Who Were The Pharisees?

Hinzugefügt: 2026-05-25

[00:00:00]Mention the word Pharisee to some believers and they immediately begin to boo and hiss. But who were they exactly?

[00:00:09]The word Pharisee comes from a term meaning the separated ones.

[00:00:14]This Jewish movement rose to prominence during a difficult period in Israel's history and [music] began to flourish around 100 years before the birth of Jesus.

[00:00:24]Israel had faced foreign occupation, outside influence, [music] and persecution.

[00:00:30]Many feared the Jewish people were losing both their identity and their faithfulness to [music] God.

[00:00:37]So, the Pharisees responded by cultivating a culture [music] deeply committed to preserving holiness and obedience to what they understood as God's law.

[00:00:49]Through the scribes [music] and rabbis, the Pharisees became highly influential among ordinary Jews and helped shape what would [music] later become rabbinic Judaism.

[00:00:59]One of the things that made the Pharisees distinct [music] was something known as the oral law, sometimes described as building a fence around the law.

[00:01:07]These were additional traditions, rules, and interpretations passed down through generations intended to stop people from accidentally breaking God's commands.

[00:01:17]Over time, many of these traditions came to function with enormous authority, sometimes practically alongside the written law itself. For example, if scripture said not to work on the Sabbath, the Pharisees asked, [music] "What exactly counts as work?"

[00:01:34]So, detailed debates emerged over things like how far someone could walk [music] on the Sabbath, whether tying a knot was allowed, or whether carrying certain objects counted as work.

[00:01:45]And this is where Jesus often confronted [music] them.

[00:01:49]Not because holiness was wrong, but because outward rule-keeping had begun replacing [music] the deeper heart of God's law.

[00:01:58]Everything became [music] focused on external righteousness.

[00:02:02]The law was meant to reveal humanity's need for God. Many Pharisees [music] responded not with humility, but with spiritual pride.

[00:02:12]And in raising the standard externally, they often missed [music] the very grace they claimed to defend.