What was Christ’s disposition
toward the publicans and prostitutes of His day?
“Then drew near unto Him all
the publicans and sinners for to hear Him. And the Pharisees and scribes
murmured, saying, This Man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them.” (Luke
15:1,2).
The marginalized irreligious
class had camaraderie. But, was their love for one another divine love? Jesus,
didn’t You say, “If ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? Do not
even the publicans the same?” (Matt. 5:46). Wasn’t this rhetorical admonition
for Christians to flee cliquish love? Is a publican’s cliquish love the
beautiful love that Christ’s Spirit restores in humanity? No. Christ can’t work
with irreligious cliquish love any more than He can with pharisaical cliquish
love. The publican’s only saving grace was that the publican had a higher
chance of knowing that he was sinful and in need of a Saviour from sin. It was
the publican’s knowledge of personal sin versus the Pharisee denial of personal
sin that Paul spoke of when he defended the Gentiles as a whole and reproved
the Jews.
“And as Esaias said before,
Except the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, we had been as Sodoma, and been
made like unto Gomorrha.
What shall we say then? That
the Gentiles, which followed not after righteousness, have attained to
righteousness, even the righteousness which is of faith.
But Israel, which followed
after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness.
Wherefore? Because they
sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they
stumbled at that stumblingstone….
Brethren, my heart’s desire
and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved.
For I bear them record that
they have a zeal [emulation] of God, but not according to knowledge.
For they being ignorant of
God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have
not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.
For Christ is the end [telos] of the law for righteousness to
every one that believeth.
For Moses describeth the
righteousness which is of the law, That the man which doeth those things shall
live by them.” (Rom. 9:29-32; 10:1-5).
Below
Jesus showed a preying Pharisee. The tax collector who went home that day was a
justified publican, and no longer a thieving publican.
“The Pharisee stood and
prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are,
extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican…. And the publican,
standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote
upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner.” (Luke 18:11,13).
We don’t want
self-sufficiency in either pharisaical or publican form. Most of the publicans
justified themselves and felt moral in their own way. “By the deeds of the law
there shall no flesh be justified in His sight.” (Rom. 3:20). Neither the
unconverted, unjust pharisaical nor unjust publican disposition of the heart
are desired and neither are they any different than Laodiceanism.
“I know thy works, that thou
art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou
art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of My mouth.”
(Rev. 3:15,16).
So,
the publicans’ and sinners’ natural character was not the standard to
follow—and neither was the Pharisees’ and scribes’. But, would the rougher
crowd surrender to the Spirit of the Son? It seems that the publicans and
sinners had an advantage over the Pharisees and scribes in that they knew they
were sinners before God. Therefore Christ championed them in many parables and
occasions for examples of repentance and redemption.
Of the two groups in Christ’s
parable who did the Law condemn? At first, both. But, after the prayers, the
Law no longer condemned the publican, but the Law continued to condemn the Pharisee. The
Law so stated this of the Pharisees, who claimed descendancy from Pharez, the
son of the first law-giver, Judah.
“When thou art come unto the
land which the LORD thy God giveth thee, and shalt possess it, and shalt dwell
therein, and shalt say, I will set a king over me, like as all the nations that
are about me;
Thou shalt in any wise set
him king over thee, whom the LORD thy God shall choose.…
And it shall be, when he
sitteth upon the throne of his kingdom, that he shall write him a copy of this
law in a book out of that which is before the priests the Levites:
And it shall be with him, and
he shall read therein all the days of his life: that he may learn to fear the
LORD his God, to keep all the words of this law and these statutes, to do them:
That his heart be not lifted up above his brethren, and that he turn not aside from the commandment, to
the right hand, or to the left: to the end that he may prolong his days in his
kingdom, he, and his children, in the midst of Israel.” (Deut. 17:14,15,18-20).
What about the modern
Pharisees, the guardians of biblical truth? What is Jesus’ disposition toward
the Religious Right, the Moral Majority, the Christian Coalition? Was the
Pharisee religio-political theocracy any different than the theocracy of these
modern religio-political organizations? What would happen if they were to jocky
themselves into a power niche and be recognized by the White House, Supreme
Court, and Congress? Would Jesus be more likely to recognize them than He
recognized the Pharisees of ancient times?
Where did the Pharisees come
from? What was their historical origins? Didn’t they arise from military
conflicts during the Maccabean period? Yes, according to Wikipedia.
“The Maccabees (/ˈmækəˌbiːz/), also spelled Machabees (Hebrew: מכבים or מקבים, Maqabim;
Latin: Machabaei or Maccabaei; Greek: Μακκαβαῖοι, Makkabaioi), were a group of Jewish
rebel warriors who took control of Judea,
which at the time was part of the Seleucid Empire. They founded the Hasmonean dynasty, which ruled from
167 BCE to 37 BCE, being a fully independent kingdom from about 110
to 63 BCE. They reasserted the Jewish religion, partly by forced conversion, expanded the boundaries
of Judea by conquest and reduced the influence of Hellenism and Hellenistic Judaism…
Following the re-dedication
of the temple, the supporters of the Maccabees were divided over the question
of whether to continue fighting or not. When the revolt began under the
leadership of Mattathias, it was seen as a war for religious freedom to end the
oppression of the Seleucids. However, as the Maccabees realized how successful
they had been, many wanted to continue the revolt and conquer other lands with
Jewish populations or to convert their peoples. This policy exacerbated the
divide between the Pharisees and Sadducees under later Hasmonean
monarchs such as Alexander Jannaeus. Those who sought the continuation
of the war were led by Judah Maccabee..”
“The Pharisees (/ˈfærəˌsiːz/) were a social movement and a school of thought in the Holy Land during the time of Second Temple
Judaism. After the destruction
of the Second Temple in 70 CE, Pharisaic beliefs became the
foundational, liturgical and ritualistic basis for Rabbinic Judaism.
Conflicts between Pharisees
and Sadducees took place in the context of
much broader and longstanding social and religious conflicts among Jews, made
worse by the Roman conquest. Another conflict was cultural,
between those who favored Hellenization (the Sadducees) and
those who resisted it (the Pharisees). A third was juridico-religious, between
those who emphasized the importance of the Second Temple with its rites and
services, and those who emphasized the importance of other Mosaic Laws. A fourth point of conflict,
specifically religious, involved different interpretations of the Torah and
how to apply it to current Jewish life, with Sadducees recognizing only
the Written Torah (with
Greek philosophy) and rejecting doctrines such as the Oral Torah, the Prophets, the Writings, and the resurrection of
the dead.
Josephus (37 – c. 100 CE),
believed by many historians to be a Pharisee, estimated the total Pharisee
population before the fall of the Second Temple to be around 6,000. Josephus
claimed that Pharisees received the full support and goodwill of the common
people, apparently in contrast to the more elite Sadducees, who were the upper
class. Pharisees claimed Mosaic authority for
their interpretation of Jewish Laws, while Sadducees represented
the authority of the priestly privileges and
prerogatives established since the days of Solomon, when Zadok,
their ancestor, officiated as High Priest. The phrase ‘common people’ in
Josephus' writings suggests that most Jews were ‘just Jewish people’,
distinguishing them from the main liturgical groups.
Outside Jewish history and literature,
Pharisees have been made notable by references in the New Testament to conflicts with John the Baptist and with Jesus.
There are also several references in the New Testament to the Apostle Paul being a
Pharisee. The relationship between Early Christianity and
the Pharisees depended on the individual; while numerous nameless Pharisees
were portrayed as hostile, New Testament writings make mention of several
Pharisees, including Joseph of Arimathea, Nicodemus and Gamaliel, who are sympathetic to Jesus
and Christians.”
So the Sadducim derived their name from Zadok, the high priest in David’s and Solomon’s days. Thus, they inherited
the ceremonious, ritualistic temple duties. And the Pharisim derived their name from Pharez (although the word’s recognized Hebrew and Greek “Pharisaios” etymology is, “the separated
ones”).
So the Sadducim derived themselves from Zadok, the high priest in David’s and Solomon’s days. Thus, they inherited
the ceremonious, ritualistic temple duties. And, in my opinion, the Pharisim derived themselves from Pharez.
Since history repeats itself,
and no less does sacred history (because God never changes, and Satan in God’s
absence never changes his deceptions), how could these two groups appear today.
Could we say that we have both groups today that have arisen following our own period
of military conflicts, i.e. the wars of the past century? Have not these
religio-political groups reappeared, not because God raised them up, but rather
Satan, of which history attested during the inter-testamental silent period
between Nehemiah and John the Baptist? Have we had our own silent
inter-testamental period after Ellen White passed from the Advent movement? Did
not our Jeremiah, Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, leave her fearful Malachi message of
hope to her Lord’s beloved “prisoners of hope” (Zech. 9:12) to bridge the
silent period of military conflict and spiritual decline?
If the ancient Pharisim are
the modern religio-political Protestant action groups, then who are the modern
counterpart of the ancient, sacerdotal, ritualistic Sadducim rulers over the
Pharisim? What religio-political group is competing with the moral Protestant
majority for religious power over the hearts of the people, and winning the
competition? What religio-political power is rebuilt by the religio-political
Protestants, per Revelation 13:11-15?
Will the modern Sadducees
rule the higher seats of government while the modern Pharisees rule the lower
seats?
And one final thought: Since
the ancient religio-political Jewish leadership sought forced conversions of
all who they conquered, can we expect Satan to move their modern counterparts to
do the same? Only by the force of love is love awakened, and any other force,
political or military, has no place in the gospel. Extremist fundamentalism has
nothing to do with the U.S. Constitution of Republicanism or Protestantism.
But, will we see the original Constitution go away and be replaced in the New
World Order by our own western version of ISIS? I.e., will Republicans
persecute heretics and homosexuals like the Pharisees persecuted publicans and
sinners?
This is my fear.
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