1 Theff. v. 23. Пu, Jux, op; the conftituent parts of man in the opinion of almost all fects. This opinion was familiar to the Theffalonians.

Critici, Benson, Chandler, Macknight in loc.

SECT. III.

Of the Jewish Sects and Parties.

587. After the captivity, the Jews, from being obliged to use literal tranflations of the Scriptures, were led, gradually, to comment upon them; which, giving occafion to differences of opinion, produced different fects among them, diftinguished both by their opinions and their practices.

Lightfoot, in Mat. iii. 7. § 3. Ćunæ. Rep. Heb. 1. 2. c. 17. Beaufobre, Intr.

588. The Jewish fects were, principally, three; the Pharifees, the Saducees, both of whom are often expressly mentioned in the New Teftament, and the Effenes, who are never mentioned there, but to whose tenets there are probably fome allufions.

Lightfoot. Cuna. ib.

589. The Pharifees were the moft confiderable fect, both for numbers and for influence; but, though

the multitude followed them, that title was confined to men of leifure, rank, and fortune. Lightfoot, ib. g 2. Beaufobre, ib.

590. The Pharifees acknowledged a twofold fenfe in Scripture, the literal and the hidden; but principally regarded the latter; and, in giving it, indulged themfelves very much in allegories.

591. They received not only the written law, or the Scriptures, but also the unwritten, confifting of traditions, supposed to have been conveyed orally by their fathers, most of them from Moses; reckoned thefe of equal authority with the Scripture; and, by thefe, explained, or perverted it.

Lightfoot, in Mat. xv. 2. Beaufobre, ib.

Mark vii. 3. "Traditions of the elders; " because derived from their ancestors.

Mat. xxiii. 4. Mark vii. 9, 13. Luke xi. 46. " of the Pharifees; " because received and inculcated by them.

592. Their traditions included, not only explications of Scripture, but also inftitutions and ceremonies regarding practice, founded folely upon them.

593. They affected great exactnefs in explaining the law, and, likewise, in observing all the ceremonies enjoined, either by it, or by their traditions; and were oftentatious, hypocritical, and fuperftitious, in the observance of them.

Jofeph. B. J. 1. 1. c. 5. Beaufobre,. ib.

Acts xxvi. 5. axgißesatny diestry," the ftricteft," exacteft, most accurate "fect. "

594. The Pharifees believed the refurrection, and future rewards and punishments.

Jofeph. ib. c. 8. Beaufobre, ib. Acts xxiii. 6, &c.

595. But most of them believed, at the fame time, a tranfmigration of at leaft fome fouls into other bodies.:

Jofeph. Beaufobre, ib.

John ix. 2. "Who did fin, this man," in a preexiftent ftate, or his parents, that he was born blind?”

66

596. The Saducees were not fo numerous, nor fo popular, as the Pharifees, but very confiderable for their riches.

Jid. ib. Lightfoot in Mat. iii. 7.

597. It is thought by many, that the Saducees received only the books of Mofes; but others are of opinion that they acknowledged the whole of the Old Teftament.

Grot. in Mat. xxii. 23. Simon, V. T. l. 1. c. 18,

Beaufobre, ib.

598. They admitted only the literal and obvious fense of the Scriptures, rejecting all mystical and allegorical interpretations.

599. They received only the written law, and rejected all traditions, with the opinions and practices founded upon them,

Jofeph. Ant. 1. 13. c. 10. l. 18. c. 1. Beaufobre, ib.

600. They believed no fpirit but God, denying the existence both of angels, and of human fouls after death.

Beaufobre, ib. Acts xxiii. 8. Mat. xxii. 23, &c.

601. The Saducees were thus, both in their prin. ciples, and in their practices, perfectly oppofite to the Pharifees; and a continual rivalship prevailed between them.

Jofeph. Beaufobre, ib. Mat. xxii. 34. Acts xxiii. 7, &c.

602. The Saducees, notwithstanding the looseness of their opinions, were often in the magiftracy and the priesthood, and were remarkable for their feverity and cruelty; which accounts for the bitterness of their perfecution against Christians, whofe doctrine they all hated, and few of them feem to have embraced.

Jofeph. Ant. ib. and 1. 20. c. 9. Bel. Jud. 1. 2. c. 8. Beau fobre, ib. Acts iv. 1. Acts v. 17, 23, &c,

603. The Effenes were not very numerous, and lived in retirement, affociating only with one another; and, for that reafon, probably, fell not in our Saviour's way.

Jofeph. Bel. Jud. 1. 2. c. 7. Philo. Mofheim, Hift. Eed. fæc. 1. p. 1. c. 2. § 7, &c. Lardner, Cred. p. I. b. 1. c. 4. 5. Beaufobre, ib. Marfh's Michael. vol. 4. ch. 15. fect. 2, &c.

604. They rejected tradition, receiving only the Scrip tures; but they fet no value on the literal fense of these,

1

but

but on a spiritual fenfe, of which they supposed that to be only an emblem; which they carried fo far, as not to offer any facrifices.

605. Their doctrine was a compofition of the ori ental philofophy, with the Jewish religion; and, therefore, in many particulars, bore a great refemblance to that of the Gnoftics; and was, perhaps, the immediate occafion of the rife of thefe heretics among the Jewish converts; and, on this account, some paffages of the New Teftament may refer almoft equally to either,

Michael. 122-125, 136.

Col. ii. 18. @enoxed two gyvena, "worfhipping of angels. " The Effenes were curious about, and anxious to conceal, the names of angels, and ufed them as mediators. KaraßgaBEVETO, deceive by fubtle argument, fuits their speculations, which were common to them with Gnoftics, and derived from the fame philofophy.

Michael. ib. Knatchbul. in loc.

606. The Effenes, reckoning all matter evil and impure, believed only the immortality of the foul, but not the refurrection of the body, which, they thought, is at present the prison of the foul, and by being reunited to it, would only defile it.

2 Tim. ii. 17, 18. «The refurrection paft already." They did not deny it, like the Saducees, but allegorized it. To this they were led, v. 16. "by profane and vain babblings, the fpeculations and refinements of their philosophy.

607. In confequence of the fame principle con

0 4

cerning