Ancient Sectarian Disputes over Purity

Purity laws were sometimes the subject of disagreements and even rifts between different sects in the Second Temple period. A document from Qumran called Some Precepts of the Torah (Miktsat Ma‘asei ha-Torah) details a variety of disagreements between the Qumran sect and the text’s addressees, perhaps representatives of the Hasmonean high priesthood (see “Some Precepts of the Torah”). One of these disagreements concerns the purity of a liquid poured from a pure vessel into an impure vessel, which the sectarians maintained transferred impurity to the pure vessel. This topic is also cited in the Mishnah as a point of disagreement between Pharisees and Sadducees and is one of several halakhic matters on which the Dead Sea Scrolls correspond to the views of the Sadducees as represented in rabbinic literature. See also Legal Tension between Pharisees and Sadducees.

Purity law was also a subject of dispute between early Christians and other Jewish sects. The Synoptic Gospels record a confrontation between Jesus and a Pharisee or group of Pharisees regarding the practice of washing hands before eating, a Pharisaic tradition that Jesus rejects (Mark 7:1–23; Matthew 15:1–20; Luke 11:37–41). Mark 7:3–4, apparently elaborating on the practice for a non-Jewish audience, adds that the Pharisees and “all the Jews” wash their hands before eating and also observe other purity rites relating to vessels and (in some versions of the text) beds. In fact, not all Jewish sects of the Second Temple period had the practice of washing hands before eating, but this Pharisaic tradition was maintained in rabbinic law and is discussed in m. Yadayim 1:1–4. Purity regulations relating to vessels and beds are discussed in m. Kelim 1:1–4. See also Jesus and the Law.