have an oral law in addition to the written law. This oral law consists of sundry religious, ceremonial, and so- cial practices which obtained in the course of time, and which were called forth either through the obscurity, conciseness, and apparent contradiction of some of the written enactments, or through the inapplicability of some of the Mosaic statutes to the ever-changing cir- cumstances of the commonwealth. Some of the enact- ments contained in this oral code are undoubtedly as old as the original laws which they supplement and explain, so as to adapt them to exceptional cases not specified in tlie Mosaic law; others, again, were introduced by the spiritual heads of the nation after the return from the Babylonian captivity, because the altered state of the nation absolutely required these regulations, although there was no basis in the Jlosaic law for them ; while others originated in party feeling, to shield the pious against even approaching the limits of transgression. Now the Sopherim (i. e. scribes and the lawyers), after the Babylonian captivity, who found this accumidatcd traditional code, tried to classify and arrange it. Those practices which could be deduced from or introduced into the text of Holy Writ by analogy, combination, or otherwise, were regarded as the legitimate and authori- tative traditional exposition of the law [see Midrash] ; while those practices which obtained in the course of time,' which were venerated and esteemed by the people both for their antiquity and utility, but forwhich neither author nor apparent reason could be found in the writ- ten law, were denominated A traditional law oj" Moses from Sinai ('0DT2 niTTSP Jirbtn), because from their antiquity and importance it was thought that they must have come doAvn orally from the lawgiver him- self. It is this oral law which the Sadducees rejected ; and in their conservatism the}' adhered to the ancient Hebrew Scriptures, as well as to those time-honored ex- planations and practices (nzbn) which were not at variance with the text of the Bible. It must be dis- tinctly borne in mind that by their rejecting traditions is not meant that the Sadducees rejected all the tradi- tional comments u]wn the law and the ancestral prac- tices not found in the Bible. Even the Talmud itself only charges them with rejecting some things (Sanhe- drin, 33 b; Ilorajoth, 4 a), and there is but little doubt that those practices which they rejected were originated by the Pharisees, tlie liberal party whose innovations the conservative Sadducees disliked, and regarded as an encroachment upon their priestly and aristocratic rights. In the Mishna sjjecific points of difference between the Pharisees and Sadducees are mentioned, which are un- important— such, e. g., as whether touching the Holy Scriptures made the hands technically " unclean," in the hevitical sense, and whether the stream which flows when water is poured from a clean vessel into an un- clean one is itself technically "clean" or " unclean" (I'«- daim, iv, 6, 7). If the Pharisees and Sadducees had differed on all matters not directly contained in the Pentateuch, it would scarcely have been necessarv* to particularize points of difference such as these, which to Christians imbued with the genuine spirit of Christ's teaching (Matt, xv, 1 1 ; Luke xi, 37-40) must appear so trifling as almost to resemble the products of a dis- eased imagination. Indeed, it will be seen in the course of this article, from the eiunneration of their distinctive tenets, that the theological views of the two sects were not so much at variance as might have been supposed, and that the Sadducees in many cases actually adhered to ancient traditions, while the Pharisees abandoned these traditions and introduced new statutes in order to raise the people, whose true representatives they were, to a nation of^ kings and priests. Sec Thadition.
That the Sad(iucees also rejected the prophets and Hagiographa, and only believed in the Pentateuch, as is asserted by Ei)iphanius (^Adversus Hcereses, xiv), Origen {Cels. i, 49), Jerome {Comment, on Matth. xxii, 31-33), and followed by some modern writers, is utterly
SADDUCEE
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at variance with the Jewish records of this sect, ami has eviileiitly arisen from a confusion of the Saililucees with the Samaritans.
2. Jti'uial of the Resurrection, etc. — Next in impor- tance in point of doctrine is their eschatoloiry. The Sadducecs denied that the dead will rise to receive their reward and punishment. Josephus, who specifies this second cardinal difference between the Pharisees and the .Sadducees, describes their respective doctrines of a future reward and punisiiment in such a manner as to infer tliat tlie former, believiiit; in a future jiidijment, also believed in the immortality of the soul; while the latter, by denying a future judgment, also denied the survival of the soul at'ler the death of the body (^vx>JQ re Ti]y ciafioviiv Kal tuc Ka^' ^Sov ri^wpiaq Kai TifiiiQ dvaipovai [\V<ir, ii, 8, 14]). In another place, again, where this historian mentions the distinctive eschato- logical views of the Sadducecs, he plainly says, "Their doctrine is that souls perish with the bodies" (SacSov- Kaioif St TUC \l/i'\ac; o \6yoc rrvvacpcnn^ti roig aij>fiani [Ant. xviii, 1, 4]). But in the Talmud and in the New Test, we are told that they simply denied the resurrec- tion (comp. Sanhfdrin, 90 b with Luke xx, 27; Mark xii, 18; see also IVIatt. xxii, 23), which by no means in- volves the imm<irtality of the soul; and it cannot be supposed that if the Sadducees had actually denied the immortality of the soul, so vital a point would be passed over in silence by the Talmudic doctors, when unimpor- tant ditterences are minutely specified. There can, there- fore, be no doubt that Josephus, in his vanity to depict to the Greeks the Jewish sects in such colors as to make thera correspond to the different philosophical schools among tlie Greeks, did injustice to the Sadducees by assigning to tliem the doctrines of the Stoics. The misrepresentation of the Sadducees will appear all the more evident when it is borne in mind how defectively Josephus describes the Pharisaic eschatology in the very same section. He there represents the Pharisees, who were his own party, as believing that the resurrection is to be confined to the righteous, while the wicked are to be detained in everlasting punishment in Hades un- der the earth (.4 iit. xviii, 1,3); whereas it is well kiiown that this opinion was only entertained by some of the later doctors, while the Pharisees generally believed in the resurrection of both the righteous and the wicked (Dan. xii, 2), and this was tiie common doctrine as late as the second book of jMaccabees (comp. xii, 40-45). The reason which the Sadducees assigned for not be- lieving in the resurrection of the dead to receive their reward and punishment is that it is not taught in the law of Moses (SanheJrin, 90 b), which simply promises temporal rewards and piniishments for obedience and disobedience (Kxod. xx, 12; xxiii, 25, 2G; Deut. vii, 12-15; xxviii, 1-68). The very quotation made by our Saviour (Alatt. xxii, 31, 32; Mark xii, 26, 27; Luke xx, 37) of Exod. iii, 6, 15, which it is only natural to sup- pose is the most cogent text in the law, nevertlieless does no more than suggest an inference on this doctrine. The Sadducees, however, did not admit the inference, and they simply regarded this mode of proving the resurrection from the law as Pliarisaic, as they were in the habit of iiearing similar inferences deduced bv the Pharisees from otlier passages. Thus the Talmud re- lates: "The Sadducees asked liahbi (iamalicl. Whence do you know that the holy one, Ijlcssed be he, will raise the dead? To which he replied, From the law, the prophets, and the Hagiograplia: from the law because it is written, 'And the L<ird said to Moses, Heboid, thou Shalt lie down with thy fathers (cpi), and this people shall rise again' (Deut. xxxi, 16): from the prophets because it is written, 'Thy dead men shall live,' etc. (Isa. xxvi, 19); and from the Hagiographa because it is written, 'And the roof of thy month,' etc. (Song of Songs, vii, 9). The Sadducees, however, would not ao cept these passages till hciiiuifed the passage, ' The land which the Lonl sware unto your fathers U) give it to