What did the Pharisees represent?

[pohaikawahine]

This may appear to be off-topic, but it is related .... there is no proof that King Arthur ever existed .... yet the search for the holy grail, a central part of the legend of Arthur, is related to many biblical references .... the grail itself has been described as many things: as a stone, fallen from the crown of the Angel of Light during the war in Heaven; as a cauldron of celtic antiquity; as the cup used by Christ to celebrate the last supper and the first eucharist, or a jewel (the philosopher's stone?) .... the idea was to search for the castle where the vessel was kept and upon finding it, it would bring healing to the wounded king and the land over which he ruled or the healing of the waste land .... this almost sounds like it could be connected with the exile and the dry wilderness .... but as far as I can tell (from the symbols) the tales of arthur are metaphors and they relate to metaphors found in the bible .... yet how many of us grew up believing that arthur was a real king .... follow the yellow brick road .... aloha nui, pohaikawahine

[wil]

I'd be very interested in hearing what the current Rabbinical view is on the authorship of the 5 books of Moses. The Christian Scholars today are leaning toward 5 different groups of authors/writers..and then more that edited. And I read some discussion amongst Jewish Scholars as well. Of course it is all theories and quite disputed, but as the direction away from the books being authored by Moses have been growing since before I was born, I would think these discussions are also going on in the Jewish community. Now of course in Sunday school we were taught that these books were dictated from G!d to Moses who wrote them...and many are stilll learning in this fashion.

My question is, what are the Rabbi's who are studying this issue saying?

Jewish Learning

Straight Dope

Devarim

Probe Ministries

more

and more

and more

[I, Brian]

For more on the issue of authorship, these are great reference points:

1. bob x on the secular approach to determining authorship
http://www.comparative-religion.com/...h_torah_torah/

2. bananabrain and bob x debate the academic vs religious approach to authorship:
tilting at windmills: a response to 'redaction theory'

[mee]

the pharisees looked down on others ,and they had a self-righteous attitute,
They completely lost sight of the important matters, namely, justice, mercy, faithfulness, and love of God.

[bananabrain]

thank you for enlightening us all, mee - i refer you to my comments four pages ago, which you don't seem to have bothered reading:

What did the Pharisees represent?
What did the Pharisees represent?
What did the Pharisees represent?

b'shalom

bananabrain

[mee]

Originally Posted by bananabrain

thank you for enlightening us all, mee - i refer you to my comments four pages ago, which you don't seem to have bothered reading:

What did the Pharisees represent?
What did the Pharisees represent?
What did the Pharisees represent?

b'shalom

bananabrain

its short and to the point and it gets the point over

[mee]

Watch Out for Self-Righteousness!


A Superior Attitude

"Stop Judging"


Misguided Zeal



God Favors the Humble Ones

[bananabrain]

what, like you JWs, you mean? sheesh, it's like talking to a brick wall. but then, that's cults for you, i suppose.

b'shalom

bananabrain

[mee]

Originally Posted by bananabrain

what, like you JWs, you mean? sheesh, it's like talking to a brick wall. but then, that's cults for you, i suppose.

b'shalom

bananabrain

humility works wonders and it leads to great blessings from the Almighty .


and it also leads to spiritual food in abundance matthew 24;45-47 Daniel 12;4


and i have found those faithful to God ...................Jehovahs witnesses

[mee]

The Pharisees found fault with Jesus and his disciples because of their not practicing the traditional washing of hands. (Mt 15:1, 2; Mr 7:1-5; Lu 11:37, 38)

But Jesus exposed their wrong reasoning and showed them to be violators of God’s law on account of their adherence to man-made traditions. (Mt 15:3-11; Mr 7:6-15; Lu 11:39-44)

[bananabrain]

ok, so from a reading of those verses, jesus is condemning hypocrisy, rather than being a pharisee per se. he's criticising people who are punctilious in commandments that are "bein adam le-Maqom" (between man and G!D) at the same time as they transgress commandments between man and man. jesus is maintaining a correct jewish moral stance and is clearly using the transgression of a ritual commandment to make it obvious to all that a sin has been committed! i actually think this is a lovely bit of teaching, albeit breaking commandments publicly in order to educate is probably a bit halakhically suspect. i don't see anything here which is not in the spirit of precisely the pharisees that i have described. the problem is here that you are using "pharisee" as a label to describe moral hypocrisy, when in fact it was these same pharisees that held precisely the views that you ascribe to jesus.

b'shalom

bananabrain

[mee]

The Pharisees may have been highly esteemed by men, but not by God.
On another occasion Jesus said to these Pharisees: "You are those who declare yourselves righteous before men, but God knows your hearts; because what is lofty among men is a disgusting thing in God’s sight."—Luke 16:15.





howPharisees "Shut Up the Kingdom"

Moreover, the Jewish clergy sought to block those seeking to enter through the narrow gate.

"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you shut up the kingdom of the heavens before men; for you yourselves do not go in, neither do you permit those on their way in to go in." (Matthew 23:13)

The Pharisees’ method was just as Jesus warned. They would "cast out [his disciples’] name as wicked for the sake of the Son of man." (Luke 6:22)

Because the man born blind and healed by Christ believed that Jesus was the Messiah, they expelled him from the synagogue. His parents would answer no questions because they feared expulsion from the synagogue.


For the same reason, others who believed Jesus to be the Messiah hesitated to admit it publicly.—John 9:22, 34; 12:42; 16:2.

[Dream]

Every generation is different, Mee. Stop strumming the pain.