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46 Is JUDAISM the Religion of Moses?

In other words, the Sad du cees, who were mainly priests and main tained that all teach ing
should be de pend ent upon Scrip ture, could eas ily coun ter the Phar i sees as long as they taught in the
Mid rash-form of try ing to ap peal to Scrip ture. So, the Phar i sees taught in the Mish nah-form which
did not have to rely upon the Scrip ture for sup port.

Pharisees Used Scripture at Times

The Phar i sees would, at times, it is true, make ref er ence to cer tain scrip tures that might
seem ingly give sup port to their in de pend ent teach ings. In do ing so, the Phar i sees be came no to ri ous
for their meth ods of forc ing the Scrip ture to teach what they wanted it to teach.

When they en deav ored to use the Scrip ture, the Phar i sees would, in al most ev ery case, have
to stretch the plain mean ing in or der to make it mean some thing en tirely dif fer ent from the ac tual
mean ing. Using this forced method of ap peal ing to Scrip ture opened them up to fur ther at tacks by
their op po nents, and it is not sur pris ing that ap peal ing to the Scrip ture be came un pop u lar with the
Phar i sees.

"If the Phar i sees ar rived at a cer tain de ci sion by means of a new in ter pre ta tion, the Sad du -
cees COULD ALWAYS dis pute that de ci sion by re fut ing the scrip tural proof of fered for it.
IT WAS POSSIBLE for them to ar gue that the Phar i saic in ter pre ta tion was un war ranted and
that the scrip tural pas sage DID NOT MEAN WHAT THE PHARISEES TRIED TO READ
INTO IT ... THE PHARISEES WERE WELL AWARE THAT SOME OF THEIR
INTERPRETATIONS WERE RATHER FORCED, AND THAT THEIR OPPONENT'S
ARGUMENTS AGAINST THESE INTERPRETATIONS WERE SOUND" (ibid., p.
232).

This method of read ing into the Scrip ture what it clearly did not teach was a method of in ter -
pre ta tion in her ited from Hel le nism dur ing the pe riod of the re li gious an ar chy.

In a book pub lished by the Jew ish Theo log i cal Sem i nary of Amer ica, en ti tled Hel le nism in
Jew ish Pal es tine, by Dr. Saul Lieberman, new, star tling in for ma tion con firms this. Dr. Lieberman
states that the Greek Law Col leges taught their stu dents the art of twist ing the law ac cord ing to the
re quired aim and pur pose (ibid., p. 63). Dur ing the re li gious an ar chy, many Jews at tended these
schools. The Greeks took great pride in be ing able to make a law teach what in re al ity it did not
teach. The Phar i sees used this same method!

"THEY [the Jews] WOULD CERTAINLY NOT HESITATE TO BORROW FROM
THEM [the Greeks] METHODS AND SYSTEMS WHICH THEY COULD CONVERT
INTO A MECHANISM FOR THE CLARIFICATION AND DEFINITION OF THEIR
OWN TEACHINGS" (ibid., p. 64).

Lieberman informs us that

"RABBINIC LITERATURE ABOUNDS IN SUCH ARTIFICIAL AND FORCED
INTERPRETATIONS" (ibid., p. 63).

The Berean Voice