Mark 07:03-04 Tradition of the Elders

The New Testament refers to Pharisees holding the tradition of the elders. Josephus provides some additional insight into the tradition of the elders in disputes between the Pharisees and other sects. The comparison below is based on the cross reference notes in the Comprehensive New Testament:
3 For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands with the fist, holding the tradition of the elders. 4 And, from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they dip themselves. And there are many other traditions which they observe, the washing of cups and pitchers and copper vessels [and beds]. [Mark 07:03-04 Comprehensive New Testament]
The Pharisees have delivered to the people a great many observances by succession from their fathers, which are not written in the laws of Moses; and for that reason it is that the Sadducees reject them, and say that we are to esteem those observances to be obligatory which are in the written word, but are not to observe what are derived from the tradition of our forefathers. And concerning these things it is that great disputes and differences have arisen among them… [Josephus, Antiquities (13.10.6 297)]