Sadducees

SAD'DUCEES, a Jewish sect often mentioned in the N.T. The origin of the term and its meaning are involved in obscurity, but the most satisfactory theory is that the sect was derived from Zadok and constituted a kind of "sacerdotal aristocracy." This explains Acts 5:17. The Zadok spoken of is the famous high priest of that name whom Solomon appointed to succeed the deposed Abiathar. 1 Kgs 2:35. The Sadducees were a small party, of limited influence among the people, and of a rationalistic turn of mind. From their connection with the high priests, they were men of position, and probably of more or less wealth. They were worldly-minded and had only a superficial interest in religion. They are the forerunners of the modern reform Jews. Their theology was in direct contradiction to the Pharisaic, and, from its nature, could not be popular. It embraced four principal tenets: (1) A denial of the divinity and consequent authority of the oral Law, the body of commentary on the written Law which the Pharisees, without any historic evidence, maintained was handed down by tradition from the lawgiver himself. (2) The Sadducees accepted the teaching of Moses only, and seem to have rejected the later books of the O.T. (3) The denial of man's resurrection - the soul dies with the body. Matt 22:23. Of course the doctrine of future rewards and punishments fell with it; likewise belief in angel or spirit. Acts 23:8 (4) Their fourth principal tenet was that man had the most absolute moral freedom, for upon this freedom was dependent the moral quality of his actions. This tenet was, however, so far "pushed as almost entirely to exclude the divine government of the world." In the N.T. they are not spoken of with the same bitterness as the Pharisees; yet they were determined foes to our Lord, and made common cause with them in condemning him to the cross. Annas and Caiaphas were Sadducees. The sect disappears from history after the first Christian century. They have their successors in the worldly Jews and Christians of the present day.