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Again, when he was brought before the council, and perceived that the chief priests and scribes were bent upon his destruction, he took advantage of the circumstance, that the one part of them were Sadducees, and the other Pharisees,* to make a declaration which he knew would set them against each other, and probably divert their resentment, for the time at least, from himself: Men and brethren, I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee: of the hope and resurrection of the dead I am called in question. And when he had so said, there arose a dissension between the Pharisees and the Sadducees: and the multitude (that is, the great body of the council) was. divided.

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Upon that occasion the scribes, that were of the sect of the Pharisees, asserted the cause of Paul against the violence of their opponents, not because they regarded him, or his doctrines, with favour, as being themselves sincere lovers of the truth; but from a hatred of the Sadducees, and from a spirit of party, which urged them to defend a member of their own sect, however odious and offensive to them on other grounds, rather than acknowledge, in presence of their adversaries, that he was a preacher of false doctrines: We

* Acts xxiii. 6.

*

find no evil in this man; but if a spirit or an angel hath spoken unto him, let us not fight against God. A somewhat similar counsel had before been given by Gamaliel, but probably from different motives: Refrain from these men, and let them alone: for if this counsel or this work be of man, it will come to nought: but if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it; lest haply ye be found to fight against God. But neither did Gamaliel, in the case of Peter and his brethren, nor did the Pharisees, in that of St. Paul, pursue their reasoning, till it should land them in the right conclusion: If by opposing this counsel, and persecuting these men, we should be fighting against God; then, by neglecting and disregarding their doctrines, we are despising God, and rejecting his counsel: if it be dangerous to oppose them, it must be sinful not to follow them.

It appears, from the narrative of St. Luke, that the Jews who banded together, and bound themselves under a curse, to kill Paul, were encouraged by the chief priest and elders:† these therefore must have been of the sect of Sadducees: and when Ananias and the elders accused him before Felix, Paul declared that they had found

* Acts v. 38.

+ Acts xxiii. 12, 14.

no evil doing in him, while he stood before the council, except it were for that one voice, or expression, that he cried, standing among them, Touching the resurrection of the dead, I am called in question by you this day. In the fifth chapter of the Acts, it is expressly said, that the then high priest, Caiaphas, and his family, were Sadducees. What a dreadful revolution was that in the government of God's people, which had seated in the pontifical chair, and invested with the consecrated symbols of spiritual authority, the profligate, the scoffer, and the atheist! Well did it beseem the hypocrite, whom the Apostle indignantly designated as a whited wall; who hated, if he admitted the existence of that God, whom he professed to serve; well did it beseem him to be the foremost amongst the persecutors of Paul, the singlehearted, the persuasive, the fearless preacher of the resurrection, and a judgment to come. It is impossible for the reflecting Christian to peruse this portion of the Apostolic history, without calling to mind that era of the Christian Church, when the truth was opposed, and its asserters persecuted by unbelieving and profligate men, high priests over the house of God, and lords over his heritage, fierce maintainers of all the

corruptions of religion, and relentless enemies of its sincere professors, in proportion as they themselves disbelieved the foundations of its authority, and were ignorant of its spiritual energies. We learn, from the historian of the Jews, that the Sadducees, who laughed to scorn the notions of a resurrection and a judgment to come, were remarkable for their severity, and for their pitiless infliction of the most cruel punishments. Other points of resemblance might easily be discovered; but the course which is pursued by the enemies of divine truth is in all ages much the same. The mistaken zeal of the bigot, who verily thinks with himself that he ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth, when it is preached otherwise than suits his prejudices; and the politic intolerance of the hypocrite, whether in the Jewish or the Christian Church, have raised the same clamour against the apostles of truth: We have found this man a pestilent fellow, and a mover of sedition throughout the world.

In answer to this accusation, St. Paul declares, that his accusers had not found him in the temple disputing with any man; neither raising up the people, neither in the synagogues, nor in the city. They knew that the charge of sedition was likely

to awaken the jealousy of the Roman governor; for the Jews were a turbulent and rebellious people, ready to follow the auspices of any pretender, who promised to deliver them from the yoke of a servitude which they abhorred. By this argument they had determined the wavering resolution of Pilate; If thou let this man go, thou art not Cæsar's friend :* whereas the Roman magistrates in these provinces treated with contempt the prejudices and jealousies of the Jews respecting their religion; "If it be 'a question of words, and names, and of your law, look ye to it; for I will be no judge of such matters. With such words did Gallio drive the Jews from the judgment-seat.

St. Paul was described by the hired orator of his Jewish accusers, as a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes. The word, which is here translated sect, is in the fourteenth verse rendered heresy. It signifies the adoption of a distinct and peculiar set of opinions; and as the fourteenth verse is St. Paul's answer to the charge which is contained in the fifth, the same version should be employed in both cases. Let us observe the candour and courageous sincerity of the Apostle. The false and calumnious * John xix. 12. + Acts xviii. 15.

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