Page 141 - Biblical Backgrounds student textbook

messiah to return. Some have said John the Baptist may have been an Essene because he withdrew
from society to the wilderness and practiced a careful purity and diet regimen.

The Scribes

The scribes were learned individuals who could read and write. Their primary job was teaching the law
and settling disputes about it.

The Samaritans

The Samaritans were the descendants of the Israelites who had survived the destruction of the Northern
Kingdom. Over the years they had intermarried with those who had moved into the region. This made
them unclean and therefore despised among the Jews. They did not appreciate this ostracism, so they
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built their own temple, and tried to defile the Jewish temple by spreading human bones inside it.

The Herodians

The Herodians are mentioned in Scripture but not much is known about them. We believe that they
likely were related to or patrons of the Herodian rulership. They were involved in the trap to discredit
Jesus. They and the Pharisees asked Jesus whether it was lawful to pay taxes to Caesar. Jesus saw the
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trap and asked them something akin to “why are you carrying around pagan money?” That could be
considered unclean.

The Zealots
Zealots were the political revolutionaries of Jesus’ day. They could not abide the continued rule of Rome
and sought to violently overthrow it. Barabbas is said, in Mark 15, to have been a murderer and to have
been involved in insurrection. For this reason, he is thought to have been a zealot.
Jewish Government structure under Rome:

The Sanhedrin

This was the ruling body of Judaism under Roman rule. Joseph of Arimathea was a member of this
group. This council was made up of 70 members comprised of Pharisees, scribes, and Sadducees. The
council was under the direction of whoever the High Priest was at the time. This is the council that
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met and is recorded as being worried that Jesus would cause an uprising and the Romans would destroy
Judea and what they had worked hard to build. Jesus is seen before the Sanhedrin in Matthew 26:57-68.

The Village
The village had its own council of elders that would meet to discuss business, political affairs, issues that
effected daily life, judicial affairs, and to worship. This often met at the town gate in the Old Testament
and in the time of Jesus and the early church meetings were often held at the local synagogue. The

183 Ibid, p. 67.
184 N.T. Wright and Michael F Bird, The New Testament in Its World: An Introduction to the History, Literature, and
Theology of the First Christians. 52.
185 Gary M. Burge, Gene L. Green, and Lynn H. Cohick, The New Testament in Antiquity (Grand Rapids, Mich.:
Zondervan, 2009), 70.

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