(3) Functions. The functions of the Sanhe drin] were, according to the Jewish writers, co extensive with tthe civil and religious relations of the people. In their hands, we arc told, was placed the supreme authority in all things ; they interpreted the law, they appointed sacred rites, they imposed tributes, they decreed war, they judged in capital cases; in short, they engrossed the supreme authority, legislative, executive, and judicial. In this there is no small exaggeration ; at least, none of the historical facts which have come down to us confirm this description of the extent of the powers of the Sandhedrim ; whilst some of these facts. such as the existence of civil officers armed with appropriate authority, seem directly opposed to it. In the notices of this body, contained in the New Testament, we find nothing which would lead us to infer that their powers extended beyond matters of a religious kind. Questions of blasphemy, of sabbath-breaking, of heresy, are those alone which we find referred to their judicature (comp. Matt. xxvi :57-65; Acts v :17, sq., etc.) On those guilty of these crimes they could pronounce sentence of death ; but, ureter the Roman government, it was not competent for them to execute this sentence; their power ter minated with the pronouncing of a decision and the transmission of this to the procurator, with whom it rested, to execute it or not as he saw meet (John xviii :31 ; Matt. xxvii :1, 2). Hence the unseemly readiness of this council to call in the aid of the assassin for the purpose of destroy ing those who were obnoxious to them (Acts N' :33 ; xxiii :12-15). The case of Stephen may scent to furnish an objection to this statement ; but as his martyrdom occurred at a time when the Roman procurator was absent, and was alto gether a tumultuous procedure, it cannot be al lowed to stand for more than a casual exception to the general rule. Josephus informs us that, after the death of Fcstus, and before the arrival of his successor, the high-priest Annas, availing himself of the opportunity thus afforded, sum moned a meeting of the Sanhcdrim, and con demned James, the brother of Jesus, with several others, to suffer death by stoning. This license, however, was viewed with much displeasure by the new procurator, Albinus, and led to the deposition of Annas from the office of high-priest (Antiq. xx :9, 1, 2).
(4) Time of Origin. At what period in the his tory of the Jews the Sanhedrim arose is involved in much uncertainty. The Jews, ever prone to invest with the honors of remote antiquity all the institutions of their nation, trace this council to the times of Moses, and find the origin of it in the appointment of a body of elders as the assistants of Moses in the discharge of his judicial functions (Num. xi :16, 17). There is no evidence, how ever, that this was any other than a temporary arrangement for the benefit of Moses; nor do we, in the historical books of the Old Testament, detect any traces whatever of the existence of this council in the times preceding the Babylonish captivity, nor in those immediately succeeding the return of the Jews to their own land. The
earliest mention of the existence of this council by Josephus, is in connection with the reign of Hyrcanus II, B. C. 69 (Antiq. xiv. g, 3). It is probable, however, that it existed before this time —that it arose gradually after the cessation of the prophetic office in Judah, in consequence of the felt want of some supreme direction and judicial authority—that the number of its members was fixed so as to correspond with that of the council of elders appointed to assist Moses—and that it first assumed a formal and influential existence in the later years of the Macedo-Grecian dynasty. This view is confirmed by the allusions made to it in the Apocryphal books (2 Mace. i. to; iv. 44; xiv. 5; Judith xi. 14, etc.) ; and perhaps, also, by the circumstance that the use of the name saneo rion, from which the Hebrews formed their word Sanhedrim, indicates a Macedonian origin (comp. Livy, xlv. 32).
(5) Smaller Sanhedrims. The Talmudical writers tell us that, besides the Sanhedrim erly so called, there was in every town containing not fewer than one hundred and twenty itants a smaller sanhedrim, consisting of three members, before which lesser causes were tried, and from the decisions of which an appeal lay to the supreme council. Two such smaller councils are said to have existed at Jerusalem. It is to this class of tribunals that our Lord is sup. posed to allude, under the term krisis. in Matt. v :22. Where the number of inhabitants was tinder one hundred and twenty, a council of three cated in all civil questions. What brings able doubt upon this tradition is, that Josephus, who must from his position have been intimately acquainted with all the judicial institutions of his nation, not only does not mention these smaller councils, but says, that the court next below the Sanhedrim was composed of seven members. At tempts have been made to reconcile the two ac counts, but without success; and it seems now very generally agreed, that the account of Josephus is to be preferred to that of the Mislina ; and that, consequently. it is to the tribunal of the seven judges that our Lord applies the term KplaLs in the passage referred to (Tholuck, Bergpredigt, in loc., Eng. Transl. vol. i. p. 241 ; Kuinoel, in /oc.; comp. Otho, Lexicon Rabbinico-Philolog. in vote; Selden, De Synedriis l'eterum Ebroiortn, ii, 95, sq.; Rcland, Antiq. ii. 7; Jahn, Archcrologie, IL 2, sec. 186; Pareau, Antiq. iii. 4; Lightfoot, Works, plur. locis; Hartmann, Enge Verbindung des Allen Test. mit dent Neuen, s. 166, sq., etc.).
W. L. A.