spamandham

I'm going to concede this point. It isn't critical to the argument regarding Justin.

The core argument in regards to Justin, is that Justin criticizes gentiles calling themselves Christians, and Paul's mission (according to the writings we attribute to Paul) is to the gentiles. Presumably then, Justin would not be a Paulanist assuming he had even heard of Paul, and would not be expected to mention Paul as a result.

I don't understand why you keep bringing up Acts. I agree it's a work of fiction. The mere fact that Paul is cast in it, is the weakest imaginable evidence that Paul never existed, yet you present it as if it were a trump card.

Suppose that Acts had not yet been written at the time Marcion was alive, and further suppose that Paul was in fact historical, and that the gospels as we know them did not yet exist, but instead, merely sayings existed that were later incorporated into the Gospels.

How would these suppositions in any way be incompatible with the evidence? Why is this not the simpler approach, to presume Paul actually existed considering we have writings in which the author claims to be Paul, and Tertullian shows us that the character was known in his day as well?

What is the motive for someone to invent Paul as a fictional character?

DevilsAdvocate

So in reference to Acts. Is there more to the argument than the following?

"Every reader of the Bible can see for himself that in Acts, though Paul's achievements are described in extenso, there is nowhere word of his letters. That's odd, as in these letters a person of great authority comforts, admonishes, instructs and criticizes his followers. Moreover 1 Cor. 14 : 26-40 obviously does not speak of a community recently founded by Paul, but of a Church that must already have had a long tradition at the time and in which for example at its meetings it was not unusual for women to address the members. The Radicals' concluded that Paul's letters were not written before de middle of the second century. They consequently differentiated between the historical Paul of Acts and the canonical Paul of the Epistles. Further they ascertained that the canonical Paul's native idiom was Greek and that his writings were embedded in the world of Hellenism. This, in turn, explained the clash in Paul's earliest communities -described in the Letter to the Galatians- provoking him to oppose those that wanted to stick to their Jewish-legalistic practices."

"For these reasons, the Radicals considered the origin of Pauline Christianity in the Jewish-legalistic atmosphere of Jerusalem unacceptable. In their opinion the source of Christianity has to be looked for in the confluence of ideas of the Gnostic communities of Alexandria and of the Stoics in Rome. There the myth of redemption, alive in Gnosticism, was elaborated and connected with the Jewish idea of a Messiah, and it was this synthesis that brought the well-known figure of Jesus in Palestine into being. That is to say, gnosticism and Stoa were joined with the tradition of the Old Testament in the figure of Jesus."

{from here}

spin

Start with the view of the christian who will often reduce the options to either trustworthy or elaborate hoax. The choices of the modern world are often reduced to a ridiculous dichotomy: good/bad, truth/fraud, democrat/republican, us/them. We so often define ourselves as what we are or are not in relation to social reality. The average non-christian in a catholic country, defines him/herself in terms of not being catholic. The person who rejects christianity in America often takes up the christian rhetoric of trustworthy/hoax and perceives the hoax. It's logical in the sense of self-definition, but it doesn't seem to have much to do with finding any historical reality behind the religion.

Enlightenment is what believers crave. I think one should settle for tools for confronting the world as she is. Science doesn't lead to enlightenment, just more questions to be answered. Along the way there will be functional interim explanations that fit the evidence as well as possible. And if you haven't seen a convincing argument yet, it's either because one hasn't come along or you can't recognize it.


spin

DevilsAdvocate

Dichotomies are good for binary systems, but seldom for organics. People like their ruts and slots. Seeing the world as a continuum seems to leave one alone against most everyone who have selected their slots to fit into.

Is not enlightenment is an evolution. The world changes continuously, at least in your perception. Scientific process is one tool to help sort it all out and see how things work together in the new world - especially for the benefit of those stuck in a binary world.

But change in perception leads to seeing new possibilities and the ability to recognize new questions... new ways to be enlightened.

Or is enlightenment a binary swtch? Once you have it you are enlightened.

aa5874

You are so wrong. Justin certainly did not criticise gentiles by calling them Christians and it was for that exact problem why he wrote First Apology, to stop Christians from being abused just because of the name. In First Apology, Justin was making an appeal to the Emperor Titus on behalf of people who were unjustly hated, and that included Christians.

First Apology 4 The history of "Paul" is fiction yet that is the weakest imaginable evidence that "Paul" is fiction.

Your reasoning is illogical.

Fiction is canonised as Acts of the Apostles, and this book contained the entire cast, Jesus on his way to heaven, his disciples and "Paul", even in the Epistles more than one person is "Paul".

No one knew Paul. More than one person called themselves "Paul" and was accepted by the Churches as "Paul". A fictitious story was written with the name "Paul" and the Churches accepted this fiction as history. "Paul" is fiction without a reasonable doubt.


Tertullian's knowledge of "Paul " came directly from the fiction called Acts of the Apostles. You must not forget that "Paul" supposedly died about 120 years before Tertullian.

Against Marcion 5.1 Tertullian is offering Acts as history to Marcion, probably for the first time, but Marcion and Justin are already dead about 30 years earlier.

No, "Paul" was invented to appear real, to distort history and mis-lead people into believing that there was a god called Jesus Christ, but now it is known that "Paul" is fiction.

Toto

There is a great deal more. But what was your question with regard to Acts?

schilling.klaus

this is a lie spread by deceivers of mankind, such as Tertullian and Holding.
Couchoud proved that the exact contrary is the case: The Pauline epistles are derived by manipulation of Marcionite writings.

Klaus Schilling

schilling.klaus

The canonical epistles are full of theological inconsistencies and foul compromises, whereas Marcion's version of the epsitles is theologically and ethically and metaphysically and ontologically reasonable and consistent.

It takes an insane effort to distill such a clarity from the insane chaos of the canonical epistles. And noone would write such a chaotic nonsense as the canonical epistles if not vinculated by external traditions to refute, and these external tradition has to be , both in gospels and letters, Marcionism, as Marcionite statements are often just thinly camouflagued by rhetorical contortions. That's not what an original writer would do, only an Anrtimarcionite faker of Marcionite doctrines could slip into such a chaos.

Believing in Marcion being able to distill a consistent treatise from the canonical epistles is more thaumasiolatric than literal belief in virgin birth, resurrection in the flesh, waterwalk, and multiplication of breads taken together.


Klaus Schilling

DevilsAdvocate

This argument seemed to condense one of the whole arguments to a poor reconciliation of the Paul of Acts and the Paul of the epistles leading to the conclusion that they were fabricated in an attempt to reconcile the theology and doctrine of competing parties. It is then extended to the whole of the new testament "history" to "prove" it all a fiction.

I am looking for an orderly and rational argument that is based on verifyable evidence rather than opinion and supposition... Most of the arguments here are based on opinion of content and circumstance ... It seems they can be distilled to...`

"I don't believe this part so the whole thing is fiction"
or
"I would expect it to be another way so it is all fiction"
or
"I don't think it makes sense so it is fiction"
or
"I thought they would say so-and-so so it is fiction"
or
"I know it is fiction so here's how everything else fits that paradigm"

I looked to some of the referenced anti-apologists and found a more concise generalized statement of the position. It too is based on what they would expect content and an historical Paul to be like. Since they did not reconcile their expectations they concluded the whole thing to be a fiction created later than tradition of the time held and built a paradigm in that position. More supposition...conjecture...based on an interpretation given one set of biases.

Is there an orderly and rational argument based on verifyable facts? Klaus came close, but then resorted to interpretation as proof.

"That's not what an original writer would do, only an Anrtimarcionite faker of Marcionite doctrines could slip into such a chaos."

If the writings are contextualized, as suggested by another, a different set of views on the text is possible that may improve reconciliation without resorting to conspiracy theories.

spamandham

That isn't what I said. I said he criticized gentiles who called themselves Christians.


You keep bringing Acts up, even though it bears very little relevance at all. Acts, as evidence that there was no historical Paul, is the weakest argument.

By that same line of argument, we would conclude that Pilate and Herod are also fictional, since they show up in the fictional Gospel stories.

So they made up a new fictional character, Paul, to increase the believability of an earlier fictional character whose historicity was not even in question?