To the Sadducees, no doubt, the
political danger of any Messianic movement was serious; and they would
have been glad to put down Nazarenism, lest it should end in useless
rebellion against their Roman masters, like that other Galilean
movement headed by Judas, a generation earlier. Galilee was always a
hotbed of seditious enthusiasm against the rule of Rome; and high
priest and procurator alike had need to keep a sharp eye upon natives
of that district. On the whole, however, the Nazarenes were but little
troubled for the first twenty years of their existence; and the
undying hatred of the Jews against those later converts, whom they
regarded as apostates and fautors of a sham Judaism, was awakened by
Paul. From their point of view, he was a mere renegade Jew, opposed
alike to orthodox Judaism and to orthodox Nazarenism; and whose
teachings threatened Judaism with destruction. And, from their point
of view, they were quite right. In the course of a century, Pauline
influences had a large share in driving primitive Nazarenism from
being the very heart of the new faith into the position of scouted
error; and the spirit of Paul's doctrine continued its work of
driving Christianity farther and farther away from Judaism, until
"meats offered to idols" might be eaten without scruple, while the
Nazarene methods of observing even the Sabbath, or the Passover, were
branded with the mark of Judaising heresy.
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