The Pharisees (/ˈfærəsiːz/; Hebrew: פְּרוּשִׁים, romanized: Pərūšīm, lit. 'separated ones') were a Jewish social movement and school of thought in the Levant during the time of Second Temple Judaism. Following the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 AD, Pharisaic beliefs became the foundational, liturgical, and ritualistic basis for Rabbinic Judaism. Although the group no longer exists, their traditions are of great importance for the manifold Jewish religious movements.

Conflicts between Pharisees and Sadducees took place in the context of much broader and longstanding social and religious conflicts amongst Jews (exacerbated by the Roman conquest). One conflict was cultural, between those who favored Hellenization (the Sadducees) and those who resisted it (the Pharisees). Another was juridical-religious, between those who emphasized the importance of the Temple with its rites and services, and those who emphasized the importance of other Mosaic Laws. A specifically religious point of conflict involved different interpretations of the Torah and how to apply it to Jewish life, with Sadducees recognizing only the Written Torah (תּוֹרָה שֶׁבִּכְתָב‎, Tōrā šebbīḵṯāv, '"Written Law"') and rejecting Prophets, Writings, and doctrines such as the Oral Torah and the resurrection of the dead.

Contemporary Jewish historian Josephus, believed by many historians to have been a Pharisee, estimated there were around 6,000 adherents to the Pharisee movement before the fall of the Second Temple. He said that Pharisee influence over the common people was so great that anything they said against the king or the high priest was believed, apparently in contrast to the more elite Sadducees, who were the upper class. Pharisees claimed Mosaic authority for their interpretation of Jewish religious law, while Sadducees represented the authority of the priestly privileges and prerogatives established since the days of Solomon, when Zadok, their ancestor, officiated as high priest.

"Pharisee" is derived from Ancient Greek Pharisaios (Φαρισαῖος), from Aramaic Pərīšā (פְּרִישָׁא), plural Pərīšayyā (פְּרִישַׁיָּא), meaning "set apart, separated", related to Hebrew Pārūš (פָּרוּשׁ), plural Pərūšīm (פְּרוּשִׁים), the Qal passive participle of the verb pāraš (פָּרַשׁ). It may refer to their separation from Gentiles, sources of ritual impurity, or from irreligious Jews.Alternatively, it may have a particular political meaning as "separatists", due to their division from the Sadducee elite, with Yitzhak Isaac Halevi characterizing the Sadducees and Pharisees as political sects, not religious ones. Scholar Thomas Walter Manson and Talmud expert Louis Finkelstein suggest that "Pharisee" derives from the Aramaic words pārsāh or parsāh, meaning "Persian" or "Persianizer", based on the demonym pārsi, meaning 'Persian' in the Persian language, and further akin to Pārsa and Fārs. Harvard University scholar Shaye J. D. Cohen denies this, stating: "Practically all scholars now agree that the name "Pharisee" derives from the Hebrew and Aramaic parush or persushi."

The first historical mention of the Pharisees and their beliefs comes in the four gospels and the Acts of the Apostles, in which both their meticulous adherence to their interpretation of the Torah as well as their eschatological views are described. A later historical mention of the Pharisees comes from the Jewish-Roman historian Josephus in a description of the "four schools of thought", or "four sects", into which he divides the Jews in the 1st century AD. (The other schools were the Essenes, who were generally apolitical, and may have emerged as a sect of dissident priests who rejected either the Seleucid-appointed or the Hasmonean high priests as illegitimate; the Sadducees, who were the main antagonists of the Pharisees; and the Zealots.) Other sects may have emerged at this time, such as the early Christians in Jerusalem and the Therapeutae in Egypt. However, their status as Jews is unclear.

The Books of the Maccabees—two deuterocanonical books in the Bible—focus on the Maccabean Revolt against the Seleucids under King Antiochus IV Epiphanes, and concludes with the defeat of General Nicanor in 161 BC by Judas Maccabeus, the hero of the work. It includes several theological points: prayer for the dead, the last judgment, intercession of saints, and martyrology. The New Testament apocrypha, known as the Gospel of Peter, also alludes to the Pharisees.

Judah ha-Nasi redacted the Mishnah, an authoritative codification of Pharisaic interpretations, around 200 AD. Most of the authorities quoted in the Mishnah lived after the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD; consequently, it marked the beginning of the transition from Pharisaic to Rabbinic Judaism. The Mishnah was important because it compiled the oral interpretations and traditions of the Pharisees (and later the rabbis) into a single authoritative text, thus allowing oral tradition within Judaism to survive the destruction of the Second Temple. However, none of the rabbinic sources include identifiable eyewitness accounts of the Pharisees and their teachings.

The deportation and exile of an unknown number of Jews of the Kingdom of Judah to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar II—starting with the first deportation in 597 BC, and continuing after the fall of Jerusalem and destruction of the Temple in 587 BC—resulted in dramatic changes to Jewish culture and religion.^{[citation needed]} During the 70-year exile in Babylon, Jewish houses of assembly (known in Hebrew as a beit knesset, or in Greek as a synagogue) and houses of prayer (Hebrew Beit Tefilah; Greek προσευχαί, proseuchai) were the primary meeting places for prayer, and the house of study (beit midrash) was the counterpart for the synagogue.^{[citation needed]}