Gide. I'm Gary Stevens. And welcome to the second series of the History in the Bible podcast.

More of the history in more of the books in all the Bibles.

Episode 2.16. Meet the Neighbors, Pharisees, Sadducees and Essence.

This episode is a little shorter than usual, but that's how my topics divided.

In the last episode of the history in the Bible, I concluded with the death of the great

and dreadful Herod.

Let's survey the state of Judean society at the time of his unlamented passing, and talk

about the Sadducees and Pharisees and most of all the Essines.

As the Old Testament tells it, the Jewish nation and religion comprised a united body politic

and sacred commonwealth from the fall of the Kingdom of Israel, right through the return under Ezra and Nehemiah in the Persian period.

The only division in Judaism was between those who followed God's laws and those who strayed.

From the time of the Seleucids on, the people fragmented into factions and religious renewal movements.

But all shared a common framework, a core of values and beliefs.

There was only one God and all others were false.

The people and this one god were bound by a contract,

a covenant that was preserved by the people obeying the law.

This contract was closely modelled on the treaties that the Assyrians forced on their vassals.

I got stuck into that fascinating issue in episode 1.15,

Exodus Part 3, the contract with God at Sinai.

Areas of life that others said were ruled by custom and morality,

the Jews said were under God's authority. The Greeks and Romans never believed that

their gods had anything to teach about ethical principles. They held Homer in the highest

...