gurugeorge

Yeah, I have, and I think the truth is something along those lines. A Jewish form of proto-gnosticism started in Jerusalem, with a revised Messiah concept as the Logos equivalent; one of the people inspired by the idea universalised it and took it to the Gentiles and spread it (comparatively, considering we're talking about a very minor cult at this point) far and wide. He was the apostle of both Marcionism and what later became Gnosticism. The growing orthodox movement co-opted him by including him in their made-up story of having a lineage going back to the cult figure himself (IOW the "Peter" of Acts is the REAL invention around these parts). This orthodox maneouvering to have a lineage that trumps "Paul"'s merely visionary lineage is the very engine of what I think of as the "hard" historicisation of the Joshua Messiah myth, the tail that wags the "historical Jesus" dog.

spin

I think these sorts of dates are useless. Beware of consensus christian datings in general: they have little to do with history. For example, was Mark written before the final erasure of Jewish Jerusalem in 135CE? How do we know?


spin

gurugeorge

True, that may be so, but, like Doherty, I find it an interesting exercise to see just how radical a conclusion one can come to while accepting a good deal of the conclusions of biblical scholarship. The only semi-non-standard dating my theory crucially requires is the late dating for Acts/Luke (ca 130s).

aa5874

I will try to further simplify my view. "Paul" is a voice, not a real human. "Paul" represents the doctrine of the Church. "Paul" gospel is not from man but to men from the Church.

Acts of the Apostles contains events of the so-called post conversion of "Paul". Acts is canonised, it is presented in the NT as fundamentally an historical account.

But upon reading Acts it is noticed that the events are not credible, the ascension of Jesus as witnessed by the disciples, the conversion of "Paul" and numerous miracles are not credible, but it is very significant to note that "Paul" is placed after Peter has already began preaching the gospel after receiving the Holy Ghost and after there were thousands of new converts.

"Paul" is then converted and begins to preach.

But there are major problems for "Paul".

The Jesus stories [gospels] in the NT were all written after the death of Nero . Jesus, the son of God, as written in the NT, and his disciples including Peter were all fictitious characters. And in Church History, by Eusebius, "Paul" died before Nero expired.

Paul could not have met a character that did not exist. "Paul" could not have met Peter. "Paul" and Peter are eye-witnesses to fiction.

In the epistles, "Paul" claimed over 500 people saw Jesus after he rose from the dead, this event is fiction. "Paul" claimed he stayed with Peter for fifteen days, yet Peter was an eyewitness to many fictitious events. There is no external source that can confirm that there was any persons called "Paul" or Peter at anytime in the 1st century.

But, we have letters purpoting to be from "Paul", they are authoritative, and "he" says if anyone preach another gospel, even an angel, let him be accursed. And all his so-called letters are canonised.

These so-called letters appeared to have been authored by the Church.

spamandham

IMHO, theyr'e worse than useless, because they tend to promote the idea that the documents were written at one sitting, rather than what seems to be more likely - a compilation based on pre-existing texts.

You hear arguments like "oh well, Mark was written in 70 CE because it discusses the fall of the temple"...uh no, at best that means that portion of Mark was written no earlier than 70 CE.


...end rant

gurugeorge

Sorry aa, your post just seems totally non-responsive to my question, which applies to your above, and which I'll ask again:

GRANTED the letters were authorised by the Church, why would they author letters, parts of which have teachings that are doctrinally incongruous (i.e. that seem like proto-Gnosticism, which the Church, at the time of the invention of the Canon, seems to be starting to fight against and call "heresy")? That's a problem for your theory that you haven't even begun to come to grips with, so far as I can see.

It's been famously said that "absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence", and that's a good rule of thumb (it might indicate absence, but one would have to have side-arguments to show why, in this case): it seems to me that you rely too much upon there being lack of evidence for x and move too quickly to "well, that must mean there was no x".

That's not to say your theory isn't viable: one can indeed proceed on the assumption that absence of evidence, in this case, for some reason, does mean evidence of absence, and construct a theory on that basis - but as I say above, even if one takes the route you're taking, you have to explain the incongruousness of some of "Paul" (given that if the early 2nd century Christians were newly minted and inventing something, it would make no sense to invent bits that are difficult to interpret or incongruous with the main message).

aa5874

My theory does not really deal with motive in many instances. It deals more specifically with chronology.

The information in the NT and the Church writings place the gospel of "Paul" after Jesus the son of the God of the Jews was on earth, after the son of God ascended through the clouds, after Peter received the Holy Ghost, and preached the gospel where thousands of new converts were received, and after Stphen was stoned.

In letters by the supposed "Paul", he acknowledges that over 500 people saw Jesus after he was resurrected, that there were apostles before him, churches before him and that he persecuted the faith which he now preaches.

"Paul" himself places his own gospel AFTER Jesus resurrected and ascended through the clouds and persecuting the believers of the gospel before him.

The Church writers claim "Paul" was familiar with the gospel called Luke and died before the death of Nero.

It has been deduced by scholars that the gospel of Luke was written after the death of NERO.

I deduced 'Paul" is after the gospel called Luke.

I deal with chronology, not with motive.

The statement "absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence" is so obviously flawed. The statement is true only when evidence is found.

It is always true that absence is the evidence for absence.
It is always true that nothing is the evidence for nothing.

Now, read carefully Absence of evidence IS evidence of absence, since only evidence can contradict the statement.

Therefore, once there is no evidence or absence of evidence, then non-existent is true until evidence can be found.

There is absence of evidence for Achilles.

Achilles did not exist is true until eternity with absence of evidence.
Unicorns do not exist is always true with absence of evidence.

Paul is fiction forever with absence of evidence.
Jesus did not exist is true forever with absence of evidence.

My theory is based on evidence, your theory is based on your imagination and invalid logics.

gurugeorge

Yes but the presence or absence of evidence in our experience, in our ken, makes no difference to the truth.

So: the mere fact that we have found no evidence of something doesn't mean it doesn't exist. The evidence might exist, but we might just have been unlucky and not found it; or it might have existed once, but has become so eroded with the passage of time that the remaining traces are illegible.

Hence "absence of evidence isn't (necessarily) evidence of absence."

Another way of putting this: if something existed it will leave causal ripples (i.e. "evidence" in your sense). But we may have no access to those effects (e.g. texts, archaeology, etc. - "evidence" in the sense of usable evidence).

But it's deeper than that: even evidence of presence may perenially be misunderstood by us. By definition, absolute, final certainty about matters of fact will always elude us, because objectivity includes in itself the allowance that we may always be mistaken.

Anyway, the point is, we have a bunch of traces of something, our job is to interpret exactly what happened to produce that something, and tbqh I don't see how your approach is any more likely to lead to the truth of it than mine.

aa5874

So what is the evidence for absence? If something does not exist, tell what evidence do you expect?

Absence of evidence! Nothing!

gurugeorge

Sure, but as I already explained, that doesn't necessarily imply (doesn't imply logically necessarily) that, if you can't find evidence for something, it doesn't exist.

For sure, if a thing didn't exist it will leave no traces - there will be an absence of evidence for it. But a thing can exist and leave traces that we just haven't come across, or they have disappeared over time, etc.

OTOH if we had good reasons (from a separate argument) for expecting that there should be traces where we're looking, then absence of evidence might have some weight in that case. This is Doherty's argument, for example - and I remind you, again: that's the problem with "Paul" which perenially gives room for doubt about the historical Jesus, which is one of the reasons you do have to give some plausibility argument, in your story, for why "Paul" doesn't have the orthodox feature of emphasis on Jesus' life story IF "PAUL" IS SUPPOSED TO BE A SEAL ON THE TEACHING. And again, I remind you, this critique of your theory accepts the "total Church invention" hypothesis for the sake of the argument.