Pharisees outside Judea?

[Ken Olson]

There is another way to resolve this --- Paul was not a Pharisee.

This does not really help with the geographical problem I was posing. If Paul was not really a Pharisee in the same way Josephus was not really a Pharisee, it leaves the question of where Paul was educated in Pharisaism. Josephus was instructed by Pharisees in Judea, where, according to Josephus, Pharisees were the dominant biblical interpreters.

[robert j]

There is another way to resolve this --- Paul was not a Pharisee.

This does not really help with the geographical problem I was posing. If Paul was not really a Pharisee in the same way Josephus was not really a Pharisee, it leaves the question of where Paul was educated in Pharisaism. Josephus was instructed by Pharisees in Judea, where, according to Josephus, Pharisees were the dominant biblical interpreters.

It’s not entirely clear from reliable extant early sources just what training, education, initiation rituals, etc. may have been required to have been considered a Pharisee.

That said, Josephus’ own account is certainly fishy.

And when I was about sixteen years old, I had a mind to make trim of the several sects that were among us. These sects are three: - The first is that of the Pharisees, the second that Sadducees, and the third that of the Essenes, as we have frequently told you; for I thought that by this means I might choose the best, if I were once acquainted with them all; so I contented myself with hard fare, and underwent great difficulties, and went through them all. Nor did I content myself with these trials only; but when I was informed that one, whose name was Banus, lived in the desert, and used no other clothing than grew upon trees, and had no other food than what grew of its own accord, and bathed himself in cold water frequently, both by night and by day, in order to preserve his chastity, I imitated him in those things, and continued with him three years. So when I had accomplished my desires, I returned back to the city, being now nineteen years old, and began to conduct myself according to the rules of the sect of the Pharisees … (Josephus, Life)

Josephus claims to have spent only three years to become acquainted with the sects of the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes --- all the while during those same 3 years he claimed to have lived in the desert, used no other clothing than grew upon trees, had no other food than what grew of its own accord, and bathed himself in cold water frequently, both by night and by day. He wrote that at the end of those 3 years he, “began to conduct myself according to the rules of the sect of the Pharisees”.

Despite the lack of clear and definitive ancient accounts of the process and the educational requirements to have been considered and recognized as an appropriately trained and initiated Pharisee, I doubt one could have accomplished such in the way Josephus described.

Of course, in part this is an exercise in semantics --- just what was necessary to have been considered a “Pharisee”? Regardless, I think the preponderance of the evidence, setting aside interpretive expansion, points to both Paul and Josephus as among the many that are said to have followed the religious and legal precepts of the Pharisees, while not having completed traditional training, education, and initiation that set-aside those that would have been called “Pharisees”.

When Josephus claims to have returned to the city and engage in city affairs, it would be entirely logical for him to have adopted the precepts of the Pharisees as those were apparently the precepts under which the preponderance of Jewish civil and legal affairs were conducted in Jerusalem at the time. To wit ---

But the doctrine of the Sadducees is this; that souls die with the bodies. Nor do they regard the observation of anything besides what the law enjoins them. For they think it an instance of virtue to dispute with those teachers of philosophy whom they frequent. But this doctrine is received but by a few: yet by those still of the greatest dignity. But they are able to do almost nothing of themselves. For when they become magistrates; as they are unwillingly and by force sometimes obliged to be; they addict themselves to the notions of the Pharisees: because the multitude would not otherwise bear them. (Josephus, Antiquities,18)

For Paul to claim that he followed the legal precepts of the Pharisees, and for Josephus to claim that he followed the rules of the Pharisees, does not necessarily make them “Pharisees” any more so that the Sadducees that followed the notions of the Pharisees in the conduct of civil and legal affairs.

To engage in some “interpretive expansion” here, I think it would be entirely reasonable to expect that a Jewish enclave in a metropolis such as Damascus, for example, would have facilities for advanced education and training in Jewish civil and legal affairs. Paul clearly experienced some form of higher education. I suspect Paul was trained as a legalist, a lawyer, a scribe. Paul employed some legalisms in his letters, terms typically used in legal documents. And Paul presented some of his positions in the form of legal arguments and certified some statements with oaths and authorizations. David Trobisch, who studied hundreds of ancient letters, observed that the letter Galatians has the literary characteristics of a legal document. And certainly a lawyer needs a “set of books”, legal codes by which legal documents are constructed --- “as to the law, a Pharisee …”

I just wanted to add my 2-cents worth here. I've already spent more time than intended. But of course feel free to respond to what I've written here. Your thread --- over and out for now.

[StephenGoranson]

Ken, **if** you agree that Ephraim is symbolic for Pharisees in some Qumran texts, then see, with possible geographic significance:
"The Exclusion of Ephraim in Rev. 7: 4-8 and Essene Polemic Against Pharisees," Dead Sea Discoveries 2 (1995) 80-85.
http://people.duke.edu/~goranson/Exclus ... phraim.pdf

Maybe also:
Goranson, Stephen. “Essene Polemic in the Apocalypse of John.” In Legal Texts and Legal Issues: Proceedings of the Second Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies, Cambridge, 1995: Published in Honour of Joseph M. Baumgarten. Ed. by Bernstein, Moshe J., , Florentino García Martínez, Kampen, John. Pages 453-460. STDJ 23 Leiden: Brill, 1997.

[Ken Olson]

Thanks Stephen. Yes, I do accept the identification of the Pharisees with Ephraim and the seekers after smooth things in the Qumran corpus. I also accept the theory of Essene influence on Christianity. (Parenthetically, though, I don’t really like the word influence, as though there was a distinct Christian sect borrowing ideas from Essene outsiders. I’d prefer to say they had a common recent ancestor in their theological, philosophical, or intellectual genealogy). But I take it that the argument you are making is that the author of Revelation, presumably in the Roman province of Asia, was aware of Pharisees/Ephraim and viewed them as opponents or, rather, a group that would be excluded from the people of God in the end times. That’s helpful, but stll doesn’t quite get us to Pharisees resident in Asia Minor.

Best,

Ken

[Baley]

Judah ben Tabbai was a Pharisee scholar in the first century BCE. Wikipedia:

To escape Alexander Jannaeus's persecution of the Pharisees, Judah ben Tabbai, who was already a prominent Pharisee scholar, fled to Alexandria.

He can't have been the only prominent Pharisee between 100 BCE and 100 CE to have gone abroad during difficult times.

Furthermore, by the time of Paul, a jewish community had of course already been living in Egypt for centuries. There were even two jewish temples in Egypt - at Leontopolis and Elephantine if memory serves. How can we imagine this community without scribes and Pharisees? Surely this was also the case in other countries with a sizable jewish population.

[Difflugia]

Furthermore, by the time of Paul, a jewish community had of course already been living in Egypt for centuries. There were even two jewish temples in Egypt - at Leontopolis and Elephantine if memory serves. How can we imagine this community without scribes and Pharisees? Surely this was also the case in other countries with a sizable jewish population.

That seems to me like assuming that a sizeable Christain population anywhere would necessarily include, say, Coptic or Ethiopian Orthodox Christians.

There has been occasional speculation that the etymology of "Pharisee" is related to "Parsi" and the Pharisees were those Jews that had assimilated some aspects of Zoroastrianism while in exile and brought them back to Jerusalem. If that's true and the original Jewish community in Alexandria was drawn primarily from Jewish communities dating back to refugees mentioned in 2 Kings 25:25-26, then the Alexandrian Jewish community may not have included much Pharasaism, almost by definition.

I'm not saying positively that any of those things is true, but neither is it outrageous to question whether Pharisaic Judaism existed in community form outside of Judea.

[Ben C. Smith]

Ken, **if** you agree that Ephraim is symbolic for Pharisees in some Qumran texts, then see, with possible geographic significance:
"The Exclusion of Ephraim in Rev. 7: 4-8 and Essene Polemic Against Pharisees," Dead Sea Discoveries 2 (1995) 80-85.
http://people.duke.edu/~goranson/Exclus ... phraim.pdf

I like that hypothesis (from the linked file). I have also, however, liked for many years now another hypothesis for the omission both of Dan and of Ephraim in Revelation 7.4-8. Basically, this hypothesis extends to Ephraim the same courtesy so many already extend to Dan: to wit, both Ephraim and Dan are linked to idolatry insofar as Jeroboam erects his Golden Calves both in Bethel (in the south) and in Dan (in the north):

12 Tribes, Bethel & Dan.png (319.84 KiB) Viewed 8864 times

Bethel belongs to Ephraim, whereas Dan belongs to Dan (appropriately in an etymological sense, but somewhat confusingly in a geographical sense; formerly Laish). Hence the omission of both of these tribes from the roster in Revelation. Do you have any opinion on this hypothesis that might help me decide between the two?

[Ben C. Smith]

Ken, **if** you agree that Ephraim is symbolic for Pharisees in some Qumran texts, then see, with possible geographic significance:
"The Exclusion of Ephraim in Rev. 7: 4-8 and Essene Polemic Against Pharisees," Dead Sea Discoveries 2 (1995) 80-85.
http://people.duke.edu/~goranson/Exclus ... phraim.pdf

I like that hypothesis (from the linked file). I have also, however, liked another hypothesis for the omission both of Dan and of Ephraim in Revelation 7.4-8 for many years now. Basically, this hypothesis extends to Ephraim the same courtesy so many already extend to Dan: to wit, both Ephraim and Dan are linked to idolatry insofar as Jeroboam erects his Golden Calves both in Bethel (in the south) and in Dan (in the north)....

The Targum pseudo-Jonathan and the Vulgate both intimate a similar, plausibly related reason for thinking of Dan and Ephraim in the same respect:

Jeremiah 4.15: 15 For a voice declares from Dan and proclaims wickedness from Mount Ephraim! / [Vulgate:] 15 Vox enim adnuntiantis a Dan et notum facientis idolum de monte Ephraim. ["A voice of one declaring from Dan and making known the idol from Mount Ephraim."]

Targum pseudo-Jonathan, Jeremiah 4.15: 15 For the voice of the prophets that prophesied against those who go into captivity because they worshiped the calf which is at Dan, and those who bring evil tidings, shall come upon them, because they served the image which Micah set up in the mount of the house of Ephraim.

In fact, the entirety of Judges 18 is a singularly narrated connection between Ephraim and Dan, as the Danites seeking territory take idols from Micah's house at Mount Ephraim (or in the hill country of Ephraim) and set them up in their newly claimed city of Dan, formerly Laish.

[mbuckley3]

Back to Matt 23.15. 'Proselyte' is a specific term, referring to a gentile who made a full conversion to Judaism, never to a Jew who adhered to a specific sect. So any connection to Paul would be secondary, social interaction with a Pharisaic mission outside Judea.
So to Shaye Cohen's lucidly structured essay, 'Was Judaism in Antiquity a Missionary Religion ?' His verdict on Matt 23.15 : "Since no other text, either in the New Testament or elsewhere, ascribes missionary zeal to the Pharisees (or to the rabbis), the historical value of this verse is difficult to determine. But even if it is somewhat exaggerated, the verse is important as the only ancient source that explicitly ascribes a missionary policy to a Jewish group".
In short, there is not a lot you can do with it (I would stress the "no other text"). Logically, we are hamstrung by the farrago that is Acts in placing the geographical/intellectual location of Paul. If Tarsus is a red herring, Paul could have been a Judean; but we can't confidently assert that because of Tarsus. We have to wait until Jerome (de viris illustribus 5) to find a 'tradition' that Paul came from Gischala in Galilee.

[Ben C. Smith]

We have to wait until Jerome (de viris illustribus 5) to find a 'tradition' that Paul came from Gischala in Galilee.

That "tradition," if such it is, would be interesting to try to explain:

Jerome, On Famous Men 5: 5 Paul, formerly called Saul, an apostle outside the number of the twelve apostles, was of the tribe of Benjamin and the town of Gischala in Judea. When this was taken by the Romans he removed with his parents to Tarsus in Cilicia. Sent by them to Jerusalem to study law he was educated by Gamaliel, a most learned man whom Luke mentions. .... / 5 Paulus apostolus, qui ante Saulus, extra numerum duodecim apostolorum, de tribu Beniamin et oppido Iudaeae Giscalis fuit, quo a Romanis capto cum parentibus suis Tarsum Ciliciae commigravit, a quibus ob studia legis missus Hierosolymam, a Gamaliele viro doctissimo cuius Lucas meminit, eruditus est. ....

Jerome, Commentary on Philemon 1.23: 23 “Epaphras my fellow prisoner in Christ Jesus greets you” (= Philemon [1.]23), he says. We have received the following story about this Epaphras, Paul’s fellow prisoner. They say that the apostle Paul’s parents were from the region of Giscala in Judea; and that when the whole province was laid waste by the hands of the Romans, and the Jews were dispersed into the world, they were moved to the city of Tarsus in Cilicia. As a young man he followed the condition of his parents. And thus what he testifies about himself can be confirmed: “Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they Abraham’s seed? So am I” (= 2 Corinthians 11.22). And again elsewhere he says, “Hebrew of Hebrews” (= Philippians 3.5). and the other things that indicate that he was a Jew more than a man of Tarsus. But if this is so, we can conjecture that Epaphras too was arrested at that time when Paul was taken, and that having been found with his own parents in Colossae, a city of Asia, he later received the word about Christ. This is why it is written to the Colossians, as we said above, “Epaphras, who is one of you, a slave of Christ, greets you, being always earnest over you in his prayers” (= Colossians 4.12).

I think it is thought that Jerome used Origen's (now lost) commentary on Philemon in writing his own, so does this datum come from Origen?

When did the Romans take Gischala? Is it when Pompey annexed all of Palestine? Or does it have something to do with the turmoil in Galilee under Herod? If the latter, Paul's putative contemporaneity with Jesus remains undisturbed. If the former, Jax, who has not posted on this forum quite as much as he used to, has spent a lot of pixels testing out his hypothesis that Paul lived nearly a century earlier than generally thought:

As most of you I am sure by now know, I have been playing around with an idea that the apostle Paul may have been involved in the civil wars that took place in the eastern Mediterranean during the 1st century BCE.

Perhaps this little tidbit from Jerome could be pressed in that direction. Of course, the mention of Gamaliel in the same (Latin) sentence both sits uneasily with a military career and also conflicts with Jax's timeline, so the "tradition" about Gischala, provided it originally applied to the time of Pompey, would have to be its own separate thing which Jerome has failed to harmonize with his other sources (mainly the New Testament).

Or both of these chronological guesses might be wrong and we are actually talking about Paul being a child during the War with Rome, circa AD 66!

We could say that Jerome (or Origen) is confused, and that may well be, but what confused him? We could say that Jerome (or Origen) is lying, and that may well be, but what benefit was the lie supposed to convey? What could have induced him to contradict Acts 22.3?

Acts 22.3: 3 “I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia [Vaticanus: γεγεννημένος ἐν Ταρσῷ τῆς Κιλικίας; Bezae: ἐν Ταρσῷ τῆς Κιλικίας γεγεννημένος], but brought up in this city, educated under Gamaliel, strictly according to the law of our fathers, being zealous for God just as you all are today.”

ETA: Jerome's Vulgate has natus Tarso Ciliciae at Acts 22.3; both in Epistle 53.3 and in his Apology Against Rufinus 1.17 he makes mention of Paul having been educated under Gamaliel, as the second half of the verse states.