spin

This position sees correct, being fairly standard understanding of the situation from Jewish literature. The title "rabbi" (my master) wasn't used to refer to anyone prior to the end of the first century according to rabbinical texts. The term wasn't used in respect for earlier figures either. None of the Pharisaic figures starting from the "great sanhedrin" had the title and not even the great Hillel received the title. The first in the literature to receive such a tittle seems to be rabban Gamaliel (II), so we have a strong indication that "rabbi" reflects historical usage and would be anachronistic in the first part of the first century.

This is another indicator that at least some of the gospel material was written late and has overtly questionable historical value.


spin

Solitary Man

Gamaliel the II, still mid first century, received the title, but it is unknown if the title was applied to earlier people for something other than how it was applied to Gamaliel. Your exclusion of Mark on this is purely special pleading.

spin

See the stupid position you put yourself in when you cannot date the texts you would like to use? There's no special pleading, just you talking rubbish. Another doh!

And Gamaliel II was last two decades of the first century. He was a younger contemporary of Yohanan ben Zakkai.


spin

Solitary Man

Gah, you threw me off. I meant Gamaliel the I.

Ted Hoffman

Anthony Saldarin does not say anything decisive in the cited passage. He notes that "we cannot be certain that Mark and his sources give us a completely accurate picture of the Pharisees as a strong community force in Galilee in the early and mid-1st century" and makes an argument about probability.
The Pharisees were a small purity group/sect. Josephus (in War) presents them as a party with no major role in politics (compared to the Essenes for example) and are known to have been exact and strict interpreters of the law - they occasionally played small roles in political affairs as seen elsewhere. This is argued by Jacob Neusner (From Politics to Piety, The Rabbinic Traditions About The Pharisees Before 70) and others.
What Jeffrey and anyone else who disagrees with Price ought to do is to provide evidence that supports the idea that Pharisees were major group with several members, not present speculations by other scholars.

spin

Yes, facts tend to have that effect on you.

For some unknown reason, as I clearly indicated "Gamaliel (II)". And you'll note his title was "rabban". The first use of "rabbi" in Jewish literature was even later with rabbi Jose (ben Halafta) and rabbi Aqiba, early 2nd c.


spin

gstafleu

Let's have a look at the piece by Anthony Saldarin quoted by Jeffrey::
So, when it comes to "were there Pharisees in Galilee at that time?", Josephus says No, Mark says Yes, which is pretty much where we started; the historian says: no pharisees.
Err, if Mark experienced Pharisees in Galilee around the time of the war, and then puts them where Josephus says they weren't, how is that not anachronistically reading them back?
So, we are moving a little back here, from "just before or after the war against Rome" (66–73 CE) to "the mid-1st century." Touch-and go, and a bit transparent attempt to get close to Jesus' time, but we'll let that slide. Still not relating to "the experience of Jesus himself" though.

We now snip some stuff that doesn't seem to bear on the presence of Pharisees in Galilee in Jesus' time. There is some question-begging in there: "The Pharisees, one of many political and religious interest groups seeking power...", which just assumes the Pharisees were in Galilee, or possibly is talking about not Galilee but e.g. Jerusalem--in both cases it doesn't do anything to show the presence of pharisees in Galilee.

And then finally we come to the zinger:
So, "we cannot be certain" but it is "is intrinsically probable." In other words it is not impossible. Fine. But this is supposed to be evidence for the presence of Pharisees in Galilee in Jesus time???

Gerard Stafleu

gstafleu

No it doesn't! It starts with saying that Josephus agrees with Price. It then continues to try and spuriously move the situation at the time of the war back to the time of Jesus. And it ends with saying that we cannot be sure if Mark was accurate, but that a pharisaic presence in Galilee was not impossible. Well, sure, maybe it is not impossible either. But we don't know it was the case either, plus Josephus seems to side with Price. If this is the best argument to be made for pharisees in Galilee in Jesus' time then Price seem to be in pretty good shape.

Gerard Stafleu

No Robots

The point is that Price is asserting that it is intrinsically improbable that there were synagogues and thus Pharisees in Galilee in the time of Christ, yet he provides no argument or evidence to justify this claim.

No Robots

A pertinent quotation from Saldarini:

The Pharisees do not appear as residents of Galilee in Josephus. Three Pharisees are sent to Galilee from Jerusalem as part of the delegation to remove Josephus as commander during the revolution. However, Josephus concentrates on events and people at the center of Judaism in Jerusalem in his works and never gives a complete account of the officials and groups who made up Jewish society. If the Pharisees were a minor presence in Galilee, they might easily have gone unmentioned in the War and Antiquities and even in the Life which recounts Josephus' exploits in Galilee. Their absence in Josephus' accounts of Galilee does suggest that they were not one of the leading political, social or religious forces there.--Pharisees, Scribes and Sadducees in Palestinian Society: A Sociological Approach By Anthony Joseph Saldarini, p. 292.

Saldarini continues by pointing out that, "Paul's identification of himself as a Pharisee to the Philippians in eastern Macedonia implies that the Pharisees were known and probably active outside Judea and Jerusalem."