must be no alliances with other nations; Israel, as the chosen people of J”, must live an altogether separated life. The whole tendency of the new dynasty was against this exclusiveness. Hence the opposition to it of the Pharisees. Josephus may be right in making the ostensible ground of their quarrel with Hyrcanus the possession by him of the high priesthood. But the real ground of their opposition to him was much deeper. The Hasmonians were orthodox worshippers of J”, and even compelled neighbouring peoples to become Jews. But the dynasty they had founded was a worldly dynasty ; and the Pharisees felt instinct- ively that in a national State with national politics their ideal was less likely to be realized than even under the rule of the Gentiles. The success of the Maccabeean rising had thus led to the formation of the two parties which played so important a part in the after history of the Jews." Under Alexander Jannieus (B.C. 104-78) the opposition between the Hasmonwans and the arisees broke out into open conflict. Jannzus was a man of such an utterly worthless character that he very soon alienated the people from him and made them sympathize with the Pharisees. On one occasion, when, at a Feast of Tabernacles, he was officiating as high priest, the people pelted him with the lemons they were carrying for the celebration, and reviled him as the son of a ote tive and as being therefore unworthy of his priestly office. At his command his troops eut down 6000 of the people (Ant. XII. xiii. δ). When he returned to Jerusalem from his war with Obfdas, defeated and without an army, there broke out an open rebellion, which lasted for six years, during which 50,000 Jews perished. When, wearied of the con- test, he asked the conditions of peace, they de- manded his death and called in the aid of the Syrian king, Demetrius ΠῚ. (Eucairus), Jannzus was totally defeated and fled to the mountains. Moved by sympathy with him in his sore need, and perhaps dreading lest their country should once more become subject to Syria, many of the Jews deserted to him; Demetrius was compelled to retire, and Jannzus took fearful revenge upon his adversaries :—upon his return in triumph to Jerusalem he caused 800 of theirchiefs to be crucified (Ant. XIII. xiii. 5, xiv. 1. 2). That the leaders in this rebellion were Pharisees, is evident from the fact that they afterwards avenged the execution of the 800 (Ant. XIII. xvi. 2), and that Jannzeus, when dying, counselled hiswife AlexandraSalometomake peace with them and be guided by them (XIII. xv. δ). Alexandra Salome (B.c. 78-69), during whose reign Hyrcanus I1., her eldest son, was high priest, followed entirely her dying husband’s advice. She recalled the exiled Pharisees, admitted them to a large share in the government, and reintroduced the Pharisaie practices which John Hyrcanus is said to have abolished (Ant. Χμ. xvi. 1ff.; BJ 1. ν. 1ff.). She also gave to the heads of the scribes a seat in the Sanhedrin along with the priestly aristocracy and the elders. According to later tradition, this was the golden age of Judaism.+ But the Pharisees, who, according to Josephus, governed the queen, made a bad use
* See Bousset, Jesu Predigt in ihrem Gegensatz zum Juden- thum, p. 29ff. The Psalms of Solomon complain bitterly of the Hasmonwans having assumed the office of high priest and the title of king ; see Ryle and James, Ps. of Sol. on 812 1755... Hyrcanus, however, did not call himself king, but ‘ high priest and head of the commonwealth of the Judmans.’
+ Montet, op. eit. 277. ‘Under Simon ben Shatach [a leadin, Pharisee and brother of the queen) and queen Salome, rain fel on the eve of the Sabbath, so that the corns of wheat were large as kidneys, the barley corns as large as olives, and the lentils like golden denarii; the scribes gathered such corns and Preserved specimens of them in order to show future genera- tions what sin entails’ (Talm. Bab. Ta’anith 23a, in Streane, The Age of the Maccabees, p. 72).
PHARISEES
of their authority. They took such fearful ven- geance upon the Sadducees that a deputation of the latter, led by Aristobulus, Salome’s younger son, presented themselves before her, protesting against the cruel treatment to which they were subjected. They reminded her of the assistance they had rendered her husband, hinted at the readiness with which neighbouring monarchs would receive them into their service, and insisted upon being at least placed in her fortresses. They not only succeeded in having an end put to the rei of terror, but also obtained command of all the fortresses, except three, where, along with Aristo- bulus, who soon joined them, they awaited the death of the queen to snatch the power out of the hands of the Pharisees (Ant. XIII. xvi. 2. 3. 5; BJ 1. v. 3. 4).
On the death of Alexandra, Aristobulus (B.c. 69-63) soon dispossessed Hyrcanus Π. of both the kingship and the high ξείθοθθσοα (Ant. XIV. i. 2, XV. vi. 4, xx. x.). He befriended the Sadducees, who were his chief supporters. In the course of the struggle that ensued, both the brothers appealed to the Romans, and presented themselves before Pompey in Damascus, in order to plead their cause. A third party (whom most take to have been Pharisees) also appeared before him, desiring the abolition of the sovereignty altogether, and the restoration of the old sacerdotal constitution (Ant. XIV. iii. 2). When at last he was compelled to take the temple-mount by storm (B.C. 63), Pompey entered the Holy of Holies, but left the treasures of the temple untouched. Many of the leaders of the Sadducees were executed ; Aristobulus and his children were taken to Rome; and Hyrcanus was restored to his much-curtailed inheritance, not as king, but as high priest and ethnarch, with the nominal control of the civil administration of the country. How the Pharisees regarded this terrible catastrophe we learn from the Psalms of Solomon.* They looked upon it as a Divine punish- ment of the Sadducean aristocracy and priests, who had called the Romans into. the land (82-1), but were at the same time bitterly enraged against the heathen, who had so impiously defile the temple and the holy city (Ps-Sol 1, 2, 8, and 17, which seem to refer to Pompey’s capture of Jeru- salem ; cf. Ryle and James, op. cit. xliii).