[Avodah] O vs pharisee

[Zev Sero]

On 1/09/2011 4:00 PM, Micha Berger wrote:
>>        ... (The NT's criticisms of "Pharisees" may be seen in the same
>> >  light, as aimed only at the fake ones.)

> Off topic, but I think they really meant us. Part of the justification
> of the abandonment of the whole concept of Jewish Law (halakhah or some
> sect's version) is to portray people for whom compliance to law occluded
> their acting on faith and morality.

I think that's how the later authors of the NT meant it; they had
probably never seen an actual Parush in the flesh, and they had an
agenda of justifying the way their community already lived.  Also,
they were mostly antisemitic nochrim.  But the original characters
in these stories were shomrei mitzvos, so there's no reason to believe
they had an anti-Prushi agenda.  And the NT's criticisms of Prushim
sound very much like the ones in Sotah, which are aimed only at the
fakes.

-- 
Zev Sero        If they use these guns against us once, at that moment
zev at sero.name   the Oslo Accord will be annulled and the IDF will
                 return to all the places that have been given to them.
		                            - Yitzchak Rabin