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Pharisees

The Pharisees of 1st century Judaism and earlier are a very important sect in Judaism; they are seen as its most popular group and became its most powerful, and are also associated as the ancestors of the rabbinic movement. Gospel writers of the New Testament divulged an opinion of the Pharisees as hypocritical, though this is probably the result of the aversion of some of them to Jesus of Nazareth. Josephus considered the Pharisees to be "the most accurate interpreters of the laws and hold the position of the leading sect, attribute everything to Fate and to God" (Josephus, Jewish War? 2:162). Alan Segal says "the Pharisees were disposed to interpret the scriptural text broadly" (Segal RC 1986:53).

The Pharisees and the "Parting of the Ways"

The Pharisees as a group seem to be one of the main keys in our understanding of what were some of the main causes in the split between Judaism and Christianity. Some of them were responsible for the change of 1st century Judaism to rabbinic Judaism, while others such as Saul of Tarsus (Paul the Apostle) became devout followers of Jesus and the Way. Perhaps because the Pharisees exercised such a broad freedom of scriptural interpretation, some of its members were able to see Jesus as a fulfillment of prophetic scripture, while others would have no part with it.

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