This section on ‘Life and the Law’, itself a reformulation of Schürer’s own title, Das Leben under [sic] dem Gesetz, presents the reviser with a new kind of problem. He is faced here not so much with an antiquated account or a faulty historical reconstruction, as with questionable value judgements. It has been decided therefore not to reproduce § 28 unchanged, as a period piece: readers concerned with a late nineteenth century ideology can read the German original or the previous English translation. On the other hand, since to delete the chapter completely would be to deprive the revised volume of a great deal of interesting information, the subject has been treated in this new version from a historical rather than a theological vantage point. Moreover, the purpose of the Pharisees and their rabbinic heirs is obviously no longer represented as a trivialization of religion, but identified as an attempt to elevate everyday Jewish life as a whole, and in its minute details, to the sphere of cultic worship. It should also be noted that although in the historical survey that follows, Jewish observances and customs are referred to in the past tense, the laws on which they are based are still valid and practised by traditional Judaism.
The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ, Revised English Edition, eds. Geza Vermes, Fergus Millar, and Matthew Black (T & T Clark, 1979), volume 2, page 464, footnote 1.
As you say, ‘indeed’ – especially the last sentence.