The papers collected here, which result from the invitation of Professor Philip Davies to the authors to take part in a symposium held at the 2004 International Meeting of the SBL at Groningen, have sociology as their main social-scientific subject, with occasional glimpses of anthropology. It is fashionable and now almost a convention to speak in terms of social-scientific approaches to biblical and post-biblical materials and societies, and the intention conveyed is the desire to include all relevant social sciences, including sociology, psychology, economics, political science and anthropology, that might illuminate specific cases (Chalcraft, 1997). When approaching ancient Judaism from the perspective of sociology however, it seems obvious that the enquiry forms a part of the sociology of religion, or more exactly is a branch of historical sociology.

This book is best understood therefore as an exercise in historical sociology, with a close relation to the sociology of religion, given its concern with sects and sectarian movements. The range of methods available to the historical sociologist is not wide, but it is still necessary to acknowledge the theoretical and methodological traditions this collection is rooted in, even if this rootage is at times semi-conscious. This volume locates itself in a more or less Weberian frame of typological and comparative analysis of historical and social data. Even where Max Weber is not the preferred social theorist used as point of departure in the contributions which follow, his methodological legacy can be detected, not least because of the “typological nature” of the approaches adopted.