measure of the sentence which they pronounced that the libel had not received their approval. They replied, "Stripes and imprisonment." The taunt did not seem to merit capital punishment; the more so as the Pharisees are naturally lenient in the matter of penalties. Hyrcanus was greatly incensed at this answer, supposing that the man's abusive language had met with their approbation. His exasperation was increased in particular by Jonathan, who so worked upon him as to induce him to desert the Pharisees and join the Sadducean party; he also persuaded him to abolish the practices which the Pharisees had ordained for the people, and to punish any who observed them. To this cause he and his sons owed their unpopularity with the multitude.
Of this more hereafter. Here I would merely explain that the Pharisees had delivered to the people certain customary practices, handed down by their forefathers and not recorded in the laws of Moses, and for that reason rejected by the Sadducees, who maintain that only what is written (in Scripture) should be held binding, and that customs based on ancestral traditions should not be observed. On these matters the two parties had great debates and differences. The Sadducees are influential only with the wealthy and have no following among the populace; the Pharisees have the masses on their side. But of these two sects and of the Essenes I have given a precise account in the second book of my Jewish (War).[1]—Ant. XIII. 10. 5 f. (288-298),
- ↑ See § (54).
