Boethusians
The Boethusians (
Origins according to the Talmud
The post-
The Mishnah, as well as the Baraita, mentions the Boethusians as saying that the omer offering must be offered on the Sunday of Passover (in opposition to the Pharisees who offered it on the second day of Passover), resulting in different dates for the Shavuot holiday.[4] Elsewhere, it is narrated that the Boethusians hired false witnesses in order to mislead the Pharisees in their calculation of the new moon.[5] Another point of dispute between the Boethusians and the Pharisees was whether the high priest should prepare the incense inside or outside the Holy of Holies on Yom Kippur[6]
As the beginnings of this sect are shrouded in obscurity, so also is the length of its duration. The Talmud mentions a Boethusian in a dispute with a pupil of Rabbi Akiva,[7] yet it is likely that the word here means simply a sectarian, a heretic, just as the term "Sadducee" was used in a much wider sense later on. A Boethus, son of Zonim, and nearly contemporaneous with Rabbi Akiva[8] is mentioned in the Mishnah;[9] he was not, however, a Boethusian, but a pious merchant. An amora, c. 300 CE, was also called "Boethus".
Relationship to other groups
A parallel to the Yoma 19b has "Sadducees" instead of "Boethusians"; and in other passages the Talmud undoubtedly uses these two terms indifferently in designating the same sect. Graetz's assumption, therefore, that the Sadducees were the political and the Boethusians the religious opponents of the Pharisees, is untenable.
Some scholars have identified the Boethusians with the Essenes, the sect that produced the Dead Sea Scrolls.[10] Some of the scrolls express views similar to those attributed to the Boethusians by the Talmud. [11] According to this theory, the word "Boethusian" is a corruption of "Beit Essaya", meaning "House of Essenes".[12]
A high-priestly family
The Boethusians are believed to have been associated with the members of the high-priestly family of Boethus. The family of Boethus produced the following high priests:
- Simon, son of Boethus from Alexandria, was made a high priest about 25 BCE by Herod the Great, in order that his marriage with Boethus's daughter, Mariamne, might not be regarded as a mésalliance, a marriage with a person thought to be unsuitable or of a lower social position.[13]
- Joazar, son of Boethus (4 BCE and before 6 CE), unpopular and an advocate of compliance with the Census of Quirinius[14]
- Eleazar, son of Boethus (4-3 BCE)[15] independently attested in the Mandaean Book of John.
- Simon Cantheras, son of Boethus (41-42 CE)[16]
- Elioneus, son of Simon Cantheras[17]
- Joshua ben Gamla (64 CE), whose wife Martha belonged to the house[18]
The hatred of the Pharisees toward this high-priestly family is shown by the words of the
"The house of Boethus" heads the list of the wicked and sinful priestly families enumerated by Abba.References
- Shimon ben Boethus, high priest in King Herod's time; the family is "
- ^ Pirkei Avot 1:3
- Avot of Rabbi Natan5:2
- ^ Menachot 10:3; compare also Hagigah 2:4.
- ^ Tosefta, Rosh Hashana 1:14; Bavli Rosh Hashana 22b; Yerushalmi Rosh Hashana 2 (57d), below; compare Geiger, "Urschrift," p. 137, 138.
- ^ Tosefta, Yoma, 1:8; Yerushalmi Yoma 1 (39a).
- ^ Shabbat 108a; Soferim 1:2
- ^ compare Yerushalmi l.c. 10b
- ^ Bava Metzia 5:3
- ^ Y. Sussmann (1989), The History of the Halakha and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Preliminary Talmudic Observations on Miqṣat Ma‘aśe ha-Torah. Tarbiz 59
- ^ Sigalit Ben-Zion, A Roadmap to the Heavens: An Anthropological Study of Hegemony Among Priests, Sages, and Laymen. Academic Studies Press, 2009. p. 105
- Encyclopedia Britannica, ""Boethusian | Judaism".".
- ^ Josephus, "Antiquitates", 15:9§3; 19:6§2.
- ^ Josephus, "Antiquitates", 18:1§1.
- ^ Josephus, "Antiquitates", 17:13§1
- ^ Josephus, "Antiquitates", 19:6§2.
- ^ Josephus, "Antiquitates", xix. 8, § 1.
- ^ Yevamot 6:4
- ^ Pesachim 57a; Tosefta, Menachot 12:23
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Singer, Isidore; et al., eds. (1901–1906). "Boethusians". The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls. Its bibliography:
- Eduard Baneth, "Ueber den Ursprung der Sadokäer und Boethus." Berliner-Hoffmann, Magazin, ix.1-37, 61-95 (also printed separately, Dessau, 1882);
- Geiger, Urschrift, 1857, pp. 105 et seq.;
- Heinrich Grätz, Gesch. der Juden, iii.89, 223, 4th ed.;
- Emil Schürer, Gesch. ii.217-218, 409–419.
