes the above view) suggests that this was not, in fact, a matter of religion. He claims that as complete rejection of Judaism would not have been tolerated under the Hasmonean rule, Hellenists maintained that they were rejecting not Judaism but Rabbinic law. Thus, the Sadducees were in fact a political party not a religious sect (Dorot Ha'Rishonim).


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharisees


The reason that I'm raising this topic is that I believe that Jesus was himself a Pharisee (as were his followers and the early christians) and that his criticism of them was in fact self criticism.  Like when we criticise nigeria and the nigerian way of doing things.  It doesn't mean that we are ourselves distinct from Nigerians.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by KunleOshob(m): 1:11pm On Apr 21, 2009
Pastor AIO:


The reason that I'm raising this topic is that I believe that Jesus was himself a Pharisee (as were his followers and the early christians) and that his criticism of them was in fact self criticism.  Like when we criticise nigeria and the nigerian way of doing things.  It doesn't mean that we are ourselves distinct from Nigerians. 

And what fuels this belief as you have not been able to show any similarity between Jesus and the Pharisees. On the contrary Jesus was always at logger heads with them.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by PastorAIO: 2:02pm On Apr 21, 2009
KunleOshob:

And what fuels this belief as you have not been able to show any similarity between Jesus and the Pharisees. On the contrary Jesus was always at logger heads with them.

I get this mainly from the fact that when one takes a close look at what the ideology of the pharisees actually was then we find that they say nothing in opposition to what Jesus taught, and Jesus says nothing in opposition to what they taught. Ideologically they are exact carbon copy of each other. Then there are other points too.

-Jesus was a Rabbi and taught in the Synagogues. This is what the Pharisees did.

- Jesus actually endorsed them (ideologically) when he tells us to do as they preach because they sit on the seat of Moses. He only tells us not to do as they do, because even they do not do as they preach.

- Jesus also demoted the importance of the Temple as the Pharisees did. He told the samaritan woman that God would be worshipped neither in the temple nor on the mountain. He dismissed the magnificence of the temple saying one day not one stone will be found on top of another. This was a typical pharisee attitude. Actually it was found more so with the Essenes, but the pharisees had a similar attitude.

- the Christian doctrine that we are all priests is a pharisee doctrine. The laws of cleanliness that they upheld were actually only meant for the levites and priesthood initially but they interpreted it apply to all the israelites, a people to be set apart for God.
He suggests that two things fundamentally distinguished the Pharisaic from the Sadducean approach to the Torah. First, Pharisees interpreted Exodus 19:3-6 literally:
And Moses went up to God, and the LORD called to him out of the mountain, saying, "Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the people of Israel: You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself. Now therefore, if you will obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my own possession among all peoples; for all the earth is mine, and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel."[7]
Or, in the words of 2 Maccabees 2:17, Pharisees believed that "God gave all the people the heritage, the kingdom, the priesthood, and the holiness."
The Pharisees believed that the idea that all of the children of Israel were to be like priests was expressed elsewhere in the Torah, for example, when the Law itself was transferred from the sphere of the priesthood to every man in Israel (Exodus 19: 29-24; Deuteronomy 6: 7, 11: 19; comp. 31: 9; Jeremiah 2: 8, 18:18). Moreover, the Torah already provided some ways for all Jews to lead a priestly life: the precepts concerning unclean meat were perhaps intended originally for the priests, but were extended to the whole people (Leviticus 11; Deuteronomy 14:3-21); the prohibition of cutting the flesh in mourning for the dead (Deuteronomy 14: 1-2, Leviticus 19: 28; comp. Lev. 21: 5). The Pharisees believed that all Jews in their ordinary life, and not just the Temple priesthood or Jews visiting the Temple, should observe rules and rituals concerning purification.

I took this again from wikipedia.

It was this concern with priestly purification applied to even the layman that Jesus referred to when he talked about washing the outside of the cup and not the inside. This idea of being a company of priests is found in christianity too. The only difference is that the purfication is not an outward ritual but rather internal.

Christianity being apparently at loggerheads with the Pharisee tradition is contradictory. Nicodemus was a Pharisees, Jesus also seemed to get on with the pharisees. Gamaliel the leader of the pharisees is the one that spoke up in support of the christians in acts 5 34-39.
38 And now I say to you, Withdraw from these men and let them alone, for if this counsel or this work have its origin from men, it will be destroyed;

This very same Gamaliel it was that Paul claimed with pride was his teacher. And indeed Paul's letters are full of Pharisee doctrines.

-When asked what was the greatest of the laws Jesus responded that it was the Shema. That is 'hear o israel . . . '. This is pharisee doctrine as taught by Hillel the grandfather of Gamaliel, probably the most influential pharisee ever.

The victory, as it were, of the Shema over the Decalogue is reflected in the liturgical canonization of the Shema and the corresponding excision of the Decalogue. This change of status is reflected in the explanation of Sifre Deuteronomy for the absence of the Decalogue from the daily recitation and from the tefillin as opposed to the presence of the Shema in both. The result is that the Shema alone is debated by the Houses of Hillel and Shammai in Mishnah Berakhot. It alone is mentioned in The Gospel of Mark, though never explicitly in the Pauline corpus. It alone appears in the tefillin of the caves of Murabba`at. And it alone is alluded to in The Rule of the Community (10,10) and in Pseudo-Aristeas (160). By the time of Mishnah Berakhot and the formalization of the liturgy, the Shema reigns supreme.

From here:
http://www.clalrabbis.net/unit24.htm

There were two poles in the Pharisee tradition. The house of Hillel and the house of Shammai. The elevation of the Shema above all the laws in the bible occurred long before Jesus' ministry. That Jesus concurred is for me the biggest sign that he was a pharisee.

Check this quote out from the Mishnah ( the pharisee oral tradition):
Hebrew Text

אֵלּוּ הֵן בֵּין הַפְּרָקִים:
בֵּין בְּרָכָה רִאשׁוֹנָה לִשְׁנִיָּה,
בֵּין שְׁנִיָּה לִ"שְׁמַע",
וּבֵין "שְמַע" לִ"וְהָיָה אִם שָׁמֹעַ",
בֵּין "וְהָיָה אִם שָׁמֹעַ" ל"וַיֹּאמֶר",
בֵּין "וַיֹּאמֶר" לֶ"אֱמֶת וְיַצִּיב".
רַבִּי יְהוּדָה אוֹמֵר:
בֵּין "וַיֹּאמֶר" לֶ"אֱמֶת וְיַצִּיב" – לֹא יַפְסִיק.
אָמַר רַבִּי יְהוֹשֻׁעַ בֶּן קָרְחָה:
לָמָּה קָדְמָה "שְמַע" לִ"וְהָיָה אִם שָׁמֹעַ"?
אֶלָּא כְדֵי שֶׁיְּקַבֵּל עָלָיו עֹל מַלְכוּת שָׁמַיִם תְּחִלָּה,
וְאַחַר כַּךְ יְקַבֵּל עָלָיו עֹל מִצְוֹת.
"וְהָיָה אִם שָׁמֹעַ" ל"וַיֹּאמֶר"?
שֶׁ"וְהָיָה אִם שָׁמֹעַ" נוֹהֵג בַּיּוֹם וּבַלַּילָה,
"וַיֹּאמֶר" אֵינוֹ נוֹהֵג אֶלָּא בַיּוֹם.
[edit]
English Translation

These are the section breaks:
Between the first and second blessings,
Between the second blessing and Shema (Deuteronomy 6:4),
Between Shema and V'hayah im shamoa ("If you truly listen"wink(Deuteronomy 11:13),
Between V'hayah im shamoa and Vayomer ("[God] said"wink(Numbers 15:37),
Between Vayomer and Emet v'yatziv ("True and enduring"wink.
Rabbi Yehuda says:
Between Vayomer and Emet v'yatziv -- one may not pause.
Rabbi Yehoshua ben Korchah said:
Why does Shema precede V'hayah im shamoa?
[size=15pt]So that one may accept the yoke of the kingdom of heaven first,
And after that accept the yoke of the commandments.
[/size]
And [why does] V'hayah im shamoa [precede] Vayomer?
Because V'hayah im shamoa applies during the day and at night,
And Vayomer only applies during the day.

From here:
http://www.freemedialibrary.com/index.php/Mishnah_Berakhot_2:2

Again the part that I've made bold is core christian ideology.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by KunleOshob(m): 2:22pm On Apr 21, 2009
@PastorAIO
I think this your posts are really confusing, one thing is certain Jesus was definitely not a pharisees even if he had certain doctrines in common with them. Today we have over 30,000 christian denominations in the world with a number of them at each others throats, some would even deny others are christians. the distrust between the catholic church and the evangelical pentecostals is very obvious. the average pentecostal is mis-led to believe catholics are not christians and vis -versa and that does not make either one of them christian or not. My point being even though he may have similarities with them like we have in most churches today they are still very different ideologically
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by PastorAIO: 2:35pm On Apr 21, 2009
KunleOshob:

@PastorAIO
I think this your posts are really confusing, one thing is certain Jesus was definitely not a pharisees even if he had certain doctrines in common with them. Today we have over 30,000 christian denominations in the world with a number of them at each others throats, some would even deny others are christians. the distrust between the catholic church and the evangelical pentecostals is very obvious. the average pentecostal is mis-led to believe catholics are not christians and vis -versa and that does not make either one of them christian or not. My point being even though he may have similarities with them like we have in most churches today they are still very different ideologically

I can understand that it is confusing especially as we have learned to think of pharisees as evil people, but what I'm saying is that after actually taking a look at what their doctrines and ideologies are, I do not see the difference with christianity.
Apart from any prejudice you may have against the name pharisee can you tell me one thing that they say ideologically that is at odds with christian beliefs? I understand that you may not be familiar with Pharisee doctrine but if you study into it I think you'll find that there is no disparity with christianity. Try googling the pharisees and researching what they believed in. I'm interested to know what you think after a bit of research.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by KunleOshob(m): 3:08pm On Apr 21, 2009
Well i won't be able to do the research immeditely as i a working on some things that need my attention right now, but i think the issue is not the pharisees doctrine per se it is actually that they are hypocrites as jesus stated in Matthew 23. Jesus did not critisize what they said (doctrine) he cristisized what they did (Hypocrisy) That apart i also have the impression that the pharisees had a very rigid interpretation of the law which was oppressive ( i can't remember the verse which buttresses this point). Also matthew 23:23 is a reminder of how the pharisees implement the law. they focus on the showmanship of it and ignore the weightier matters of justice, equity, mercy and honesty.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by domwas2(m): 4:09pm On Apr 21, 2009
Hi, is as follows:
Pharisee: A self-righteous or sanctimonious person, A member of an ancient Jewish sect noted for strict obedience to Jewish traditions.
Christiian:A religious person who believes Jesus is the Christ and is a member of a Christian denomination, Following the teachings or manifesting the qualities or spirit of Jesus Christ

Matt5:20
For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by PastorAIO: 5:53pm On Apr 21, 2009
domwas2:

Hi, is as follows:
Pharisee: A self-righteous or sanctimonious person, A member of an ancient Jewish sect noted for strict obedience to Jewish traditions.


And herein lies the problem. Pharisee has become synonymous with hypocrisy to the point that we probably think that the qualifications for becoming a pharisee is that they had to demonstrate how hypocritical they could be. Yet that is not the case. You cannot have an association of people for hypocrisy. They had their beliefs and tenets. There are hypocrites in all walks of life. Pharisee does not equal hypocrite. Dictionary definitions will not help you none. If you want to know anything about the pharisees you'll have to do some research.

The following is taken from a christian website that talks about their history and then about their doctrines and characteristics. The history is factual but then when talking about their beliefs they miss the facts.
History of the Pharisees

No one knows precisely when the fraternity or party of the Pharisees actually started. Maybe it started as an ideological movement and eventually evolved into an organized religious sect.

In 538 B.C., the Persian king, Cyrus, allowed the Israelite people to return to Palestine. There was a movement to preserve a pure remnant of Israel, calling on the people to be dedicated to God and keep the Law.

The first mention of the "Pharisees" comes in the second century B.C. Sometime around 168 B.C. Antiochus Epiphanes, who was sort of a "Greek Hitler," determined to annihilate the Jewish religion and make Judea and Palestine completely Hellenistic. He sacked Jerusalem, killed thousands of Jews, and then offered sacrifices to the Greek god, Zeus, on the Jewish altar. The Jews were horrified and outraged. They organized themselves into guerrilla groups. After much fighting and bloodshed, they regained their freedom under their famous leader Judas Maccabaeus, in 165 B.C. For that reason Judas Maccabaeus is remembered as one of the great heroes of Judaism to this day. In the midst of the record of this restoration of Jewish freedom, we have the first historical reference to a group called the "Pharisees," meaning "the separated ones," in the midst of the Hasidim or "Pious Ones," sometimes called the Hasideans, who fought with Judas Maccabaeus.

From 134 - 104 B.C. a new ruler reigned over Palestine. His name was John Hyrcanus. The Pharisees did not believe that he had a right to be king and high priest. At a state banquet, John Hyrcanus asked if anyone present had recommendations on ways to improve the government. A Pharisee, named Eleazar, stood up and suggested that the best thing Hyrcanus could do for the government would be to resign. He explained that since Hyrcanus' mother was a captive of the Greeks, she obviously had been violated, and the king was probably the illegitimate son of a Greek soldier, and resignation would be the only honorable thing to do. John Hyrcanus was not impressed, and developed closer ties with the Sadducees.

When John Hyrcanus died, his son Aristobulus assumed the throne. He was, like his father, not favorably disposed toward the Pharisees, but he ruled only one year before he died.

Aristobulus' wife, Salome Alexandra, became the queen. She had more sympathy with the Pharisees, because it is reported that her brother was a prominent Pharisee, Simon ben Shatach. But she then married Alexander Jannaeus, who had no tolerance for the Pharisees.

Alexander Jannaeus did everything he could to denigrate the Pharisees. On one occasion as the Feast of the Tabernacle, he refused to pour water on the altar and poured it on the ground instead. The Pharisees began pelting him with citrons, a fruit resembling a large lemon, and began yelling insults at him. He responded by calling out the troops and slaughtered large numbers of Jews. Six years of civil war resulted, in which the Pharisees fought the king's troops. Eventually, when Jannaeus was mortally wounded in a skirmish, Salome became ruling queen again. During her nine year reign, before she died in 67 B.C., the Pharisees became a powerful political and religious party, and remained so until the first century A.D,

The Roman general, Pompey, entered Jerusalem in 63 B.C. and set up Roman rule. During the reign of Herod the Great in 37-4 B.C., the Pharisees refused to take an oath of loyalty to Herod and the Romans, and were therefore look upon with skepticism by the Roman rulers. The Romans allowed the Jewish Sanhedrin, composed mostly of Sadducees, to have some control of internal affairs in Palestine, but Josephus, the Jewish historian, notes that even the Sadducees had to capitulate "to the formulas of the Pharisees, since otherwise the masses would not tolerate them."

Even among modern Jews there is a respected veneration for the Pharisees. These men were the "freedom fighters," the heroes of Jewish liberation, brave men who helped to preserve God's people. Jews don't appreciate the fact that Christians hold the Pharisees in such disdain, to the extent that the English language even defines "pharisaism" as an attitude marked by hypocrisy and self-righteousness.

It is true that we can see some admirable points in the history of the Pharisees. They were dedicated national heroes. They accepted the Scriptures as God-given, and were careful Old Testament students. They kept the ceremonial laws, tithed sacrificially, emphasized the study of the Old Testament, and looked forward to the coming of the Messiah. 1

But during the ministry of Jesus, almost one hundred years after the establishment of their influence and power, the Pharisees represented almost everything that was the antithesis of what Jesus came to reveal in Himself. The Pharisees represented the predominant grass-roots religion of Judaism during the first half of the first century A.D. They were the "people's party." Their influence was felt far beyond their numbers, for only about one in ten people in Palestine were official members of the Pharisees.

Most of the scribes, who were the professional teachers of the Law, were Pharisees. Some of the priests were Pharisees. Some scholars regard the Zealots as an extremist, left-wing branch of Pharisaism, determined to deliver Israel from Roman rule by militaristic might.

Most of the Pharisees, though, had no scribal education. They were just people who wanted to live pure, separated lives, separating themselves from the amhares, the "people of the land," the "worldly" people. They joined together in closed communities (haburah) of religious association, which had strict rules of admission, demanding commitment to laws of purity and tithing. They tended to relate only to the haber, other members of the "brotherhood." They were committed to the Law of Moses, as well as the Halakah, the oral traditions of the rabbis, which included many of the seyag, the "fence" or "hedge" laws to keep people within the parameters of the law. They had regular meetings, and were organized under the leadership of a scribe.

External behavior and "appearances" were important to the Pharisees. Coleman refers to them as the "How do we look" cult.2 "The ethical side was more important than the theological side. They were far more concerned with orthopraxy than with orthodoxy." 3 But, they didn't practice what they preached!

Even the Jews themselves recognized the hypocrisy and false piety of the Pharisees. In the Talmud there was a list of seven kinds of Pharisees. (1) the "shoulder" Pharisee who wore his good deeds on his shoulder so everyone could see them. (2) the "wait a little" Pharisee who was always procrastinating and finding an excuse for putting off a good deed. (3) the "bruised" Pharisee who closed his eyes to avoid looking at a woman and ran into a wall and bruised himself. (4) the "hump-backed" Pharisee who always walked bent over in false humility. (5) the "ever-reckoning" Pharisee who was always counting up the number of his good deeds. (6) the "fearful" Pharisee who was terribly afraid of the wrath of God. (7) the God-loving Pharisee who was like Abraham.4

Criticism of the Pharisees was common. The Sadducees criticized them. The writings of the Essenes of the Qumran community, in the Dead Sea Scrolls, criticized them. Jesus criticized them intensely.
From here:
http://www.christinyou.net/pages/pharisaism.html

The part that I've marked blue is filled with many inaccuracies.

Let us look at what a Jewish website has to say about the Pharisees.

Of the various factions that emerged under Hasmonean rule, three are of particular interest: the Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes.

The Pharisees

The most important of the three were the Pharisees because they are the spiritual fathers of modern Judaism. Their main distinguishing characteristic was a belief in an Oral Law that God gave to Moses at Sinai along with the Torah. The Torah or Written Law was akin to the U.S. Constitution in the sense that it set down a series of laws that were open to interpretation. The Pharisees believed that God also gave Moses the knowledge of what these laws meant and how they should be applied. This oral tradition was codified and written down roughly three centuries later in what is known as the Talmud.

The Pharisees also maintained that an afterlife existed and that God punished the wicked and rewarded the righteous in the world to come. They also believed in a messiah who would herald an era of world peace.

Pharisees were in a sense blue-collar Jews who adhered to the tenets developed after the destruction of the Temple; that is, such things as individual prayer and assembly in synagogues.

The Sadducees

The Sadducees were elitists who wanted to maintain the priestly caste, but they were also liberal in their willingness to incorporate Hellenism into their lives, something the Pharisees opposed. The Sadducees rejected the idea of the Oral Law and insisted on a literal interpretation of the Written Law; consequently, they did not believe in an afterlife, since it is not mentioned in the Torah. The main focus of Sadducee life was rituals associated with the Temple.

The Sadducees disappeared around 70 A.D., after the destruction of the Second Temple (see below). None of the writings of the Sadducees survived, so the little we know about them comes from their Pharisaic opponents.

These two "parties" served in the Great Sanhedrin, a kind of Jewish Supreme Court made up of 71 members whose responsibility was to interpret civil and religious laws.

From here:
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/sadducees_pharisees_essenes.html

I've put in bold the key points and words.

The Christian websites makes many grave errors as follows:
But during the ministry of Jesus, almost one hundred years after the establishment of their influence and power, the Pharisees represented almost everything that was the antithesis of what Jesus came to reveal in Himself.

This is unfounded, in fact the contrary seems to be true when you study what the pharisees believed.
Some of the priests were Pharisees.
If there were any pharisees in the priesthood then there were very few, I actually think it is unlikely there were any. The Sadducees had the priesthood locked down. The pharisees were organised around the synagogue.
External behavior and "appearances" were important to the Pharisees. Coleman refers to them as the "How do we look" cult.2 "The ethical side was more important than the theological side. They were far more concerned with orthopraxy than with orthodoxy." 3 But, they didn't practice what they preached!
This is a grievous and totally erroneous thing to say. The same can be said of christians or of any group. There is actually no citations of this but the website is quoting a contemporary writer who we've never heard of, we don't know what his research is based on.

[size=14pt]Even the Jews themselves recognized the hypocrisy and false piety of the Pharisees. In the Talmud there was a list of seven kinds of Pharisees.[/size]

And this bring us to the crux of my point. The Talmud is a Pharisee book. It is the Oral Tradition written in a book. So what we have here is Self Criticism. If a pharisee is upbraiding another pharisee to stop being hypocritical does that mean that the definition of pharisee is a hypocritical person.
The pharisee tradition was a very democratic tradition. There were many debates and varying viewpoints. The tradition developed from this dialectical approach. Jesus could be a pharisee and still upbraid other pharisees. In fact as a pharisee he would focus his teachings on his fellow pharisees. This was the pharisee approach.

In fact the pharisee tradition at the time of Jesus can be seen as a dialectic between the Hillel viewpoint and the Shamma viewpoint. It is the Shamma pharisees that are strictly ritualistic and the Hillel pharisees are more liberal.
Hillel the Elder’s friendly adversary was Shammai, a native of the Land of Israel about whom little is known except that he was a builder, known for the strictness of his views. He was reputed to be dour, quick-tempered and impatient. Both lived during the reign of King Herod (37-4 BCE), an oppressive period in Jewish history because of the Roman occupation of the Land of Israel. Shammai was concerned that if Jews had too much contact with the Romans, the Jewish community would be weakened, and this attitude was reflected in his strict interpretation of Jewish law. Hillel did not share Shammai's fear and therefore was more liberal in his view of law.
From here:
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/hillel.html
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by huxley(m): 6:40pm On Apr 21, 2009
Why was Jesus so effusive in his praising of the pharasees in the following gospel text taken from Matt 5:

17Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.

18For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.

19Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

[size=14pt]
20For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.
[/size]
21Ye have heard that it was said of them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment:

22But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by Lady2(f): 4:57pm On Apr 22, 2009
I'm not sure of that interpretation of the verse. There is nothing about official interpreters in the original greek. It says literally that the scribes and pharisees ( οἱ γραμματεῖς καὶ οἱ Φαρισαῖοι. -oi grammateis kai oi pharisaioi) sit (ikathisan) in moses' chair (kathedras).

Sitting in Moses' chair means one has the authority to interpret scripture and define law for the people. Sitting in Moses' chair gives them the authority to interpret the scriptures. That's why they have the authority to interpret the scriptures.

The reason that I'm raising this topic is that I believe that Jesus was himself a Pharisee (as were his followers and the early christians) and that his criticism of them was in fact self criticism. Like when we criticise nigeria and the nigerian way of doing things. It doesn't mean that we are ourselves distinct from Nigerians.

You'll have to map out the similarities between Jesus and the Pharisees.

I think we all have a grave misunderstanding of the system of that time. The Pharisees and the Sadducees all had their respective roles in the Jewish religion and they were supposed to stay within the constraints of their roles, but couldn't. Instead of realising that they each had their roles. The Pharisees for interpreting the law, and the sadducees for carrying out the law. They were to work together and not against each other. They couldn't comprehend that, call it elitism. But it's the human nature.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by Lady2(f): 6:34pm On Apr 22, 2009
Oh KunleOshob

You mentioned that Catholics are misled to believing that pentecostals or protestants are not christians. Just wanted to correct you there. We aren't misled into thinking so. We acknowledge them as christians, we just know that they only have partial truth of the christian faith.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by PastorAIO: 7:33pm On Apr 22, 2009
~Lady~:

Sitting in Moses' chair means one has the authority to interpret scripture and define law for the people. Sitting in Moses' chair gives them the authority to interpret the scriptures. That's why they have the authority to interpret the scriptures.


What you've given above is an extrapolation, an interpretation. I was referring to the translation not the interpretation of what the verse said. The word official does not occur in the greek and neither does the word interpreters. (I know I said I wasn't sure about the interpretation of the verse, what I meant was the translation of the verse.)
The direct translation says that they sit in moses' chair. That could also be taken to mean not just that they interpreted Moses but that they wield the same authority that Moses wielded. Interpretations extrapolate from the text, while translations should try to stay as close to the text as possible.

~Lady~:


I think we all have a grave misunderstanding of the system of that time. The Pharisees and the Sadducees all had their respective roles in the Jewish religion and they were supposed to stay within the constraints of their roles, but couldn't. Instead of realising that they each had their roles. The Pharisees for interpreting the law, and the sadducees for carrying out the law. They were to work together and not against each other. They couldn't comprehend that, call it elitism. But it's the human nature.

This is quite wrong. What are you basing what you've said here on? There were no Sadducees or Pharisees originally in Jewish religion. The Sadducees emerged when the Greeks conquered Israel and instated their own puppet High Priest in the temple. The Sadducees rose in support of this new priesthood and were in favour of Israel becoming hellenized. This is all history, not a matter of opinion.
The pharisees rejected this hellenization and they had the popular support of the people. That is why they were as powerful as they were. To the point that the Sadducees had to compromise with them to keep the peace. They were not just different parts of Jewish religion. Their beliefs and ideologies were different.
I don't know how you arrived at your notion. Perhaps you can provide sources. However I know it not to be true as a matter of historical fact.

~Lady~:

You'll have to map out the similarities between Jesus and the Pharisees.

I've already given a few outlines above. I'll repeat them.


-Jesus was a Rabbi and taught in the Synagogues. This is what the Pharisees did.

- Jesus actually endorsed them (ideologically) when he tells us to do as they preach because they sit on the seat of Moses. He only tells us not to do as they do, because even they do not do as they preach.

- Jesus also demoted the importance of the Temple as the Pharisees did. He told the samaritan woman that God would be worshipped neither in the temple nor on the mountain. He dismissed the magnificence of the temple saying one day not one stone will be found on top of another. This was a typical pharisee attitude. Actually it was found more so with the Essenes, but the pharisees had a similar attitude.

- the Christian doctrine that we are all priests is a pharisee doctrine. The laws of cleanliness that they upheld were originally actually only meant for the levites and priesthood initially but they interpreted it apply to all the israelites, a people to be set apart for God.

[color=#000099]The Pharisees believed that the idea that all of the children of Israel were to be like priests was expressed elsewhere in the Torah, for example, when the Law itself was transferred from the sphere of the priesthood to every man in Israel (Exodus 19: 29-24; Deuteronomy 6: 7, 11: 19; comp. 31: 9; Jeremiah 2: 8, 18:18). Moreover, the Torah already provided some ways for all Jews to lead a priestly life: the precepts concerning unclean meat were perhaps intended originally for the priests, but were extended to the whole people (Leviticus 11; Deuteronomy 14:3-21); the prohibition of cutting the flesh in mourning for the dead (Deuteronomy 14: 1-2, Leviticus 19: 28; comp. Lev. 21: 5). The Pharisees believed that all Jews in their ordinary life, and not just the Temple priesthood or Jews visiting the Temple, should observe rules and rituals concerning purification.


-And indeed Paul's letters are full of Pharisee doctrines.
(This very same Gamaliel it was that Paul claimed with pride was his teacher. )

-When asked what was the greatest of the laws Jesus responded that it was the Shema. That is 'hear o israel . . . '. This is pharisee doctrine as taught by Hillel the grandfather of Gamaliel, probably the most influential pharisee ever. [/color]

And I would add to that also very importantly the belief that there were[b] two adams[/b].
There are just too many similarities when you look closely at it.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by huxley(m): 10:35pm On Apr 22, 2009
The Pharisees were the most righteous of the Jews, a fact acknowledge by Jesus himself when he enjoined people to have a degree of righteousness exceeding that of the Pharisees.  This is a far cry from the charge of hypocrites that some have levelled on them.  The high recommendation of the Pharisees comes from God himself.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by KunleOshob(m): 11:03am On Apr 23, 2009
~Lady~:

Oh KunleOshob

You mentioned that Catholics are misled to believing that pentecostals or protestants are not christians. Just wanted to correct you there. We aren't misled into thinking so. We acknowledge them as christians, we just know that they only have partial truth of the christian faith.
So in could you list out what the complete real truths of christian faith are? What is the central focus of the christian faith? Does it also iclude worshiping mary? please reply cos i would really like to know. Also was the full christianity being practised by the catholic church responsible for all the evil the catholic church authorixed in the middle ages?
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by Lady2(f): 6:30pm On Apr 23, 2009
@ Pastor AIO
I will return to yours.

@ KunleOshob
The fullness of the christian truth is knowing what the Bible says truly and fully and interpreting all passages in light of the other passages. Understanding the exegesis of what Christ and his apostles convey. It is really too long to post here. It is understanding who God is, why he created us, why after adam and eve sinned, he didn't wipe out humanity and started all over again, why he chose abram, why he changed his name and why he chose jacob and why he changed his name. why he chose moses, why he permitted certain things to happen, why he decided to redeem the world, why he decided to redeem the world through a messiah, why did the messiah have to be born of a woman, why didn't he just appear in human form, what is the purpose of his birth from a woman and why does the woman have to be a virgin when she conceives him, why mary, why did the woman have to marry, what is the purpose of the man she married, why did he have to have 12 disciples, why not 11 or 20, why did they all have to be men or why were they men. why did he have to die by crucifixion, why couldn't he have just been stoned to death, why couldn't his legs have been broken, after all he had power to heal his legs when he resurrected. why did he start his ministry at the prompting of the woman, why does he call his mother woman at beginning of his ministry, why does he call her woman at the foot of the cross, after all he did go on to say to the disciple that the woman was now his mother, why didn't he just call her mother and then give her away, why did he have to give her away, didn't she have other children that could have taken care of her? why give her away?
why does he call himself the son of man, what does the son of man mean? why does he institute the eucharist or holy communion? why did he have to be betrayed, everyone already knew his whereabouts and they had chances to catch him and take him to trial, why didn't they do it at that point. why does he take his last breath at 3pm, what is the significance of that 3pm. why does he have to carry the cross? why does he go through the crucifixion during the feast of the passover? why does he give holy communion in the form of bread and wine? why do we have to do it in remembrance of him? why forgiveness? and so many more questions are answered by the Catholic church.

Does it also iclude worshiping mary

nope, it includes honouring God's mother and honouring his saints, after all the Bible does instruct us to do so, and we see it too many times in the Bible. And mostly Mary tells us that all generations will call her blessed. You can't ust skip through passages in the Bible and hold some as more important than the other, they are all equally infallible.

Also was the full christianity being practised by the catholic church responsible for all the evil the catholic church authorixed in the middle ages?

Yes it was being practiced by the Church, and the Church teaches the fullness of truth. Now there are members of the Church that do not practice the fullness of the truth. However just because people do not always practice what they preach does not mean that they do not preach the truth.
The church's teaches the truth and it is up to its members to practice them.
If we are to go by your reasoning, then no one earth has the fullness of truth, and Christ would not leave us without us knowing the truth, and mostly it would mean that Christ failed when he said he will send us the Holy Spirit to guide us into all truth.
Unless you Kunle are trying to say that you are perfect.
Infact it would mean that the apostles also didn't know the fullness of the truth, and that infact would cast doubt on the New Testament writings. No where does it state that the requirement for the true church would be that all the members would be sinless or perfect. Even those who walked with Christ weren't. Even the one he gave the Keys to Kingdom of Heaven denied him 3 times. Go figure. If the Bible states that the members of the Church would be sinless, pls show me. The Church is sinless because the Church is the body of Christ, but the members are not.

Also pls make sure that you do some more research on the history of the Catholic Church as there are hardly any credible historians who would claim that the atrocious acts that were taught as being fashioned by the Church were really by the Church. Just because it is popularly known does not make it true.

Let it be noted, that the Catholic Church has never taught error and neither has she practiced error, but her members have. There has never been a Pope that sits on the chair pf Peter (remember the chair of moses from the other discussion?) that has ever issued a decree ex-cathedra, that is from the Chair of Peter binding upon all christians as a belief, that is atrocious.

If there ever has been let someone cite a source for it. Let me remind you that you will have to post that the Pope called for it ex-cathedra, not just that he stated it, but that he called for it ex-cathedra.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by noetic1: 7:37pm On Apr 23, 2009
@ AIO

To some extent u have a point but have refused to identify the main purpose of Jesus coming.

Jesus expects us to be "holier" than the pharasee`s like He was. but the difference is that while the pharasee condemned those who are unrighteous, full of sin and not of God, He commanded us to love them.

so in reality Christianity is holiness, humility, love kindness and all the other goodies the Father teached about.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by Bastage: 8:07pm On Apr 23, 2009
My personal take on it is that Jesus was much more likely to have been an Essene rather than a Pharisee.

http://latter-rain.com/Israel/essenes.htm
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by PastorAIO: 9:31pm On Apr 23, 2009
~Lady~:

There has never been a Pope that sits on the chair pf Peter (remember the chair of moses from the other discussion?) that has ever issued a decree ex-cathedra, that is from the Chair of Peter binding upon all christians as a belief, that is atrocious.

If there ever has been let someone cite a source for it. Let me remind you that you will have to post that the Pope called for it ex-cathedra, not just that he stated it, but that he called for it ex-cathedra.

I'm sorry, but that's a really tall order. How is anyone supposed to know whether the popes were sitting in the kathedra or not when they were using their authority to order all manner of atrocities? How would I know whether the sale of indulgences was done from the Cathedra or not? Heck, how would you know, as a catholic which orders are binding and which are not? How do you know if the pope was giving it ex-cathedra or while he was on his toilet seat? All you know is that the pope has said such and such.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by PastorAIO: 9:42pm On Apr 23, 2009
n_o_e_t_ic:

@ AIO

To some extent u have a point but have refused to identify the main purpose of Jesus coming.

Jesus expects us to be "holier" than the pharasee`s like He was. but the difference is that while the pharasee condemned those who are unrighteous, full of sin and not of God, He commanded us to love them.

so in reality Christianity is holiness, humility, love kindness and all the other goodies the Father teached about.

A number of things . . .
First, the title of this thread is 'What is the Difference between a Christian and a Pharisee?'. Not 'What is the Main Purpose of Jesus Coming?'. So I have not refused to identify anything. To make a refusal one must first hear a request. If you are making a request I think I can oblige you and yet satisfy the topic of this thread, but first let me answer a couple of other things you've said.

Second, You need to show me where pharisees 'condemned those who are unrighteous, full of sin and not of God'. If that was a part of Pharisee doctrine then can you please show me where they said that. Yes they wanted to preserve Jewish culture and not mix with the Greeks and adopt greek customs, but that is not a condemnation of Greeks. Love your neighbour as your self is in the Jewish Torah and the Pharisees upheld that. They are the ones who first articulated the Shema as the most important law: Hear O Israel, the Lord thy God is One, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all your strength and all your might.

Thirdly you have not showed me one place where Christian doctrine differed from Pharisee doctrine. Perhaps first you need to find out what the doctrines of the Pharisees were.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by PastorAIO: 9:54pm On Apr 23, 2009
Bastage:

My personal take on it is that Jesus was much more likely to have been an Essene rather than a Pharisee.

http://latter-rain.com/Israel/essenes.htm

I hear you but there are some differences there. The Essenes did not interact with the world and get involved with politics. Jesus was out in the world and also Jesus was part of the Rabbinic tradition. He was a Rabbi and taught in the synagogues. On the other hand it is thought that the Essenes were the real original Jewish priests that left Jerusalem in disgust after the Greeks imposed a puppet high priest. They called their community the New temple. The pharisiac tradition on the other hand tried to blur the distinction between Priests and laymen. Laymen were called to perform the purification rites and live purely like the Levitical priests were supposed to do. Pharisees called on every one to be priests. The Rabbinical tradition belonged to the pharisees. Jesus was a Rabbi.
Jesus never baptised. His disciples did, but he never did. Baptism was mainly practiced by the Essenes, but I don't think the pharisees baptised. This matter of baptism is the main point that you could say could distinguish early christians from pharisees. Although there is no record that the pharisees didn't baptise. However the bible says clearly that Jesus didn't baptise.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by noetic1: 10:00pm On Apr 23, 2009
Pastor AIO:

A number of things . . .
First, the title of this thread is 'What is the Difference between a Christian and a Pharisee?'. Not 'What is the Main Purpose of Jesus Coming?'. So I have not refused to identify anything. To make a refusal one must first hear a request. If you are making a request I think I can oblige you and yet satisfy the topic of this thread, but first let me answer a couple of other things you've said.

Second, You need to show me where pharisees 'condemned those who are unrighteous, full of sin and not of God'. If that was a part of Pharisee doctrine then can you please show me where they said that. Yes they wanted to preserve Jewish culture and not mix with the Greeks and adopt greek customs, but that is not a condemnation of Greeks. Love your neighbour as your self is in the Jewish Torah and the Pharisees upheld that. They are the ones who first articulated the Shema as the most important law: Hear O Israel, the Lord thy God is One, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all your strength and all your might.

Thirdly you have not showed me one place where Christian doctrine differed from Pharisee doctrine. Perhaps first you need to find out what the doctrines of the Pharisees were.
u postulated that Jesus was not different from the Pharisees, thats my bone of contention.

I ask u what was the major difference and bone of contention (apart from the status of Jesus) between Jesus and the Pharisees?
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by PastorAIO: 12:01am On Apr 24, 2009
n_o_e_t_ic:

u postulated that Jesus was not different from the Pharisees, thats my bone of contention.

I ask u what was the major difference and bone of contention (apart from the status of Jesus) between Jesus and the Pharisees?

I didn't just say that Jesus was not different from the pharisees. I said that Jesus was a pharisee.

As a pharisee there cannot really be a major difference between Jesus and the pharisees. As a pharisee Jesus has every right to criticise his own.

As a nigerian I have every right to criticize and complain about the rampant corruption, superficiality and idiocy of nigerian society. That does not make me not a nigerian.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by Lady2(f): 12:26am On Apr 24, 2009
I'm sorry, but that's a really tall order. How is anyone supposed to know whether the popes were sitting in the kathedra or not when they were using their authority to order all manner of atrocities? How would I know whether the sale of indulgences was done from the Cathedra or not? Heck, how would you know, as a catholic which orders are binding and which are not? How do you know if the pope was giving it ex-cathedra or while he was on his toilet seat? All you know is that the pope has said such and such.

Whatever is being said ex-cathedra is binding upon all Christians. For example the fact that we cannot have or support abortions is binding on all Christians, or that we cannot support gay marriages or unions is binding on all christians or embryonic stem cells and all teaching having to do with faith and morals. So in actuality the only thing that can 100% be known by all christians is something ex-cathedra. If it is not ex-cathedra, I am not bound to following it and I can disagree with the Pope. Popes give personal opinions and their personal opinions can and have been wrong, however it is just that his personal opinions and is therefore not of the Church. Just because the Pope said doesn't mean it is true. However if the Pope says it ex-cathedra we know that it is true and is from God, and is not his own personal opinion. So even if a Pope wishes to state his persoanl opinion ex-cathedra he cannot. A Pope tried and he couldn't speak in the duration of his audience. He could only open his mouth after everyone left, so ofcourse people looked at him as if he was stupid and those who disagreed with him were very happy.

As for indulgences the Pope didn't even know it was being sold and in reality it was done by one very stupid Bishop. Indulgences aren't wrong, infortunately ppl weren't even told what indulgences were.

So how would I know? It has to be taught. So all Bishops are informed and they in turn inform the Priests in their diocese or archdiocese, and the priests informs the people.
They do not have to tell us the Pope said it if he was saying it while on the toilet seat.

That's why Catholics on this board have been trying to explain that the Pope's infallibility doesn't lie with the Pope personally, but with the Papal Office. So the Pope can make personal statements that can be wrong, however he cannot make statements on faith and morals wrongly. The Holy Spirit won't allow that.
And if God forbid a Pope happens to be a thug we pray for his happy death.

None of the atrocious acts that I still haven't received a citing for, have ever been announced ex-cathedra, meaning it cannot be attributed to the Church, it can only be attributed to those persons who commit the act.

Just as we can't say ALL fathers are killers because some fathers killed their children, or that all christians are hypocrites because we see christian hypocrites everyday, we also cannot say that the Catholic Church committed those acts. And even at that no one has yet produced the acts the Church supposedly committed from credible historical sources.

Oh as to your earlier post, I was stating my personal opinion, which was why I stated "I think we all misunderstand"
I also wasn't trying to say that your information was incorrect I was only stating actually from what I perceived from your posts that each sect had a job to do and instead of working together, they tried to show that this one is better than the other and vice versa
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by 8oracle(m): 12:47am On Apr 24, 2009
Pharisee mean the distinguished one,and they call non member Amaharets meaning people of the dust(the masses) they love showy display,load and public prayer so to be heard seen by others, they make long prayers to impress onlookers,the hobnob with the ruling class(hand in hand with herod and pontius pilate) have elaborated the mosaic laws in their book Mishnah,thereby arrogating to themselves interpreters of the law and vicars of God,we hve them
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by duduspace(m): 2:49am On Apr 24, 2009
No difference at all, they are simply different cadres in a profession of lies.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by mazaje(m): 6:53am On Apr 24, 2009
duduspace:

No difference at all, they are simply different cadres in a profession of lies.

grin grin grin grin
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by Bastage: 10:06am On Apr 24, 2009
I hear you but there are some differences there.  The Essenes did not interact with the world and get involved with politics.

The fact is that we simply can't make that statement with certainty. We only have a couple of accounts and they only describe two of the Essene sects. There were a minimum of seven. The Essenes also weren't as seclusive as many believe - according to Josephus, the Essenes had settled "not in one city" but "in large numbers in every town". They are considered to have had "headquarters" at Qumran and Engeda.

Personally, I don't see it as a huge step for Jesus to be an Essene and decide to spread their message. Remember, we're looking at a guy who stepped outside the box.
When we take a look at the message, we see that it is much, much more compatible with the teachings of Jesus than with the teachings of the Pharisees or Saduccees.

The main factor to take into account is that the Essenes were amongst the only Jews who were messianic.
Then take into account their attitude to wealth, their pacifism, their attitude to divorce, their abstinence from worldly pleasures, their attitude to commerce, their rituals of baptism and a myriad of other similarities to the Christian message and they look by far the likeliest candidate to have produced Jesus.

We can also take into account the description of John the Baptist (that certainly seems to describe an Essene) and even the word used to describe one certain sect of Essenes - Nazarean. The latter is the word that may clear up the confusion over Nazareth - a town that didn't even exist in Jesus' time.

Luke 4 would seem to be describing Jesus' relationship with the Essene sect that raised him and how he came to preach. It would also explain their reaction to his preaching. I believe that we can swap the word "Nazareth" for "town of the Nazareans". The verse can't be describing Nazareth anyway - as I've said, it didn't exist and Verse 29 says: "And rose up, and thrust him out of the city, and led him unto the brow of the hill whereon their city was built, that they might cast him down headlong."
Nazareth wasn't built on a hill. It was built in a valley. In contrast, the Essene towns of Qumran and Engeda were both built on hills.
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by PastorAIO: 3:07pm On Apr 25, 2009
Now the following is very interesting. It looks at three different sources of the christological belief. The basic gist of it is that the Pharisees believed that two Adams were created. The primordial Adam was the one through whom the world was given form. He was the Messiah and it was also believed that this primordial Adam would one day incarnate as a human being, flesh and blood. This first Adam was quite different from the Adam made of clay that became our progenitor. There was also a Jewish philosopher from Alexandria called Philo who went on to equate this Primordial Adam with what the Greeks called the Logos. Again the Logos was seen as the Form or the Order of the Universe. Or in other words the Ordering principle of the universe.

Then a few decades Later St. Paul, who remember claimed he was a pharisee that studied under Gamaliel, goes on to articulate in 1Corinthians chapter15 a christology that relies heavily on the idea of 2 Adams. The second Adam (ie the primordial) having incarnated in the person of Jesus Christ. In other words the difference between Paul and the Pharisees, presumably, is that whereas most pharisees were still waiting for the incarnation of the primordial Adam, ie the Messiach, Paul was saying that he had already incarnated.

And then a few more decades laters the writer of John's gospel doesn't mince his words and states straight that Jesus was the Incarnation of the Logos. Remember that the Greek Logos and the Pharisee Primordial Adam had already been equated by Philo.




Philo.

The various philosophical (Gnostic) views concerning the original man are, in spite of their differences, intimately related, being a compound of Oriental mythology, Greek philosophy, and rabbinical theology. The first to use the expression "original man," or "heavenly man," is Philo, in whose view the γενικός, or ουράντος ἄνθρωπος, "as being born in the image of God, has no participation in any corruptible or earthlike essence; whereas the earthly man is made of loose material, called a lump of clay" ("De Allegoriis Legum," I. xii.). The heavenly man, as the perfect image of the Logos, is neither man nor woman, but an incorporeal intelligence purely an idea; while the earthly man, who was created by God later, is perceptible to the senses and partakes of earthly qualities ("De Mundi Opificio," i. 46). Philo is evidently combining Midrash and philosophy, Plato and the rabbis. Setting out from the duplicate Biblical account of Adam, who was formed in the image of God (Gen. i. 27), and of the first man, whose body God formed from the earth (Gen. ii. 7), he combines with it the Platonic doctrine of ideas; taking the primordial Adam as the idea, and the created man of flesh and blood as the "image." That Philo's philosophic views are grounded on the Midrash, and not vice versa, is evident from his seemingly senseless statement that the "heavenly man," the οὐράνιος ἄνθρωπος (who is merely an idea), is "neither man nor woman." This doctrine, however, becomes quite intelligible in view of the following ancient Midrash. The remarkable contradiction between the two above-quoted passages of Genesis could not escape the attention of the Pharisees, to whom the Bible was a subject of close study. In explaining the various views concerning Eve's creation, they taught ('Er. 18a, Gen. R. viii.) that Adam was created as a man-woman (androgynos), explaining (Gen. i. 27) as "male and female" instead of "man and woman," and that the separation of the sexes arose from the subsequent operation upon Adam's body, as related in the Scripture. This explains Philo's statement that the original man was neither man nor woman.

Midrash.

This doctrine concerning the Logos, as also that of man made "in the likeness" ("De Confusione Linguarum," xxviii.), though tinged with true Philonic coloring, is also based on the theology of the Pharisees. For in an old Midrash (Gen. R. viii. 1) it is remarked: "'Thou hast formed me behind and before' (Ps. cxxxix. 5) is to be explained 'before the first and after the last day of Creation.' For it is said, 'And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters,' meaning the spirit of the Messiah ["the spirit of Adam" in the parallel passage, Midr. Teh. to cxxxix. 5; both readings are essentially the same], of whom it is said (Isa. xi. 2), 'And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him.'" This contains the kernel of Philo's philosophical doctrine of the creation of the original man. He calls him the idea of the earthly Adam, while with the rabbis the (spirit of Adam) not only existed before the creation of the earthly Adam, but was preexistent to the whole of creation. From the preexisting Adam, or Messiah, to the Logos is merely a step.

Paul.

The above-quoted Midrash is even of greater importance for the understanding of the Pauline Christology
, as affording the key to Paul's doctrine of the first and second Adam. The main passage in Pauline Christology is I Cor. xv. 45-50. According to this there is a double form of man's existence; for God created a heavenly Adam in the spiritual world and an earthly one of clay for the material world. The earthly Adam came first into view, although created last. The first Adam was of flesh and blood and therefore subject to death—merely "a living soul"; the second Adam was "a life-giving spirit"—a spirit whose body, like the heavenly beings in general, was only of a spiritual nature. The apparently insuperable difficulty of the Pauline Christology which confronts the expounders of the New Testament (see, for instance, Holtzmann, "Lehrbuch der Neu-Testamentlichen Theologie," ii. 75 et seq.) disappears entirely when reference is made to the Midrash. As a pupil ofGamaliel, Paul simply operates with conceptions familiar to the Palestinian theologians. Messiah, as the Midrash remarks, is, on the one hand, the first Adam, the original man who existed before Creation, his spirit being already present. On the other hand, he is also the second Adam in so far as his bodily appearance followed the Creation, and inasmuch as, according to the flesh, he is of the posterity of Adam. Paul, therefore, is not dependent upon Philo for his Christology, as most scholars hold; indeed, he differs from him on most essential points. With Philo the original man is an idea; with Paul he is the personality of Jesus. With Philo the first man is the original man; Paul identifies the original man with the second Adam. The Christian apostle evidently drew upon the Palestinian theology of his day; but it can not be denied that in ancient times this theology was indebted to the Alexandrians for many of its ideas, and probably among them for that of preexistence. The Midrash thus considered affords a suitable transition to the Gnostic theories of the original man.

From here:
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=761&letter=A
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by MadMax1(f): 3:30pm On Apr 25, 2009
What you're saying is, Christ might have been a member of the religious council of Pharisees,since a Pharisee at the time did not have the negative connotations it does today; they were religious elders who interpreted the Jewish Laws and preached in synagogues. You're saying they might be compared to Christians in that much of Christian religious activity- preaching, praying, giving to the poor, even some religious thought- mirrors theirs? If not for labels, they might even be categorised as the same? Is that what you're saying?
Re: What Is The Difference Between A Christian And A Pharisee? by PastorAIO: 3:57pm On Apr 25, 2009
Well the bible states explicitly that he was a rabbi. Well the Rabbis were pharisees. Too many of their religious doctrines not to mention the rhetoric with which they articulated these doctrines were the same. Where perhaps there may have been a difference between christians and Pharisee is in whether or not Jesus was that Primordial Adam, the Messiah. (And also the Pharisees did not necessarily see the messiah as a military leader either. )

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