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SADDUCEES

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Originally appearing in Volume V23, Page 990 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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SADDUCEES , a See also:

sect or party of the See also:Jews mentioned in the See also:historical books of the New Testament (with the exception of the See also:fourth See also:Gospel), by See also:Josephus, and in the See also:Talmud. According to all the authorities, the essential qualification for the See also:title is the denial of certain beliefs which the See also:Pharisees held to be implicitly contained in Scripture, and therefore necessarily See also:part of Judaism as soon as they were formulated. From their own point of view they were orthodox conservatives, so far as they really cared to remain for whatever See also:reason—within the See also:pale of Jewry and i See also:SADE-SA DE See also:MIRANDA to justify their presence there. From the standpoint of the Pharisees who championed the See also:hope of See also:everlasting See also:life and believed in the existence of angels, through whom See also:God could communicate with men, they were infidels. As the Pharisees accumulated the oral tradition which was afterwards codified and elaborated or preserved by fragments, which served some useful purpose, in the Talmud and other Rabbinic writings, the Sadducees acquired See also:concrete regulations to oppose so See also:long as they dared. The Pharisees even improved upon the See also:Temple See also:ritual, and their popularity enabled them to force the Sadducees into adopting the improvements. But though some of those who See also:bore the title may be reckoned at their best as orthodox conservatives, their position was, as far as our mainly Pharisaic authorities permit us to learn, merely negative; and all the See also:information we possess, whether it rests on facts or on See also:prejudice, points to their See also:close See also:affinity with the Jews who renounced their faith altogether and advertised the fact—say by habitual and unwarranted See also:breach of the See also:Sabbath, for example. In fact, broadly speaking, the Sadducees for the See also:period during which they are reported to exist, represent and embody the tendency to conformity with neighbouring Gentiles, which is deplored and denounced by Jewish writers from See also:Moses to See also:Philo. And there is this to be said that See also:idolatry may be an outward See also:symbol of a real indebtedness to idolaters which is not necessarily wiped out when the tangible idols are smashed. Idolatry is plainly incompatible with the See also:law of Moses: so were See also:Greek caps; but the Jews who conformed to See also:Hellenism in the See also:time of See also:Antiochus Epiphanes acquired much that was conserved and utilized in that See also:great See also:attempt to convert the Greek See also:world to Judaism, whose best See also:monument is the See also:works of Philo. The See also:process is normal: first, there is an unqualified See also:adoption of a See also:foreign culture by the Sadducees of the time being: then, after unqualified opposition, the Pharisees of the time admit whatever is admissible within the four corners of the Law and are See also:con-fronted by other Sadducees who have not followed the first into temporary or permanent separation from the existing Jewish way of life and absorption in the immediate foreign environment, and who, therefore, will have none of the current innovations which the Pharisees have in course of time selected as capable of assimilation and reconciliation with the existing See also:body of growing See also:doctrine and practice. The Jews spoiled the Egyptians: some made a See also:golden See also:calf and worshipped it: others destroyed it and turned the spoils into vessels for the See also:sanctuary: some again sighed for the fleshpots of See also:Egypt, if they did not actually return thither.

The controversies of the Pharisees and Sadducees afford a typical example of this process. With the approval of Antiochus Epiphanes, the Sadducean See also:

section embraced the outward forms of Hellenism, and out of the persecution of the orthodox which followed was See also:born the hope of a future life which was in the circumstances the necessary corollary of God's righteousness and was discovered to be latent in Scripture. Later Sadducees, who actually bore the name, resisted this and all the characteristics of the Pharisees and continued to flatter the predominant foreigner—Greek or See also:Roman—by imitating him with less reckless bravado than the first Hellenizers and with growing assurance. They were men of the world, and men of this world, and, so far as they still professed and practised Judaism, they preferred to repudiate the additions for which they See also:felt no need, but which had entered into the faith of their fathers. The Pharisees, who pruned and fed the See also:tree of Judaism so that it might See also:bear See also:fruit for the healing of the Nation—and the nations in the latter days—gave them the opportunity of posing as the champions of the See also:primitive See also:standards. But, though the reformers thus played into the hands of the Sadducees, the See also:people were not deceived by the badge which Sadducean priests adopted and paraded to See also:save their faces: they loved the Pharisees and were ready to go to See also:death at their bidding. The Sadducees were the hypocrites of the Jewish world, just as the Epicureans were the hypocrites of the Greek world. The See also:rest of the Jews rated the Sadducees as atheists, just as the rest of the Greeks rated the Epicureans as atheists and discerned, as See also:Plutarch said, the sardonic grinbehind the See also:mask of their obsequious devotion to the ceremonies at which the force of public See also:opinion compelled their attendance. The Sadducee was a See also:Jew outwardly so long as he so retained See also:place, See also:power and profit. The destruction of See also:Jerusalem, long before it was consummated in A.D. 70, robbed them of the place and nation which alone compensated them for the inconveniences of their nominal See also:allegiance. They knew well enough the power of invincible See also:Rome; and her advance warned them to take themselves and their talents to the See also:market of the wide world, to which in See also:heart and mind they had always belonged.

Josephus (See also:

Ant. xiii. 5. 9, §§ 171-173, Niese) introduces the Sadducees along with the Pharisees and See also:Essenes in his See also:account of See also:Jonathan's reign (161–143 s.c.) as the third of the sects of the Jews, and defines their tenets thus: " They deny the existence of God (Josephus says ' See also:Fate,' as he is speaking to pagans) and the Divine See also:government of human affairs; and they assert that everything lies in our power, so that we are responsible for our See also:good or See also:bad See also:fortune." Similarly, in the earlier See also:history of the Jewish See also:War (ii. 8. 14, §§ 164-166, Niese) to which he refers, he says: " The Sadducees do away with Destiny altogether and set God beyond the possibility of punishing or supervising men. They assert that See also:man is See also:free to choose good or evil since both are set before him, and that he receives good or evil according to his choice. They deny the See also:immortality of the soul and the punishments and rewards of Hades. In contrast with the mutual friendliness and See also:loyalty of the Pharisees, their behaviour towards one another is lacking In See also:courtesy, and when they mix with their See also:fellow-countrymen, they are as offhanded as if their See also:fellows were aliens." Josephus might have added that they were disposed to treat aliens as they should have treated. their See also:friends. In the New Testament there is already a tendency to ignore the Sadducees and to See also:transfer to the surviving and active sect of the Pharisees denunciations addressed to hypocrites. The See also:feud which set Pharisee and Sadducee against one another is ignored, and generally the condign oblivion which overtook this sect of the Jews is already beginning. , The See also:Christian Fathers seem to confound them with the See also:Samaritans, and the confusion is natural enough. The Sadducees were as little loyal to the Judaism of Jerusalem as the Samaritans—and they were less sincere and less interested in See also:religion.

The Talmud reports See also:

ancient controversies on points of law; and gives the Sadducees a founder, Zadok the See also:disciple of Antigonus the man of Socp who prohibited the hope of See also:reward for service done to God. But this explanation of the name is as worthless as the rest of the Talmudic accounts of the Sadducees who were already dead and gone. For the See also:present the explanation put forward by A. E. See also:Cowley (Ency. Bib. 4236) holds the See also:field: a See also:Persian word Zindik meaning Zoroastrian, and therefore infidel in the mouths of those who did not hold with Zoroaster, was applied to them by their opponents, and gradually altered so as to mean something in See also:Hebrew —t.e. Zadokite or Righteous. Its acquired significance could be varied by the See also:inflexion of the See also:voice or the See also:suggestion of inverted commas. Schiirer (Geschichte See also:des jiidischen Volkes, ii., 4th ed., pp. 447-456, 475-489) gives the See also:evidence of the ancient authorities and references to See also:modern studies of the subject. See also JEWS.

U. H. A.

End of Article: SADDUCEES

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