Understanding modern talmudic (or rabinnic) Judaism and distinguishing it from the biblical Hebrew religion of the Old Testament(Torah)..........
... and with the destruction of the Temple the Sadducees disappeared altogether, leaving the regulation of all Jewish affairs in the hands of the Pharisees.
Henceforth Jewish life was regulated by the teachings of the Pharisees; the whole history of Judaism was reconstructed from the Pharisaic point of view, and a new aspect was given to the Sanhedrin of the past. A new chain of tradition supplanted the older, priestly tradition. Pharisaism shaped the character of Judaism and the life and thought of the Jew for all the future. (Jewish Encyclopedia. Emphasis mine.)
This has been affirmed over and over again by honest scholars. Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, Chief Rabbi of the United States, wrote
The return from Babylon, and the adoption of the Babylonian Talmud, marks the end of Hebrewism, and the beginning of Judaism.
The Old Testament religion became Pharisaism, and then, as Rabbi Louis Finkelstein wrote
Pharisaism became Talmudism, Talmudism became Medieval Rabbinism, and Medieval Rabbinism became Modern Rabbinism. But throughout these changes of name, inevitable adaption of custom, and adjustment of Law, the spirit of the ancient Pharisee survives unaltered." (Volume 1 of The Pharisees, the Sociological Background of their Faith)
Rabbi Ben Zion Bokser summed things up most succinctly when he wrote simply, "Judaism is not the religion of the Bible." (Judaism and the Christian Predicament, 1966, p.159) |
