In Quest of the Historical Pharisees

Whether as parents, foils, or both, the Pharisees have always been a focus of interest for anyone interested in the genesis of Christianity or of rabbinic Judaism. This volume allows serious readers an opportunity to learn the sources, to follow the debates, and so to understand and assess a revolution in historical and theological scholarship.

~Daniel R. Schwartz, Professor of Ancient Jewish History, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

This is an important book in so many ways. It demonstrates eloquently that 'what we can't show, we don't know'--that much of what we assert about Pharisees is simply not supported by the evidence. But it also reminds us that 'objective' description is not a matter of either choosing or amalgamating sources, but of realizing that how the Pharisees were perceived and presented is indeed also some part of who they were. We also see how interpretation reveals the interpreter as well as the text: in these assured and well-informed analyses, we also discern the moral and intellectual character of the scholar. Not least, we are confronted with those other Pharisees--of Jewish and Christian mythology and contemporary critical controversy, who long outlived their historical counterparts but who still haunt and fascinate us.

~Philip Davies, Professor Emeritus, Department of Biblical Studies, University of Sheffield

This is a provocative and engaging study that invites the reader to wrestle with the complexity of the sources and to come to their own synthetic conclusions. In the hands of ordinary most-modernists, such a de-centered approach to a historical question might be counterproductive, but in the hands of the learned colleagues Neusner and Chilton have here assembled, the exercise becomes a very effective way of enabling contemporary students to wrestle with difficulties of the ancient sources.

~Harry Attridge, Lillian Claus Professor of New Testament and Dean of the Divinity School, Yale University