I’ve been leading a Bible study group through the book of Acts. Last night the question of the Sadducees came up…
Who were these guys?
Well, at the time of Jesus, within Judaism there were a number of different sects. These were groups of Jews who had their own particular beliefs and practices. We encounter some of these different groups in the New Testament.
The main groups at the time of Christ were as follows:
1. The Pharisees
We encounter the Pharisee party regularly in Scripture. Their focus was upon holiness and the study of the Old Testament. I’ll do a post on them in the next few weeks.
2. The Zealots
These were the political revolutionaries. They wanted a military revolution and the expulsion of the Romans from Israel.
3. The Essenes
Until fairly recently we knew little about this group. We know that they had many practices which we typically associate with monasticism: asceticism, poverty and abstinence. We also know that the Essenes practised ritual bathing. It is believed by many that the Essenes produced the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Finally we come to the group in question, the Sadducees:
4. The Sadducees
The Sadducees were a wealthy group, fairly small in number, who mostly lived in Jerusalem and were closely associated with the Temple.
They were the aristocrats, holding positions of influence, particularly in the Jewish Council (“Sanhedrin”). Because they held power, they were more accommodating and accepting of the occupying Roman force since the Romans provided stability to the status quo.
While the Pharisees gave authority to oral tradition, the Sadducees did not. Not only that, but the Sadducees ultimately restricted themselves to the first five books of the Bible (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Deuteronomy and Numbers). It appears that they also had some kind of denial of angels (Acts 23:8). Finally, they also denied the afterlife and the resurrection (Matthew 22:23; Mark 12:18-27; Acts 23:8).
The Sadducee party was effectively destroyed in AD 70 when the Jerusalem Temple was destroyed by the Romans. Many were slaughtered. Without the Temple or the political support of Rome, the Sadducees effectively ceased to exist.
