| <pb n="18" /><head>CHAPTER TWO SCHOLARLY INTERPRETATIONS OF JOSEPHUS'S PHARISEES</head><p>A discussion of previous interpretations of Josephus on the Pharisees will demonstrate the need for a new attempt, for none of them yet satisfies, and most do not claim to satisfy, the requirements set forth in Chapter 1. Nevertheless, the previous research is extremely valuable. First, it points up some of the factors that complicate any literary study of Josephus. Second, it highlights the particular problems that must be addressed in a comprehensive study of Josephus's Pharisees. The resolution of these particular problems will become part of the larger task of the following study.</p><p>Since almost every writer on the Pharisees includes some discussion of Josephus's testimony, and since most authors on Josephus have cause to mention his connections with and information about the Pharisees, the number of scholarly references to Josephus's portrayal of the Pharisees is very large indeed.<note id="p1_c2_n1" place="foot">One can gain some impression of the number of potential references to Josephus's Pharisees by perusing H. Schreckenberg,<hi rend="italic">Bibliographie zu Flavius Josephus</hi>(Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1968), the<hi rend="italic">Supplementband</hi>thereto (1979), and L. H. Feldman,<hi rend="italic">Josephus and Modern Scholarship</hi>(1937-1980), ed. W. Haase (Berlin: W. de Gruyter, 1983).</note>It is neither practical nor desirable to review each instance here. The following survey describes rather the most complete and most programmatic discussions of Josephus on the Pharisees that have appeared since the mid-nineteenth century.</p><p>One word of explanation: the two matters of Josephus's descriptions of the Pharisees and of his own relationship to the group are often discussed together in the scholarly literature, and both will be important in the present study. Nevertheless, the determination of Josephus's relationship to the Pharisees involves many factors other than his actual descriptions of the group—such as his views of the Law, of fate and free will, and of immortality. To raise those issues in this survey would require many deviations from the main point, which is to assess the previous analyses of Josephus's portrayals of the Pharisees. The question of his own relationship to the Pharisees will suggest itself naturally in Part IV, with reference to a particular passage in his autobiography (<hi rend="italic">Life</hi>1012). I propose, therefore, to leave until then a discussion of the various ancillary factors that bear on the question. For the present, our concern is with scholarly treatments of Josephus's descriptions of the Pharisees.</p> |
