I may not be remembering this correctly from earlier in this thread, so forgive me if I'm wrong here...but I think you were explaining how the pharisees were not true Christians because their actions didn't match the words or way that Christ taught. They wanted people to think that they were with God but they actually weren't. I completely agree with you on that. There are very few Christ followers from the heart who subject themselves to the others well being, but many who seek their own well being but try to tag along with God. It's very easy to distinguish between the 2 in real life interactions, maybe a little more difficult on the internet.
Do you believe the murderers you mentioned are true Christ followers or pharasees?
I find Christ followers to just be annoying Christians who put Christianity above anything else in their life. People who pull their kids out of school to fill their head with biblical studies from fraudsters like apologia. Science taught through a creationist world view, rejection of reality and pure delusions.
People who bill themselves as Christ followers tend to be the worse of the worse when it comes to science because they are by the book Christians, literal interpretations of the Bible. They believe the Old Testament is real.
But to answer your question yes the Pharisees had a seat at the table. Their opinions mattered to the Christian leaders in the New Testament, they even went as far as to reject their view of Christianity over the gentiles but send a stern warning to the gentiles to avoid certain behaviors that would run afoul of the Pharisees and Jewish law.
