gurugeorge

Again, as with the mini-example of the apparent contradiction between Galatians and Corinthians ("received" from no man, yet "received" apparently from men), everybody seems to keep missing an obvious possibility:-

Person has vision, vision tells him that it did such and such while on earth, and that this was foretold in such and such passages of Scripture.


This results in a situation where, yes indeed, the person got wind of the whole thing through vision, but sees subsequently that, yes, the events spoken of by the visionary entity were limned in Scripture (only nobody saw it before).

Solo

My bad on the "false teachers"; it comes from 2 Peter.

Best,
Jiri

TedM

Yes that sounds consistent with my view--there was a vision of some kind and it matched scripture. That vision could have simply been Jesus resurrected, or it could also have entailed the message of salvation to the Gentiles. Either one is consistent with Paul being able to proclaim that his gospel was direct from God and not man. And neither contradicts the idea that Paul knew certain supplementary information about Jesus (ie he was buried and appeared to others too). Thanks.

archibald

Sounds good to me too. It's a way of reconciling both.

OTOH, I tend towards a slight variation, probably because I'm an atheist. :]

What are the odds that a ghost in a vision actually does the pointing out what was in scriptures bit? Wouldn't this imply that the ghost wasn't just in Paul's head? Didn't it have to be Paul telling Paul something he already knew (though perhaps hadn't believed, or thought of as significant)?

If so, and I start to think about how this situation might have arisen, it's hard to conclude that Paul hadn't heard about Jesus' life beforehand, even though (as we all know) he doesn't write much about it.

So, I get to the orthodox view. Jesus was a man. He got crucified. He still had followers afterwards (doesn't really matter whether they had witnessed his risen ghost or not) who believed he had been a really special prophet-type-man, who had at least gone up to heaven and who had left an important message about imminent eschatology. Paul persecuted the cult. Then had a lightbulb moment (possibly due to something pertinent stewing in his mind and not entirely unrelated to his persecuting activities), suddenly everything he already knew coalesces in his brain in an instant (hence the vision seems to contain a lot of stuff), he does a flip, and joins up, adding his own special brand of theology sauce.

What could be more clear and simple and unproblematical? Apart from anything else, this is what the text actually seems to say. Isn't it?............

archibald

..........The only tricky bit left to explain is why he doesn't do much biography. :]

But, really, whatever the reason, he obviously just isn't doing biography of any kind in these letters.

Put it this way. Where's the myth narrative? Where's 'this happened and then this happened, and then, this'?

Isn't this what happens in the 'world of myths' genre?

Seems to me this 'silence' is at least as odd as the one Doherty et al have noticed. Which surely means one less reason to think the explanation is not the obvious one. The one where Jesus was just like virtually every other eschatological prophet we know of. A man, wearing a sandwich-board which has a slogan (very often 'the end is nigh') with a bunch of follwers.

Can't we all just go on to other forums now? :]

aa5874

It would be UN-PAULINE for "Paul" to talk about "false apostles" once you are claiming that 1 Cor. 15.3-11 is UN-Pauline.

gurugeorge

Well where else would it be?

Being told things you don't know isn't all that unusual - it's exactly the same as when you have any bright idea, except there's an intermediary hallucination in which it seems like there's an entity telling it to you.

Probably a similar mechanism to OBEs (cf. Thomas Metzinger - the "rubber hand" illusion is a way of getting a handle on understanding how "occult" experiences are just a function of the way the brain works - and not even necessarily pathological, for all that.)

gurugeorge

Yup, it works whether you think of a mythological Jesus or a human Jesus. It's a little bit more fitting with a mythological Jesus scenario, but it does fit with the human Jesus one too.

archibald

I'm wondering, what is it that makes you think it's more fitting to a myth scenario, or do you mean, it's more fitting to a myth scenario, as you have described it?

I suppose what I mean is, in a nutshell, what, in your opinion, do you think the original cult members believed, vis-a-vis Jesus?

Or to put it another way, which part of this would you amend (if any):



And Btw, sorry for not picking up earlier that you were an atheist. I think I'm conversing with too many people at times, most of whom I hadn't 'met' until recently. :]

aa5874

You promote Logical fallacies.

We don't know that Jesus was an " eschatological prophet" in the Pauline writings.

In fact, in the Pauline writings is it claimed that "Paul" was NOT the apostle of a man but of a character, Jesus Christ , that was RAISED from the dead.

In the Pauline writings, it is NOWHERE claimed that Jesus was an escathalogical prophet.

Please, show me where exactly in the Pauline writings is Jesus called an "eschatalogical prophet".

I need book, chapter and verse.

Once you claim that the Pauline writings are EARLY then you are OBLIGATED to show me where "Paul" stated Jesus was an eschatological prophet.

Again, based on your position that the Pauline writings were EARLY then Jesus was NOT considered a man by EARLY believers and did NOT consider that "Paul" got his gospel from a man.

The EARLY Believers considered that Jesus was God and EQUAL to God.

Ga 1:1 - Gala 1.11-12 Php 2.6 In the Pauline writings Jesus was NOT an eschatological prophet. Jesus Christ was God's OWN Son who was RAISED from the dead.