By November 3, 2008 Read More →

Josephus, Antiquities XIII, 297: The Pharisees and the Sadducees on the Tradition of the Fathers

Greco-Roman Period
The traditions of the fathers, or elders, mentioned by Josephus, are an important component of what the Rabbis later called oral law. The traditions were a hallmark of the Pharisaic approach to Torah and continued into Rabbinic tradition as it was later enshrined in the Mishnah.

(297) …What I would now explain is this, that the Pharisees have passed on to the
people a great many observances handed down by their fathers, which are not written
down in the law of Moses. For this reason the Sadducees reject them and say that we are
to consider to be obligatory only those observances which are in the written word, but
need not observe those which are derived from the tradition of our forefathers.

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