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Quotes About Pharisees

This man welcomes sinners and eats with them," Jesus confronted the Pharisees and scribes not only with the return of the prodigal son, but also with the resentful elder son. It must have come as a shock to these dutiful religious people.
~ Henri J.M. Nouwen
The Pharisees were the religious experts of their day. They possessed much information about God, but they had no personal relationship with Him. Jesus thanked His Father that it was not to these "experts" that the Father had revealed spiritual truth, but rather to those who were humble and who recognized their need for God's revelation.
~ Henry T. Blackaby
The churches failed to realize that the working-class movement was the movement of the humiliated and oppressed supplicating for justice. They did not choose to work with and for them to create the kingdom of God on earth. By siding with the oppressors, they deprived the working-class movement of God. And now they reproach it for being godless. The Pharisees!
~ Milan Kundera
We can hardly say that the Pharisees had an accurate 'knowledge' of man when they pointed to the sins (the real sins) of publicans and sinners. This judgment, which separated knowledge of man from self-knowledge, was as nothing in God's eyes. The Jew did not have a better understanding because he was able to judge the heathen. In the sphere of abstract morality this could possibly be said, but this is not Biblical morality - O man, who judgest others!
~ G C Berkouwer
rich were able to afford crypts where entire families would be able to "go to sleep with their fathers," as the saying went. Sleep was the common metaphor used to express their hope that one day Yahweh would return and resurrect the dead for judgment. There was a debate within the Pharisee and Sadducee circles about resurrection. The Pharisees believed it, but the Sadducees did not.
~ Brian Godawa
I am saying that these so-called signs and wonders of Jesus raising a little girl and the man, Lazarus, from the dead are unsubstantiated rumors and legends. There is no resurrection and there is no afterlife spoken of in the Scriptures. Pharisees draw their arguments from non-Scriptural sources and traditions, which we Sadducees simply do not recognize as authoritative. We alone stand on the Word of our God." Annas had a snooty arrogance to him.
~ Brian Godawa
I believe this son represents those of us who are "Pharisees" in our hearts. We keep all the rules, we do everything required of us, and we are faithful and loyal believers. But we lack what our Father cares about most: love, compassion, mercy, grace, and forgiveness.
~ Kathie Lee Gifford
Because what touches His heart is not how much we know, but how much we love. Not how pure we are, but how passionate. Maybe that is why, when Pharisees were fighting over theology, prostitutes were falling at the Savior's feet and slipping into the kingdom of God on their tears.
~ Ken Gire
Never before had Jewish morality and Greek philosophy been fused to such momentous effect. That the law of the God of Israel might be read inscribed on the human heart, written there by his Spirit, was a notion that drew alike on the teachings of Pharisees and Stoics—and yet equally was foreign to them both.
~ Tom Holland
Hypocrites are double-edged knives.
~ Haitian proverb
I have spoken to many parents who feared they were producing little hypocrites who were proud and self-righteous. Hypocrisy and self-righteousness is the result of giving children a keepable law and telling them to be good. To the extent they are successful, they become like the Pharisees....The genius of Phariseeism was that it reduced the law to a keepable standard of externals that any self-disciplined person could do. In their pride and self-righteousness, they rejected Christ.
~ Tedd Tripp
I remember the Pharisees from Jesus Christ, Superstar. They were the ones with the deep voices who were always hassling Christ.
~ Neal Stephenson
C'est une atrocité de pharisiens d'exiger des esclaves le désintéressement spirituel qui n'est possible qu'aux affranchis.
~ Leon Bloy
The thing to note about accidental Pharisees is just that. They're accidental. They're like dinner at Denny's. No one plans to go there. You just end up there.
~ Larry Osborne
If you allow your frustration to turn into disgust and disdain for people you've left behind, you'll end up on a dangerous detour. Instead of becoming more like Jesus, you'll become more like his archenemies, the Pharisees of old, looking down on others, confident in your own righteousness.
~ Larry Osborne
As far as the Pharisees were concerned, if you gave a dish to the poor it became unclean, because the poor were the great unwashed who didn't fulfill ceremonial washing. But Jesus says the dish becomes clean because it expresses love.
~ Tim Chester
Pharisees were the upstanding "conservative evangelical pastors" of their day, strongly convinced of the inerrancy of Scripture and its sufficiency for guidance in every area of life, if only it could be properly interpreted.69 Yet it is precisely such an environment in which a healthy perspective on the Bible can easily give way to legalism.
~ Craig L. Blomberg
Pharisees were the upstanding "conservative evangelical pastors" of their day, strongly convinced of the inerrancy of Scripture and its sufficiency for guidance in every area of life, if only it could be properly interpreted.
~ Craig L. Blomberg
Throughout the Gospel there is a consistent narrative opposition between those representing the symbolic order on the one hand and the poor and marginal on the other: 1. priests (purity) vs. the leprous (1: 41ff.); 2. scribes (debt) vs. the physically disabled (2: 1ff.); 3. Pharisees (debt) vs. the dependent elderly (7: 6ff.); 4. scribes (debt) vs. disenfranchised widows (12: 40).
~ Ched Myers
Have you ever wondered what a church full of Pharisees would be like? 1. They would all attend every service 2. They would all tithe 3. They would all work in the church 4. They would all go to hell
~ Adrian Rogers
it. Many parents have successfully raised self-righteous little Pharisees. When they look at themselves, they do not see a sinner in desperate need, so they are not grateful for a Savior. Sadly, the same is true of many of their parents.
~ Timothy S. Lane
Jesus is telling the Pharisees that the kingdom is right there for them to see, but they do not see it. He is saying that because the King is here, there are visible signs of his rule. What
~ Timothy S. Lane
The Sadducees are Hellenized Judeans and dominate the Council. The Pharisees are a minority on the Council, and consider the Sadducees to be their, well—" "Their enemy.
~ Janette Oke
To avoid the trap of the Pharisees, we've got to guard the interconnection between our thoughts and our attitudes.
~ David Jeremiah