SCRIBES, a famous Jewish group frequently mentioned to gether with the Pharisees (q.v.), in the Gospels. Their rise is connected in the closest possible manner with the study of the Torah (Law). This study and understanding of the Torah was highly complex in character; it followed, therefore, that the exist ence of a distinct body of experts on the subject became a neces sity. Thus there arose the scribes, with whom Torah-study was a matter of professional occupation. Originally this occupation belonged to the priesthood, for the priests were at first, both the guardians and teachers of the Law. Ezra himself was both priest and Sopher ("scribe"). But by degrees the study of the law was pursued by others besides the priests—for the Law was meant equally for layman and priest, and the one had as much interest in it as the other—so that there arose an independent class of Torah-students, who in time supplanted the priests as teachers of the people, and became the recognized official exponents of the law. At the same time, this did not necessarily exclude scribes from being priests for, on the testimony of Philo, we know that in the synagogues priests often undertook the duty of reading the law and expounding it to the people, a duty which belonged specifically to the scribes; so that there is no reason to believe that scribes were never priests. In the first instance, scribes occupied themselves exclusively with study ; they were not allowed to pursue any other calling, lest their thoughts should be withdrawn from Torah-study; see Ecclus. xxxviii. 24: "The wis dom of a learned man cometh by opportunity of leisure : and he that bath little business shall become wise . . ." But in later days it became absolute duty for them to have some other calling besides, in order to earn a livelihood, the reason being that all labour for the law had to be gratuitous. For the most part the scribes belonged to the Pharisaic party; but as the one qualifi cation for being a scribe consisted in being "learned in the Law" there must have been scribes in the Sadducean party as well, indeed this is implied in the New Testament (see Mark ii. 16, Luke v. 3o, Acts xxiii. 9). As the scribes were occupied with the administration of the law as well as with its study, they were also called "Lawyers" (Matt. xxii. 35, Luke vii. 3o, x. 25, xi. 45, 46), or "teachers of the Law" (Luke v. 17, Acts v. 34) ; "Lawyer" and "Scribe" are synonymous, for which reason they are never mentioned together in the New Testament. But as administrators of the law it followed, in a natural course, that the scribes should also be among those who saw to its being carried out; so that they also had the power of sitting as judges, and therefore also of passing sentence upon those who were guilty of breaking the law. Hence scribes were among those who composed the great
Sanhedrin at Jerusalem, and as they were the ones whose special study of the law made them experts, it cannot be doubted that their influence in this supreme court must have been considerable.
The difference between the scribes and the pharisees was briefly this—the scribes handed down the traditional, i.e., the Oral Law as well as the Written Law, and explained it; the pharisees carried out in actual practice what was prescribed. This, of course, does not mean to say that the scribes did not also strictly observe the legal enactments; but that their special duties constituted them a class distinct from the pharisees is clear from the way in which they are differentiated in the New Testament, for there we read of the "Scribes of the Pharisees" (Mark ii. 16, Acts xxiii. 9), and of "the Pharisees and their scribes" (Luke v. 3o), showing clearly that the scribes were distinct from the Pharisees. See G. F.
Moore, Judaism. (G. H. B.) SCRIPPS, EDWARD WYLLIS (1854-1926), American newspaper publisher, was born at Rushville (Ill.) June 18, He was brought up on a farm in Winchester county and in 1872 joined the staff of the Detroit Tribune, then owned by his brother James. Fire destroyed this paper in 1875 and the same year J. E. Scripps founded the Detroit Evening News, with E. W. Scripps as city editor. Three years later the latter founded the Cleveland Penny Press, which under his direction achieved immediate suc cess. He gradually acquired other journals in Ohio and elsewhere, which later became known as the Scripps-Howard group.
In 1896 he, in conjunction with Milton A. McRae, formed the Scripps-McRae Press Association for the purpose of providing his papers with cable news. He also, in 1901, organized the News paper Enterprise Association, with the object of supplying fea tures to local papers. In 1908 the Scripps-McRae association was merged with the publishers' press association and the Pacific coast press association, under the name of the United Press Association, Mr. Scripps holding a controlling interest. In 1917 his health broke down under the strain of war work and in 1920 he retired from business activity. In this same year he founded and endowed Science Service, a news bureau for the dissemination of scientific facts. In 1924 he transferred control of his various interests to his son Robert P. Scripps. He died on board his yacht in Monrovia bay, Liberia, West Africa, on March 12, 1926.