Why pharisees against jesus

But this crowd that does not know the law is accursed John , The religious leaders assumed that the belief of some of the crowd was due to ignorance. But the attention Jesus was getting brought out the leaders' hatred and jealousy.

The jealousy of the religious leaders caused them to want Jesus dead. The deeds of Jesus also angered the religious leaders. After seeing Jesus heal a demon-possessed man some of the multitude questioned if Jesus could be the Messiah:. And some of the multitudes were amazed and said, 'Could this be the Son of David [the Messiah]?

The miracle was undeniable, for the man was blind and mute as well as demon-possessed. Rather than believe Jesus to be the Messiah, these religious rulers attributed Jesus' power to the devil. Thus their "official" explanation was that Jesus' power came from Satan.

This was another cause for which they wanted Him dead. Jesus was also a threat to their religious system. He pointed out the hypocrisy that was connected with their practice. The Bible records that on two different occasions He came into the temple precincts and drove out the moneychangers. The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And he found in the temple those who were selling oxen and sheep and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables.

And he made a scourge of cords, and drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and the oxen; and he poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables; and to those who were selling the doves he said, "Take these things away; stop making my Father's house a place of business. There were political reasons that the religious leaders wanted Jesus dead. There was an unstable situation between the Jews and the Romans.

The thought of a Messiah who may lead an uprising against Rome. The religious leaders were filled with pride and arrogance. They were particularly proud that they did not socialize with "sinners. When one Pharisee saw Jesus allow a woman to wash His feet, he said,. This man, if he were a prophet, would know who and what manner of woman this is who is touching him, for she is a sinner Luke The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, 'Look, a gluttonous man and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!

The religious rulers believed themselves to be righteous by avoiding sinners. When Jesus kept company with these individuals, it infuriated the proud Pharisees and other religious rulers. As much as anything, the lack of respect that Jesus had for their religious traditions incensed the religious leaders. Jesus ignored these traditions, which they observed so minutely. He knew they were human-made rules that had not come from God.

And it was Jesus' disregard for their traditions concerning the Sabbath that caused the most outrage. God had commanded the Sabbath to be a day of rest from labors and a time to worship Him. The religious leaders added all types of restrictions to the Sabbath making it difficult, if not impossible to observe. Jesus was grieved and angry at the way they had perverted the Sabbath observance.

He asked the religious leaders,. Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill? But they kept silent. So when he had looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts Mark , 5.

Jesus then healed a man in their presence. This healing on the Sabbath was more than they could endure. They concluded that the genuine Messiah would not dare do such a thing. Their response was immediate:. They were embarrassed and apologized profusely to the president, but he refused to quit. He modeled the way. He lived with integrity. If we want to be servant leaders, we must be willing to lead by example. It starts with integrity. These Pharisees were quick to demand perfection.

The problem was, their ambition for righteousness had turned into a list of unbearable demands. In the end, they were only hurting the people they were called to serve. Servant leaders like Jesus take a different approach.

They see leadership as a position for helping rather than a platform for hurting. I believe pride was the greatest downfall for this set of Pharisees. Unlike Jesus, they had no humility. What is humility? We know pride is a destructive force. Why were they afraid? Look at the history of Israel. In almost every generation going back to Abraham, the Israelites lived under the domination and oppression of a foreign nation.

The Pax Israeliana , or the peace of Israel, was always extremely short-lived. Almost always, the people were a conquered people, a people who lived under the oppression and the tyranny of their enemies.

In the case of the first-century Jews, the oppressor was Rome. Throughout Jewish history, there had always been those who were committed to revolution, who wanted to throw off the yoke of the foreigners who held them captive. Those who were in positions of power and authority, as the Pharisees and Sadducees were, feared losing their power and authority. The Jewish leaders feared the consequences of a revolt against Rome. They feared the Romans. They feared that Jesus somehow would lead an insurrection, cause another uprising, and consequently bring a bloodbath, and so they sought to remove Him before He caused them trouble.

Teaching Series. Conference Messages. Tabletalk Magazine. Gift Certificates. Ligonier Ministries. The agenda of the meeting was to settle an important question among the early church: did non-Jewish men need to be circumcised in order to be baptized and receive the Holy Spirit? The Pharisees in attendance were the first to chime in. In Acts , it says: "Then some of the believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, 'The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to keep the law of Moses.

Notice that it says the Pharisees were among the "believers," further proof some Pharisees, too, were early followers of Jesus.

But here's where things go south. The apostles are in stark disagreement with the Pharisees and say that everyone, circumcised or uncircumcised, can have their hearts purified through faith in Christ. Peter, acknowledging the physical pain and danger of circumcising an adult, rebukes the Pharisees in verses 10 and And that's pretty much the take of the New Testament on the Pharisees. It seems that it was this internal dispute among Jesus's followers that produced this stark line of demarcation between Christians and Pharisees.

What's important to understand is that the four gospels of the New Testament Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were written starting in the year 70 C. So it's very possible that Jesus himself wouldn't have harbored such distaste for the Pharisees during his lifetime, but that the authors of the New Testament wrote the gospels with a chip on their shoulder following their ugly divorce with the Pharisees over circumcision.

After the Second Temple was destroyed in 70 C. The Sadducees, who had been the most influential force during the Second Temple period, were scattered, while the underdog Pharisees, "who had been very much on the outs," says Chilton, "really emerged as the last authority standing in Judaism. Over the ensuing centuries, the oral traditions of the Pharisees were committed to writing in the Mishnah and then commented upon in the Talmud. The Pharisaic "sages" who had transmitted the oral tradition from the time of Moses were replaced by learned rabbis who studied the Torah and the complex commentaries found in the Talmud.

Modern Judaism is, in a sense, a continuation of the traditions first championed by the Pharisees. HowStuffWorks earns a small affiliate commission when you purchase through links on our site.