Note 160 — Chapter VII · The Pharisees and Sadducees

Two objections have been raised against the view that the term Sadducees (Zaddūkim) takes its origin from the personal name Zadok. One is that the double d in Zaddūkim does not permit of its being derived from Zadok with only one; this objection would be serious were it not that in the Septuagint and in Josephus Zadok is spelled with two d’s. This objection, therefore, falls to the ground. The other is that there is nothing to show that the Sadducees were ever regarded as the sons of Zadok, nor that they themselves made such a claim. This argumentum e silentio, always precarious, is upset by the evidence of the Zadokite Fragments. Hölscher’s contention (Op. cit., pp. 102 ff.) that the term “sons of Zadok” was one of reproach does not appear to us to be necessary.