Lit. “the common precincts.” Whiston, “the common court of the Temple.” Footnote 368: πολισταῖς (_i.e._ “Founders” or “Colonisers”), Scaliger’s emendation of the MS reading πλείστοις; cf. the allusion in Strabo 296 to a Thracian tribe who live without wives and are called Founders (κτίσται). Footnote 369: Cf. § (24). Footnote 370: Perhaps, with a slight transposition of letters, “invincible” (Bekker). Footnote 371: Cf. § (39). (56) Why John Hyrcanus went over from the Pharisees to the Sadducees [Sidenote: 135-105 B.C.] John Hyrcanus I was the son and successor, in the offices of high priest and prince, of Simon the Maccabee. These successes of Hyrcanus, however, aroused the envy of the Jews. His bitterest enemies were the Pharisees, one of the Jewish sects, as we have already stated, whose influence with the populace is such that a word from them against king or high priest meets with instant belief. Hyrcanus had been their disciple and was greatly beloved by them. Having on one occasion invited them to a banquet and hospitably entertained them, and seeing them in high good humour, he began to say to them that they knew how anxious he was to live righteously, and how in all his actions he strove to please God and them (for the Pharisees are a school of philosophers); but he besought them, if ever they saw him erring and deviating from the right way, to bring him back into it and correct him. His guests declaring that there was no virtue which he lacked, he was pleased with their commendation. But one of them, named Eleazar, an ill-natured man who delighted in faction, remarked, “As you have asked us to tell you the truth and desire to be righteous, renounce the high priesthood and be content to be ruler of the people.” And when Hyrcanus enquired of him the reason why he should lay down the office of high priest, he replied, “Because we are informed by the elders that your mother was a captive in the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes.”[372] The story was false, and Hyrcanus was exasperated with the man, and all the Pharisees were greatly indignant.