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==Jesus' Relationship to the Pharisees==

==Jesus' Relationship to the Pharisees==

====Pharisaic Attempts to Gain Christ Over====

====Pharisaic Attempts to Gain Christ Over====

The attitude of the Pharisees to Jesus - just as it was with John the Baptist - critical. They sent representatives to watch His doings and His sayings and report. They seem to have regarded it as possible that He might unite Himself with them, although it was possible that they assumed His affinities lay with the Essenes. Gradually their criticism became opposition. This opposition grew in intensity as He disregarded their interpretations of the Sabbatic law, ridiculed their refinements of the law of tithes and the distinctions they introduced into the validity of oaths, and denounced their insincere posing. At first there seems to have been an effort to cajole Him into compliance with their plans. If some of the Pharisees tempted Him to use language which would compromise Him with the people or with the Roman authorities, others invited Him to their tables, which was going far upon the part of a Pharisee toward one not a ''chabher''. Even when He hung on the cross, the taunt with which they greeted Him may have had something of longing, lingering hope in it: ''"If he be the King of Israel, let him now come down from the cross, and we will believe him"'' (Mt 27:42 King James Version). If He would only give them that sign, then they would acknowledge Him to be the Messiah.

The attitude of the Pharisees to Jesus - just as with John the Baptist - was critical judgment. They sent representatives to watch His doings and His sayings and report. They seem to have regarded it as possible that He might unite Himself with them, although it was possible that they assumed His affinities lay with the Essenes. Gradually their criticism became opposition. This opposition grew in intensity as He disregarded their interpretations of the Sabbatic law, ridiculed their refinements of the law of tithes and the distinctions they introduced into the validity of oaths, and denounced their insincere posing. At first there seems to have been an effort to cajole Him into compliance with their plans. If some of the Pharisees tempted Him to use language which would compromise Him with the people or with the Roman authorities, others invited Him to their tables, which was going far upon the part of a Pharisee toward one not a ''chabher''. Even when He hung on the cross, the taunt with which they greeted Him may have had something of longing, lingering hope in it: ''"If he be the King of Israel, let him now come down from the cross, and we will believe him"'' (Mt 27:42 King James Version). If He would only give them that sign, then they would acknowledge Him to be the Messiah.

====Reasons for Pharisaic Hatred of Christ====

====Reasons for Pharisaic Hatred of Christ====