The Sadducees, to touch upon another point, were, like the sons of Zadok of pre-Maccabæan times, the friends of Hellenistic culture; the Sadducæan party was the party of enlightenment. At first sight this strikes one as incongruous, since the Sadducees were, as against the Pharisees, conservatives in religious belief and practice. They refused, for example, as we have seen, to accept the doctrine of the resurrection of the body, which the Pharisees, being as they claimed the party of religious progress, both welcomed and taught. But the converse is true, too; it is strange that the Pharisees who were the national party, bigoted and narrow in their outlook, should have been ready to accept teaching which was of non-Jewish origin. The same incongruousness is to be seen in the respective attitude of Sadducees and Pharisees towards the Law. As Lauterbach truly says, the former “were conservative and narrow in their views and strongly opposed to changes and innovations. The Pharisees, on the other hand, were the younger party, broader and more liberal in their views, of progressive tendencies and not averse to innovations. Accordingly, we should expect that the Sadducees, whose priestly ancestors and predecessors had always been the official teachers of the people, the custodians of the Law, and presumably also of such tradition as there was, and who themselves were very conservative, the natural advocates of traditional ways and views, would seek to uphold the authority of tradition and the binding character of its Laws. On the other hand, we should expect the Pharisees, being the younger, more progressive and liberal party, which applied new methods of interpretation and developed new theories, to deny the authority of tradition and reject its laws. But, instead, we are led to believe that in their attitude towards the authority of the traditional laws the two parties had changed _rôles_. For the conservative Sadducees are said to have opposed the authority of tradition and the binding character of its teachings, while the Pharisees, who in many points departed from traditional ways and favoured new views, are represented as the advocates of tradition and of the authority of its laws.”[197] Lauterbach’s explanation of the difficulty that the disputes between the Pharisees and Sadducees were not so much about the contents of tradition, but merely about its authority, no doubt holds good in part, but only in part, for the records of the disputes which have come down to us are much concerned with the _contents_ of tradition.[198] We doubt whether the full explanation of the incongruity is in its essence really other than this: the innate illogic of human nature. Is any party ever logical and true to its tenets for long; above all, a religious party? Would any party be really honest if it were? New conditions alter the outlook; new truths tend to displace old landmarks; and the consequent new ways