| <pb n="36" /><head><hi rend="italic">E. Rivkin: Return to a Univocal Interpretation</hi></head><p>A challenge to Smith/Neusner came with E. Rivkin's<hi rend="italic">A Hidden Revolution</hi>(1978). Rivkin's total isolation from the Laqueurian stream of interpretation can be seen in his initial proposition that "parallel passages in<hi rend="italic"><span class="abbr" title="The Jewish War">War</span></hi>and in<hi rend="italic">Antiquities</hi>will be treated side by side", in order to analyze Pharisaic history "chronologically".<note id="p1_c2_n102" place="foot">Rivkin,<hi rend="italic">Revolution</hi>, 33.</note>Thus he begins with<hi rend="italic"><span class="abbr" title="The Jewish Antiquities">Ant.</span></hi>13:171173, which introduces the sects at the time of Jonathan the Hasmonean, and then passes quickly to<hi rend="italic"><span class="abbr" title="The Jewish Antiquities">Ant.</span></hi>13:288-298, the story of the rupture between John Hyrcanus and the Pharisees.<note id="p1_c2_n103" place="foot">Ibid., 34-37.</note>The latter passage is important for Rivkin because it lays out the basic features of his "definition" of the Pharisees: they were a "scholar class" that had developed an entire legal system for the people. This system was based on the Unwritten Law, Rivkin holds, which had its roots in the "fathers".<note id="p1_c2_n104" place="foot">Ibid., 38-41.</note>Rivkin thinks that throughout Josephus's writings the Pharisees appear as aggressive ("goal-oriented"!) power-seekers and not as irenic contemplatives:</p><p><q>The Pharisees in the time of John Hyrcanus, Alexander Janneus, and Salome Alexandra were a law-making scholar class capable of stirring up and abetting rebellion against king and High Priest, sanctioning the use of violence to attain power and authority.<note id="p1_c2_n105" place="foot">Ibid., 49; cf. 63.</note></q></p><p>In contrast to Smith/Neusner, then, Rivkin insists on the dominance of the Pharisees and Pharisaic law in pre-70 Palestine. Even Herod, he argues, had to "bend before" Pharisaic power: the Pharisees were able to refuse an oath of allegiance to Herod and not be punished (<hi rend="italic"><span class="abbr" title="The Jewish Antiquities">Ant.</span></hi>15:3).<note id="p1_c2_n106" place="foot">Ibid., 53.</note>The Sadducees were compelled by popular opinion to follow Pharisaic laws (<hi rend="italic"><span class="abbr" title="The Jewish Antiquities">Ant.</span></hi>18:15, 17). In Josephus's own account of his decision to govern his life (<span class="greek">ποιλτύεσθαι</span>) in accord with the Pharisaic school (<hi rend="italic">Life</hi>12), Rivkin finds further evidence that "in following the Pharisees one does not join something, but one governs oneself by a system of laws".<note id="p1_c2_n107" place="foot">Ibid., 66f.</note>Thus the Pharisees were not at all a "sect" but a class of scholars that, with their special laws, gave leadership to the people.<note id="p1_c2_n108" place="foot">Ibid., 70. Cf. 316 n. 1, where Rivkin insists that Josephus's term<span class="greek">αἵρεσις</span>be disabused of the modern connotations to the word "sect". We shall discuss the question of Josephus's meaning in chapter 6, below.</note>Rivkin offers the following definition of the Pharisees as they appear in<pb n="37" />Josephus: "The Pharisees were the active protagonists of the Unwritten Law who enjoyed, except for a brief interval, the wholehearted confidence and support of the masses."<note id="p1_c2_n109" place="foot">Ibid., 70.</note>As Rivkin himself observes, his interpretation of Josephus's Pharisees is utterly incompatible with the Smith/Neusner theory.<note id="p1_c2_n110" place="foot">Ibid., 330.</note></p> |
