Something interesting on every page e.g. Sanhedrim!

So.  The Church Manual is our November book.

I am going to cheat a little.  A couple of years ago our membership agreed to the starting of a study of the Manual as part of our preparation for business meetings.

I was clerk of the church at the time and perhaps the arrangement was of my personal choosing and in fact I think I may have been the only one who contributed. I have notes from that study and will include them here. 

I find every page of a book interesting and sometimes even inspiring, even the ones without printed numbers. Take, for instance, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures (S&H) by Mary Baker Eddy page iii: Who would want to miss out on –

                                             Ye shall know the truth,

                                             and the truth shall make you free.

                                                                           - John viii.32

 

                                             There is nothing either good or bad,

                                             but thinking makes it so.

                                                                           - Shakespeare

 

                                             Oh! Thou hast heard my prayer;

                                                            And I am blest!

                                                     This is Thy high behest:-

                                             Thou here, and everywhere.

                                                                     - Mary Baker Eddy

 

However, the first page that caught my attention at that time of study was page 3 (also unnumbered). This quotes an EXTRACT FROM A LETTER IN “MISCELLANEOUS WRITINGS”, also by Eddy, which speaks to us of her own evaluation of her Manual.

 

The extract uses a fascinating word – Sanhedrim.  I looked it up on the Internet and here is what I found.  Alas, our editor may tear her hair at the fact that I cannot now find the exact site I copied it from. Here it is anyway –

 

As high priest, Caiaphas (depicted in red) was the official leader of the Sanhedrin at the time of Jesus' arrest and trial, and the person chiefly responsible for orchestrating Christ's death.  Photo: Getty Images

Definition #1: The Sanhedrin was the supreme council, or court, in ancient Israel. The Sanhedrin was comprised of 70 men, plus the high priest, who served as its president. The members came from the chief priests, scribes and elders, but there is no record on how they were chosen.

During the time of the Roman governors, such as Pontius Pilate, the Sanhedrin had jurisdiction only over the province of Judea. The Sanhedrin had its own police force which could arrest people, as they did Jesus Christ. While the Sanhedrin heard both civil and criminal cases and could impose the death penalty, in New Testament times it did not have the authority to execute convicted criminals. That power was reserved to the Romans, which explains why Jesus was crucified—a Roman punishment—rather than stoned, according to Mosaic law. The Sanhedrin was abolished with the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D.

Pronunciation: SAN hee drin

Example: The Sanhedrin accused Jesus of blasphemy.

Definition #2: Sanhedrin - The highest judicial and ecclesiastical council of the ancient Jewish nation, composed of from 70 to 72 members.

"Jewish council that operated in Roman Palestine from the time of the Maccabees (c. 165 BC) to the end of the patriarchate (AD 425). While the term refers to the supreme Jewish court, the Sanhedrin's exact composition and powers - religious, judicial, and legislative - are reported variously in different sources. It is mentioned in various books of the Bible (Mark, Luke, Acts) as having taken part in or adjudicated the trials of Jesus, St. Peter the Apostle, and St. John the Baptist. According to Talmudic sources, the Great Sanhedrin was a court of 71 sages that met on fixed occasions in the Temple of Jerusalem, acting as a religious legislative body, trial court, and administrator of rituals. Answers.com

Definition #3: The Sanhedrin was located in Jerusalem. Its members included: the High Priest and former High Priests; members of the priestly line; community elders and heads of tribes and families, all being knowledgeable and experienced in the Jewish Law.

The Bible makes reference to the Sanhedrin e.g. Mark 14:55. At one trial of the Apostles it was noted that the members were made up of Pharisees and the Sadducees - Acts 5:21; 23:36.

Local synagogues were also known sometimes as 'local sanhedrins' in that they had legal powers to carry out scourgings and to declare excommunications, e.g. Matthew 10:17; Acts chapter 7 – Stephen’s speech to the Sanhedrin.  And his stoning; Acts 4 – Peter and John before the Sanhedrin.

Definition #4: Best Answer - Chosen by Asker

Sorry! The word sanhedrin doesn't occur in the KJV. Sanhedrim - more correctly Sanhedrin (Gr. synedrion), meaning "a sitting together," or a "council." This word (rendered "council," A.V.) is frequently used in the New Testament (Matt. 5:22; 26:59; Mark 15:1, etc.) to denote the supreme judicial and administrative council of the Jews, which, it is said, was first instituted by Moses, and was composed of seventy men (Num. 11:16, 17). But that seems to have been only a temporary arrangement which Moses made. This council is with greater probability supposed to have originated among the Jews when they were under the domination of the Syrian kings in the time of the Maccabees. The name is first employed by the Jewish historian Josephus. This "council" is referred to simply as the "chief priests and elders of the people" (Matt. 26:3, 47, 57, 59; 27:1, 3, 12, 20, etc.), before whom Christ was tried on the charge of claiming to be the Messiah. Peter and John were also brought before it for promulgating heresy (Acts. 4:1-23; 5:17-41); as was also Stephen on a charge of blasphemy (6:12-15), and Paul for violating a temple by-law (22:30; 23:1-10).
The Sanhedrin is said to have consisted of seventy-one members, the high priest being president. They were of three classes (1) the chief priests, or heads of the twenty-four priestly courses (1 Chr. 24), (2) the scribes, and (3) the elders. As the highest court of judicature, "in all causes and over all persons, ecclesiastical and civil, supreme," its decrees were binding, not only on the Jews in Palestine, but on all Jews wherever scattered abroad. Its jurisdiction was greatly curtailed by Herod, and afterwards by the Romans. Its usual place of meeting was within the precincts of the temple, in the hall "Gazith," but it sometimes met also in the house of the high priest (Matt. 26:3), who was assisted by two vice-presidents.

End quotes

Thought: The Sanhedrin with its 70 men + a High Priest who acted as president, was a body representing many minds which met and tried to make laws, or interpret Jewish law, whereas the Manual of The Mother Church was the work of the one Mind presenting its ideas to an attentive and listening Mary Baker Eddy. Here is a recipe for parliaments and for church business meetings. “In Science man is governed by God, divine Principle, as numbers are controlled and proved by His laws” S&H 318:28 (In) - 29.

MBE didn’t expect Christian Scientists to need rules to govern their actions. She was aware of all the ways in which her students disobeyed Principle in living their human lives and gave us direction on human behavior in the correcting by-laws of the Manual. It seems it almost broke her heart that these laws were necessary for students of the exact Science she had sacrificed and toiled to give them in its pure form. Read Mental Digestion from Miscellany (Eddy) p. 229.

The miracle is that she was able to present this Science in a form that can be taught and demonstrated, when for her to demonstrate it was as natural as breathing.

She was doing it “for the race,” not exclusively for the Christian Scientists. Aha! It was first for the Christian Scientists and they were to live it and demonstrate it – “for the race.”

Joyce Voysey