[92] _Quartam etymologiam (cujus fundus & autor putatur Hieronymus, Præfat. in Amos) refellit Scriptura Hebraica; si enim Pharisæus diceretur a verbo פרץ Dividere, scriberentur Pharisæi פריצים non פרושים._
First, They _separated themselves to the study of the Law_, in which respect they might be called, ἀφωρισμένοι εἰς τὸν νόμον, _Separated unto the Law_. In allusion unto this, the _Apostle_ is thought[95] to have stiled himself, _Rom. 1. 11._ ἀφωρισμένον εἰς εὐαγγέλιον, _Separated unto the Gospel_: when he was called from being a _Pharisee_, to be a _Preacher of the Gospel_; and now not _separated unto the Law_, but to the _Gospel_.
Secondly, They _separated_ themselves, or at least pretended a[96] _separation to an extroardinary sanctity of life above other men_. God, I thank thee, that I am _not as other men are_, Extortioners, Unjust, Adulterers _&c._ _Luke 18. 11._
[95] _Drusius de trib. sectis, l. 2. c. 2._
The particulars, _from which they separated themselves_, were these.
First, _From commerce with other people_, as afterward will appear in their Traditions: whence they called the common people, by reason of their ignorance, עם הארץ _populum terræ_, the _people of the earth_. In the Gospel of Saint _John 7. 49._ they are called ὄχλος. _This people_ who knoweth not the Law are cursed.
Secondly,[97] _From the apparel and habit of other men_: for they used particular kinds of Habits, whereby they would be distinguished from the vulgar. Hence proceeded that common speech, _Vestes populi terræ, conculcatio sunt Pharisæorum_.
Thirdly,[98] _From the customs and manners of the world_. This heresie of the _Pharisees_ seemeth to have had its first beginning in _Antigonus Sochæus_. He being a _Pharisee_, succeeded _Simon the Just_; who was Coetanean with _Alexander_ the Great: he lived three hundred years before the birth of Christ.
The _Pharisees_ were[99] not tied to any particular Tribe or Family, but indifferently they might be of any; S. _Paul_ was a _Benjaminite_; _Hyrcanus_ was a _Levite_.[100] Each Sect had its _Dogmata_, his proper _Aphorisms_, _Constitutions_, or _Canons_: so the _Pharisees_ had theirs. My purpose is, both concerning these and the other Sects, to note onely those _Canons_, or _Aphorisms_, wherein chiefly they were heretical, and one differing from the other.