I. THE SADDUCEES AND THEIR OPINIONS.

As the Christian church in our day has resolved itself into a diversity of sects, so was it with the Jewish at the dawn of what is commonly known as the New Dispensation. None of them, however, are mentioned in the more ancient Scriptures, because they all sprang into existence during the 400 years which intervened between the close of that volume and the commencement of the Gospel era. The leading Hebrew sects were the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes; besides these there was another division, the Herodiens, essentially political in its character, the members being partisans of the infamous Herodian house, truckling courtiers of the world, about which nothing more need be said on this occasion. As to numbers, the first and second far exceeded the third, that of the Essenes, composed of monks, spending their simple and contemplative lives in retirement. The Sadducees, in the matter of adherents, were inferior on the census roll to the Pharisees-the really dominant and most pretentious order of the day. Our concern at present is with the Sadducees; and what is known of them may be presented in a few lines. "They are supposed," says Barnes, the commentator, in animadverting on Matthew, 3rd chapter, "to have taken their name from Sadock, who flourished about 260 years before the Christian era. He was a pupil of Antigonus Sochaeus, president of the Sanhedrim, or Great Council of the nation. He had taught the duty of serving God disinterestedly, without the hope of reward or fear of punishment. Sadock, not properly understanding the doctrine of his master, drew the inference that there was no future state of rewards or punishments; and on this belief founded the sect." Now whether the disciple understood or misunderstood his master's teaching is a matter of little importance; the sect entertained the dogma imputed to it, as we discover from a source that leaves no room for doubt. That source

is the New Testament. They excluded a resurrection from their confession, as is shown in the narrative before us; and according to Acts xxiii. 8, they were sceptical not merely as to that, but also on the existence of angels and spirits.

What distinction is to be drawn between "angel" and "spirit" in the historical passage in Acts is by no means obvious. "Spirit," one of the rejected articles of faith, is not defined by any such word as human, which would have removed the difficulty at once. But there is no qualifying term, and it would be rash and hazardous to place the one just mentioned before the noun "spirit," though many English readers will, as it were instinctively, supply it in a moment. This thing is somewhat apparent from the next verse, that the beings represented by "spirit" were, to the mind of the scribes, who attached themselves to the Pharisees' "part," not necessarily bad, and that they were even employed on God's errands, like the angels; since, alluding to Paul, they say: "if a spirit or

an angel hath spoken to him, let us not fight against God;" that is, by resisting the prisoner's testimony. At any rate, they seem to have viewed the spirits referred to in their Council in this way; though of necessity what they believed on that or on any other subject has from their authority alone no claim upon our faith. Nor do we refuse to admit a distinction between " angel" and "spirit," for the inspired writer teaches us to distinguish them, by explaining the creed of the Sadducees thus: "The Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, neither angel nor spirit, but the Pharisees confess both" (Acts xxiii. 8). The Pharisees, then, were not to be blamed for accepting testimony regarding what seems to be a second class of extra-mundane existences; and yet they may have erred, and we suspect did greatly err, in maintaining that the voice of any "spirit," distinguishing that order from the angelic, was entitled to reverence, in virtue of its being a message from Heaven; as angelic communications were justly and ever held to be. In that case there would be introduced a distinction without a difference, for both would be messengers in God's service, in other words, His angels, and both would by right insist on obedience to their instructions. Now the speakers on this occasion might have known better than that supposes, and still have believed in the two orders of supernatural beings in a more Scriptural manner; that is to say, they might have understood the character and functions of the two classes of invisible agents more properly. And why do we say so? Because the Jewish Bible, as all are aware, contains manifold references to both; and does not the New Testament assure us that when the Son of God was manifested in the flesh, the unseen spirits of evil-powers of darkness, demons, principalities, with Satan, god of this world, prince and power of the air, as their chief-put forth strenuous and malignant exertions to defeat His mission? However, be the distinction what it may, we are safe in accepting this as the doctrine of the Sadducees, they believed in the existence of neither "angel" nor "spirit," good or bad; agent or antagonist of the Divine Will.

Sub

And now we return to their view of man and of death. stantially, then, they held by the unity of individual man; at all events, their faith amounted to this, that nothing survived the crushing blow of death. According to their conception, the drama of life ended in a sleep, an eternal sleep. In another's language, they "looked into the abyss without trembling. There is no phantom there! There is neither angel, spirit, nor life to come."

Why did they conclude that each little human history was everlastingly closed when the heart ceased to throb ? Perhaps-and we can use no positive language-perhaps, being what may be called the free-thinking philosophical party of the day, death was regarded by them as a perpetual slumber by the ordination of nature; or it may be some of the more serious amongst them, knowing the penalty of sin to be death, as it is written, "the soul

that sinneth, it shall die" (Ezek. xviii. 20), and discerning no efficacious provision, for there could be none, in the observances imposed on Hebrew worshippers, to cleanse the conscience or obtain pardon of moral guilt, assumed that none was foreshadowed by their complex system of ordinances, none contemplated in the counsels of Heaven, and so advanced with resignation or indifference to their fate, death, without hope of ultimate reanimation. Their conclusion as to death being inevitably eternal, was wrong; yet, if they explained their sacrificial rites to themselves in that way, the view so far was correct, but only so far. "The law"-ceremonial -"made nothing perfect, but the bringing in of a better hope did; by the which we draw nigh unto God" (Heb. vii. 19). The first tabernacle . . . was a figure for the time then present, in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices, that could not make him that did the service perfect, as pertaining to the conscience," that is, cleansing the adoring attendant at the altar from spiritual defilement. "Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by HIS OWN BLOOD, He entered in once into the holy place, having OBTANIED ETERNAL REDEMPTION for us" (Heb. ix. 8, 9, 12).

There is some reason to think they went so far as to assert that life and sensibility not only never would, but never could, be restored. Be that as it may, they contended for this at all events, that when dead a man was in the most complete or absolute sense as if he had never breathed; and that the long night of insensibility would never never be disturbed in any instance by a resurrection to intelligent consciousness; in a word, that the doctrine of a future state of existence was a bubble and a dream.

Though professing these tenets, justice requires the acknowledgment that they were not avowed infidels, as we understand the word. On the contrary, they held their Bible in professedly devout esteem, having special regard for the writings of Moses. Jesus does not charge them, and at no time are they charged, with rebellion against the supreme authority of Holy Writ. Our Lord addresses them in this manner: "Ye do err, not knowing,"-not understanding "the Scriptures." Strange as it may appear to us, with not a particle of faith in an after world, content to be only the heirs of time, they were nevertheless a religious party, and it was not unusual for members of their sect to occupy the highest positions in the church. In Acts v. 17, 18, we are informed, "Then the high priest rose up, and all they that were with him (which is the sect of the Sadducees), and were filled with indignation, and laid their hands on the Apostles, and put them in the common prison." And not merely were dignified ecclesiastics numbered among them, but according to Horne in his "Introduction to the Study of the Holy Scriptures," (vol. ii., p. 197), "the Sadducean error prevailed among the principal men both of rank and learning in those days;" the days when Christianity first began to be promulgated. Here, then, were members of the Sanhedrim, or

National Council, and officials in the Jewish Church who wore the most sacred vestments; here were very grave and learned citizens, holding by the Bible of their age, and wisely doing so, yet in some respects lamentably ignorant of its contents. Jesus Christ says so, and to us His testimony is final.

But not satisfied with holding their own opinions in peace, they were amongst the most inveterate persecutors of the Gospel; and the reason of their hostility is not difficult to find. The testimony from the Acts, quoted a few lines above, establishes this charge. So does Matt. xvi. 1-" The Pharisees also with the Sadducees came, and tempting desired Him that He would show them a sign from heaven;" likewise Acts iv. 1, 3,—“ And as they spake unto the people, the priests, and the captain of the temple, and the Sadducees, came upon them, being grieved that they taught the people, and preached through Jesus the resurrection from the dead. And they laid hands on them, and put them in hold unto the next day." This grief, we suspect, was very much akin to the "indignation. mentioned in the 5th chapter, already transcribed, and the arresting of the speakers as evil-doers shows very distinctly the temper of the zealots who deemed their own opinions so far above suspicion and dispute. No wonder they were angry, taking frail humanity as it is. They were ready for cruel deeds against those who preached "the resurrection," and we may suppose had a shower of opprobrious epithets to pour upon their heads, and fiery verbal stimulants wherewith to inflame the passions of the more servile and imbruted adherents of their cause. They would, we may be sure, denounce the innovaters as perverters of the truth, fanatics, dangerous characters, madmen, and deceivers of the people, for whom they were burdened with such a virtuous excess of sympathy. What! a "carpenter's son," a band of "fishermen" from Galilee, who never sat at the feet of a Gamaliel, teach our Doctors! call in question our wisdom! dare to hint that up till now we have misunderstood the Sacred Volume! It was there-deep down into the pride of their hearts-the sharp point of the iron entered, and incensed by the shock and the pain they selected once more the ignoble and cheap defence of persecution.

Of the Sadducees as a class, John, the herald of the Messiah, entertained a low opinion, and he expressed it on one occasion in no gentle terms (Matt. iii. 7), "When he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, O generation of vipers "-malignant and wicked men-"who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?" Once when they arrived to tempt and snare Him, our Lord spoke words that indicated His knowledge of their character (Matt. xvi. 3, 4), "O ye hypocrites! ye can discern the face of the sky; but can ye not discern the signs of the times? A wicked and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign, and there shall no sign be given unto it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas." They were benighted, immoral,

and insincere. To the Son of God their enmity was unrelenting, and His alarms and Gospel tidings fell on their hardened hearts as powerless as the breeze that strikes a granite cliff.

We must not be so uncharitable as to suppose that their unbelief of a future left every one of them reprobate and vile. There would be-and why should we think otherwise ?-many fine specimens of the race amongst them, in spite of their dismal and unrestraining creed,-good fathers, good husbands, good friends, good officials, and good neighbours. Sometimes, we may conjecture, individuals in their ranks may have taken a higher type, and resembled the young man who was so tenderly regarded by the Saviour of the world, but over whom the Divine charm of the Gospel could not be thrown.

Though their future was clouded by despair, they still, be it recollected, had faith in the God of their fathers; and the consciousness of His holy and all-seeing inspection could not but influence their hearts and lives more or less. Their religion, whatever else it inculcated, had made them familiar with His awful name, and with present rewards and present punishments; and that knowledge could not fail to affect their conduct, though nothing beyond the tomb spoke to them of danger or of hope. Many of the Stoics," those stoutest apostles of the manliest manhood," according to a distinguished scholar,-like many of the Buddhists in India at a still more ancient date, who regarded this transient scene as the "be-all and the end-all," spent pure and noble lives, and reckoned virtue its own reward, professing even to be satisfied with the meagre terms. And in our day it would be monstrous to affirm that where the true God is equally unknown as in those distant lands and epochs, the order of things is vice, treachery, and open crime. There have been fair spots in every land and in every age, however benighted,- men who, as a great preacher has finely said, "were yet not disobedient to the Eternal Voice speaking in their hearts, and who by means of that lived above their generations, penetrating into the invisible;" and, like Him who loveth righteousness, though it may be ignorant of Christian motives and Christian hope, why should we not frankly acknowledge it, and rejoice over its fruits? "God is no respecter of persons; but in every nation he that feareth Him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with Him" (Acts x. 35, 36).

A creed similar to that of the Sadducees-nay, a creed of negation more tremendous and dreary-is embraced by many in this boasted epoch of science and civilisation, against whom, on the score of morals and sincerity, it would be shameful to whisper one syllable of reproach. Such characters, in ancient or modern times, are a law unto themselves, and never sink into the slums of vice and debasement, nor brandish the weapons of slander and violence. But while many of the Sadducees bore, as in fairness we may imagine, an excellent reputation, and were governed by an innate

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