According to Josephus (Ant. xin. x. 6, xvin. I. 4), the Sad- ducees were a small minority of the Jews, which included only the rich and those of the higlicst dii^nity. This is almost equivalent to identifying them with the priestly aristocracy and their adherents. During the aecond half o'f the Persian and the whole of the Greek domination of Israel, the high priesta were the civil aa well as the religious lit-ada of the Jewish community in Judaja, and, theirs being the only hereditary olllce among the Jews since the downfall of the Davidic monarchy, they and their families formed a kind of B:u'crdotaI nobility fcf. Jos. Vita, 1). We are expressly told in Ju8ephufl(^nf. xi. IX. l)and in Ac 6" (cf. 4' 231"), that in NT ti IMS some at leaat of the high priesta were Sadducees. It was these chief priests with their families and adherents that formed the Sadducean party. This part.v, however, waa not a priestly
fiarty in the sense that the uriests gt-nerally necessarily be- onged to it : some of these (e.u. Joscphus, Vita, 1 1.; see also Vita, 39; Taylor's Sailings of the Jewish fathers^, ii. 10, Hi. 2) were Pharisees (cf. Jn V^- "^i). Nor <iid it, aa a rule, stand up for the Bpecial interests of the priests. The opposition between the Pharisees and the 8adducces was not an o]>position between the strict legalists and the jiriesis, but between the former and the chief priesta and their adherents (cf. Schiirer, ajy^il.iWt.).
ii. Deiuvation of tiih; name 'Sadducees.'—
The name 'Sadducees' (D'pns, sing, 'piiii, -aiSov- Koioi) is now almost universally derived from the proper name Xndiik. The derivation, favoured by many of the Fathers and bv a few moderns (i-.q. Derenbourg, Stanley, ami Kdersheim), from the adj. pnj, accordmg to which the Sadducees were the riqhteon.i, so called either because, in op|iosition to the Pharisees, they adhered to the written law, or because of their severity as judges^
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SADDUCEES
must be abandoned, owing to the impossibilitjr of accounting for the change of i into u (see especially Montet, Essai s^ur les origines des partis sadui'ien et pharisien, 53 fl'.). From which Zailoli, however, did they derive their name? According io Aboth de- Rabbi Nathan, from a disciple of Antigonus of Socho.
• Antigonus of Socho received from Shime'on ha-Caddiq. He used to say. Be not as slaves that serve the Rah on the terms of receiving recompense ; but be as slaves that serve the Itab not on the terms of receiving recompense ; and let the fear of Heaven be upon j'ou ; that your reward may be doubled for the time to come. Antigonus of Socho had two disciples, who repeated his words ; and they repeated them to (their) disciples, and their disciples to their' disciples. They arose and refined after them, and said. What did our fathers imagine, in saj-ing that a labourer might do work all the day and not receive his reward at evening? Nay, but if our fathers knew that there was the world to come, and that there was a revival of the dead, they would not have spoken thus. They arose and separated from the Thorah ; and two sects were formed from them, Cadukin and Baithtmn ; Cadukin after the name of Qadok,^aithuain after the name of'Baithos ' (Taylor, I.e. 112 f.).
This legend, though adopted by Ewald ((?K/' iv. 357), is of no historical value. It is tirst found in a document of late origin ; it is plainly wron" in what it says of the Boethusians, who derived their name from Boethus, the father of Simon, whose daughter, Mariamne, Herod married, and whom he raised to the high priesthood {./I n<. XV. ix. 3 ; cf. XVII. iv. 2, xvm. v. 1, xix. vi. 2) ; it is al.so mistaken in asserting that the Sadducees rejected tlie Law, and in making the denial of a resurrection of the dead their primary and funda- mental characteristic. We must tlierefore either derive the name ' Sadducee ' from an unknown Zadok, an influential member or head of the party at an epoch which it is impossible to determine (Montet, I.e. 59), or from Zadok, who was priest in Jerusalem in the days of David and Solomon (1 K 18- 26- 32ff- 2^> ; cf . 4M Ch 29"), and whose descendants held the same office do\vn to the Exile. The latter derivation is generally regarded, not indeed as thoroughly established, but as the most probable. In his ideal picture of the future theocracy, Ezekiel (40-16 4319 44*16 4811 . jj, all these passages the LXX lias the form SaSooi'/c) admits only the 'sons of Zadok ' to the right of officiating as priests in the new temple at Jerusalem. Though after the return from the Exile this rule w.as not strictly carried out, the ' sons of Zadok ' formed the main body of the post-exilic priesthood ; and more especially it was from among them that the chief priests down to the close of tlie (IJreek period were drawn (see art. PltlKSTS AND Levites, p. 96'). In the ahsenee, therefore, of more s[)ecifie information, it is a.ssumeJ that the family name ' Zadokites ' or ' Sadducees' was given, probably by their enemies, 10 the .sacerdotal aristocratic party, which included not only the chief families of the legitimate line, but also the adherents of the Ha.smona?an princes, and, in NT times, the families raised to the high priestly dignity by Herod and his successors.*