Steven Carr

Acts says Paul used to prove that Jesus was the Messiah.

What would people say were the main proofs and lines of arguments that Paul uses in his letters to show that Jesus was the Messiah?

Steven Avery

Afaik, we don't have extant any letters from Paul to non-believers in Jesus, such as the Jews with whom he reasoned in the synagogues. So even the verses most used in the NT for such apologetic (Isaiah 53 and Psalm 110) may have minimal reference in Paul's epistles.

Shalom,
Steven Avery
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Messianic_Apologetic

Steven Carr

As it was important to Paul that Jesus was the Messiah, it would be interesting to learn why he believed that.

jakejonesiv

He doesn't. Jesus is asserted to be Christ, without explanation of what that means. Jesus, in the Pauline epistles, has little or nothing to do with Jewish Nationalism as is alleged in the gospels (Matt. 2:2; Mark 15:32; John 1:49; 12:13).

The suggestion has been made that Pauline Christianity did not spring from Judaism, but was progressively Judaized, and that instead of Christ, Jesus was known as Chrestus, the good god, as in the earliest know church inscription.

The Chrestus claim should be easy to disprove if it isn't true.

What is the earliest extant Greek text of the New Testament that explicitly reads "Iesous Christos" rather than using the Nomina Sarca? (IC, etc).

Jake

andrewcriddle

Paul attempts to argue on scriptural grounds eg in Galatians chapter 3, that it is appropriate for the Messiah to be crucified. (In order that he can institute God's new covenant.) I suspect that a major issue in Paul's preaching was convincing people that someone crucified could be taken seriously as Messiah. Probably he used similar scriptural arguments to those found in his letters, about why a crucified Messiah makes sense .


Andrew Criddle

Steven Carr

Thanks for that.

But I'm sure Paul's logic did not run :-
1) The Messiah must be crucified
2) Jesus was crucified
3) Therefore, Jesus was the Messiah.

Perhaps Paul went from his resurrection experience to a belief that Jesus was the Messiah, and so used Scripture (as in Galatians 3, as Andrew points out), perhaps to support his belief, rather than as something to derive his belief from.

jakejonesiv

I do not know how to invoke an OT Messiah from Galatians 3 without resort to dogmatics.

Jake Jones

Ben C Smith

Because he knew that Jesus had died as a messianic claimant, and he thought that his resurrection from the dead had vindicated that claim?

Ben.

Steven Avery

And he was familiar with 1st century Messianic expectations. e.g. the Targum Yonathan was likely being read in the synagogues, stating "Behold, my servant messiah will suffer..."

Amaleq13

Where in Paul's letters do you find support for the notion that the Incarnation was a messianic claimant?