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Download (671Kb) Young, Muir Campbell (2018) The Matthean split: an analysis of the Pharisees in the Gospel of Matthew. MRes thesis. http://theses.gla.ac.uk/82354/ Copyright and moral rights for this work are retained by the author A copy can be downloaded for personal non-commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge This work cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Enlighten: Theses https://theses.gla.ac.uk/ [email protected] The Matthean Split: An Analysis of the Pharisees in the Gospel of Matthew GUID: 221442 Muir Campbell Young Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of MRes Theology & Religious Studies Word Count: 28,416 School of Critical Studies College of Arts University of Glasgow July 12th 2018 GUID: 2221442 Abstract This dissertation is concerned with the acerbic relationship between the Matthean community and the Pharisees as shown in the Gospel of Matthew. It is the view of this study that texts reflect the world which created them and as such this dissertation uses historical and literary criticism to analyse the setting of the Gospel of Matthew by locating it within a specific time and place. Once this has been achieved the study moves to discuss and evaluate the impact that specific events such as the First Jewish War (66-73 CE) and the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple (70 CE) had on the author and his contemporaries as he composed the text. A profile of the Pharisee will be established to base future analysis off. The dissertation will then shift focus to analyse passages of the Gospel of Matthew involving the Pharisees and through careful exegesis will aim to identify possible causes in the split between the emerging Christian group of Matthew and the more established Jewish leadership of the Pharisees. 1 GUID: 2221442 Table of Contents Acknowledgements 4 1 – Introduction 5 2 – Methodology 7 2.1 – Introduction 7 2.2 – When was it written? 7 2.3 – Who wrote it? 9 2.4 - The Pharisees 10 2.5 – Analysis 11 3 – The Matthean Period 13 3.1 – Dating the Gospel 13 3.2 – Significant Events 14 3.3 – Formative Judaism and the Council of Jamnia 18 3.4 – Summary and Conclusion 20 4 – The World of Matthew’s Gospel 21 4.1 – Introduction 21 4.2 – Authorship 21 4.3 – A Jewish Gospel 23 4.4 – A Deviant Group 26 4.5 – Antioch 28 4.6 – Summary and Conclusion 31 5 – The Pharisees 33 5.1 – Introduction 33 5.2 – Origins 33 5.3 – Practices and Beliefs 35 5.4 – Power and Influence 36 5.5 – Summary and Conclusion 39 6 – Their Synagogues 42 6.1 – Introduction 42 6.2 – The Synagogue 43 6.3 – Their Synagogue? 44 6.4 – Teaching and Rejection 46 6.5 – Persecution 47 6.6 – Summary and Conclusion 49 2 GUID: 2221442 7 – Hypocrisy 52 7.1 – Introduction 52 7.2 – Giving Alms, Praying and Fasting 52 7.3 – Woe to the Pharisees 54 7.4 – Summary and Conclusion 58 8 – The Law 60 8.1 – Introduction 60 8.2 – Controversial Interpretations 60 8.3 – Mercy versus Sacrifice 64 8.5 – Summary and Conclusion 69 9 – Conclusion 71 Bibliography 75 3 GUID: 2221442 Acknowledgements Academically, I would like to express my deepest thanks and my warmest gratitude to Dr Sean Adams and Dr Jonathan Birch. I am sure that most acknowledgement pages are peppered with flowery and bombastic rhetoric and yet in what has been an immensely difficult year for me on a personal level due to a number of serious family problems, both of my tutors have been professional, insightful and most importantly understanding. Wee things, such as a kind word or a bit of encouragement at difficult times meant a lot. Cheers fellas, I genuinely appreciate all their help you’ve given me and I hope this doesn’t let you down. On a personal level I would like to thank my grandmother Joyce Young for her continued support and enthusiasm during periods of serious ill health. Even when she has had far weightier matters to deal with than a daft big grandson who studies events that happened the best part of two millennia ago in the Near East, she has managed to be stay supportive and loving. You are an inspiration auld yin. Thank you. 4 GUID: 2221442 Chapter 1 – Introduction For almost two millennia, readers of the Gospel of Matthew have noticed how this text is the most Jewish version of the Gospel story and yet also the most critical of the Jewish leadership. Many will have wondered how a document that can promote Jesus in such Jewish terms can be so scathingly critical of the majority of the Jewry depicted in the text. Of the Jewish groups who suffer the First Gospel’s opprobrium, none face criticism as harsh as the Pharisees. The relationship between the Gospel and the Pharisees is often bitter and at times vitriolic, thus the question, why? It is the aim of this study to analyse the passages involving the Pharisees in the Gospel of Matthew and uncover what the author’s treatment of this particular group says about the relationship between the emerging Christian group and the more established expression of Pharisaic Judaism. To do so the dissertation will argue that the Gospel was written by a Jewish community, living in Antioch in Syria, c. 90 CE. Key events of this period, especially the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE, will be discussed to uncover the likely impact that they had on the Matthean group when they composed the Gospel. The dissertation will also look to create a profile of the Pharisees and will suggest that they originated from a scribal class of devout laymen during the Babylonian Exile which ended in 538 BCE and that the Pharisees in the period c. 90 CE would have had disparate practices and beliefs across the different areas of the Jewish diaspora. While the amounts of power and influence that the Pharisees exerted will also have varied in different locations, it will be argued that the removal of the ruling elites in the First Jewish War (66-73 CE) brought an increase to the power and influence that they had. With an understanding of the period c. 90 and a profile of the Pharisees firmly established, the dissertation will shift to analyse the sections of the Gospel which feature this sect. The passages of Matthew’s Gospel will then be analysed in three different sections, the first of which, Chapter Six, will argue that the synagogue was a significant area of disagreement between the Mattheans and the Pharisees and a site where the Mattheans were rejected by their Jewish community. Chapter Seven will argue that the Mattheans viewed the Pharisees as being hypocritical in their various acts and practices and will argue that the Mattheans looked to be more devout than their rival sects in order to lay claim to the pre-70 CE Jewish 5 GUID: 2221442 heritage. Finally, Chapter Eight will argue that it is the Matthean’s interpretation of the Law and their disregard for the oral traditions of the Pharisees that reveals the greatest detail about the likely reasons for the antagonism between this group and the Mattheans. 6 GUID: 2221442 Chapter 2 – Methodology 2.1. - Introduction It is the aim of this dissertation is to show through literary-historical and redaction criticism how the Gospel of Matthew’s portrayal of the Pharisees can be used to highlight the issues that were facing the author of the text and the community to which they belonged. It is believed that by doing this, a better understanding will be gained of the issues that were likely the cause for one community dividing itself and travelling down the paths that would eventually lead to both Christianity and Rabbinic Judaism. In order to achieve these aims, the dissertation will look to establish when this text was written. Once the composition of the text has been located to a specific period, the dissertation will look to try and establish who the author of the Gospel was and what type of environment they were writing in. After it has been established who wrote the text, when it was written, and to what type of community that the author belonged to, the dissertation shall then move to create a profile of the Pharisees from which analysis of the Gospel of Matthew and its depiction of this group can be based. After this has been achieved, selected themes found in the Gospel involving the Pharisees will be analysed in order to better understand probable causes of tension between the two groups. 2.2 – When was it written? Chapter Three of this dissertation will look to anchor the Gospel of Matthew in a particular time, although dating ancient manuscripts exactly can prove to be a difficult process. “Classical assumptions about Matthew were that it was the first Gospel written, was authored by the apostle Matthew, and was, therefore, written in Palestine. All these assumptions have been challenged” (Senior, 1983, p12). As will be explained in Chapter Three, the vast majority of more recent scholarship, starting from the nineteenth century onwards, regards the Gospel of Matthew as not being the first Gospel written.
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