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Luke and the Pharisees

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

J. A. Ziesler
J. A. Ziesler
Affiliation:
Bristol, England
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Extract

The reasonably clear picture of the Pharisees at the time of Jesus which we thought we had is now looking decidedly unclear. J. Bowker's work questions whether the Pharisees were the predecessors of the Rabbis, and J. Neusner's massive researches have shown how precarious are statements about the Pharisees before A.d. 70 when once critical techniques long used in Gospel criticism are employed on Rabbinic sources. It therefore seems appropriate to examine afresh the NT picture of the Pharisees, and in practice this means the Gospel picture, for elsewhere they are named once only, in Phil. iii. 5. I shall hope to show that this picture is strange and by no means uniform. We may conveniently attack the problem through Luke-Acts, partly because of the time-span involved, and partly because of the often noticed fact that Luke is rather less hostile to the Pharisees than the other evangelists are.

Type
Articles
Information
New Testament Studies , Volume 25 , Issue 2 , January 1979 , pp. 146 - 157
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1979

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References

page 146 note 1 Bowker, J., Jesus and the Pharisees (Cambridge, 1973).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 146 note 2 Neusner, J., The Rabbinic Traditions about the Pharisees Before 70 (3 vols. Leiden, 1971)Google Scholar. There is a useful summary of recent discussion, together with a stimulating enquiry into the existence, nature, and grounds of opposition between Jesus and the Pharisees, in Merkel, H., ‘Jesus und die Pharisäer’, N.T.S. 14 (1967–1968), 194–208.Google Scholar

page 146 note 3 O'Neill, J. C., The Theology of Acts (2nd ednLondon, 1970), p. 95.Google Scholar

page 146 note 4 See Barrett, C. K., New Testament Essays (London, 1972), p. 82.Google Scholar

page 146 note 5 Luke seems not to see that the gulf is still wide, even in the matter of the resurrection: believing in resurrection is not at all the same as believing that this man Jesus was raised! Cf. Haenchen, E., The Acts of the Apostles (Eng. tr. Oxford, 1971), P. 115.Google Scholar

page 147 note 1 Professor Kenneth Grayston has pointed out to me that such a Ulysses-like ploy would appeal to Hellenistic readers.

page 147 note 2 Cf. Acts xvii. 18, also iv. 2, and Haenchen, Acts, p. 101; Conzelmann, H., The Theology of Saint Luke (Eng. tr. London, 1960), p. 205.Google Scholar

page 147 note 3 Flender, Cf. H., St Luke: Theologian of Redemptive History (Eng. tr. London, 1967), pp. 49, 108, 117.Google Scholar

page 148 note 1 The Western Text probably did not originally include a reference to Pharisees at xv. 5, but identified the speakers there with the men of xv. 1; D however has probably conflated with the B text, by making both the xv. 1 and the xv. 5 people believing Pharisees. If the Western Text (apart from D) omits mention of Pharisees, it also softens the requirements laid down by the ‘Council’ – and the two may well be connected. See Epp, E. J., The Theological Tendency of Codex Bezae Canta-brigiensis in Acts (Cambridge, 1966), pp. 100 n. 1, 102Google Scholar; also Dibelius, M., Studies in the Acts of the Apostles (Eng. tr. London, 1956), pp. 93, 110Google Scholar. It is interesting that although, as Epp shows, the text of D is consistently more anti-Jewish than that of B, it does not seem to be noticeably more anti-Pharisaic.

page 148 note 2 Conzelmann, Cf., Luke, p. 78Google Scholar; Flender, , Luke, p. 108.Google Scholar

page 149 note 1 This assumes that Luke distinguishes between scribes and Pharisees. It could be argued that in v. 17 when he amplifies the Markan ‘scribes’ to ‘Pharisees and teachers of the Law’ he betrays his understanding of ‘scribes’. Again, Acts xxiii. 9 could be taken to mean that ‘scribes’ equals ‘Pharisees’. And of course scribes are present in the Lukan Passion Narrative. But the problem remains that Luke ceases to use the term ‘Pharisees’ in the Passion Story; moreover, Luke xi. 37–47 certainly appears to distinguish lawyers and Pharisees, and υ.53 identifies lawyers with scribes.

page 149 note 2 Easton, B. S., The Gospel According to St Luke (Edinburgh, 1926), pp. 221 fGoogle Scholar. He states, rather than argues, this view.

page 150 note 1 The groupings in which ‘Pharisees’ occurs are fascinating. In Mark, ‘scribes and Pharisees’ occurs only twice, but more often in Luke and especially in Matthew. ‘Pharisees and Sadducees’ is peculiar to Matthew, ‘Pharisees and Herodians’ to Mark. ‘Chief Priests and Pharisees’ is in Matthew and John only, and ‘rulers and Pharisees’ is in John only. Luke alone three times has ‘Pharisees and lawyers’ (or ‘teachers of the Law’) and a comparison of v. 17 with v. 21 suggests he equates the latter with the scribes – perhaps he is explaining what scribes are, though he often mentions them without explaining. In all four Gospels, the Pharisees occur most commonly unaccompanied. Oddly, ‘elders and Pharisees’ never occurs, though elders appear with almost all the groups which are also linked with Pharisees; a simple equation of elders and Pharisees would founder, however, on the distribution of ‘elders’ throughout the Synoptics, including Passion Narratives and pre-Passion material, and the limitation of ‘Pharisees’ to the former.

page 153 note 1 Another case is the parable of the Wicked Husbandmen, Mark xii. 1–12/Matt. xxi. 33–46/ Luke xx. 9–19. Matthew makes it explicitly an attack on the Pharisees, as Mark and Luke do not.

page 153 note 2 Matt, xxiii. 14 is surely a harmonizing from parallels, and not to be read.

page 154 note 1 On this, as on the whole chapter, esp. υυ. 29–39, see Hare, D. R. A., The Theme of Jewish Persecution of Christians in the Gospel According to St Matthew (Cambridge, 1967), pp. 80–96CrossRefGoogle Scholar. He believes Matthew has intensified Q's anti-Pharisaism, but that in Luke it survives merely as a literary convention.

page 156 note 1 So Goulder, M. D., Type and History in Acts (London, 1964), p. 90.Google Scholar

page 156 note 2 See the summary of discussion in Hill, D., The Gospel of Matthew (London, 1972), pp. 39–41.Google Scholar

page 157 note 1 Cf. Bowker on divisions within the Hakamim, Jesus and the Pharisees, pp. 29–38.Google Scholar