andrewcriddle

I think this is only plausible as an (IMHO rather forced) interpretation of Acts.

I think that Paul's letters on their own would imply that Paul presecuted Christians as an expression of his personal committal to traditional (Pharisaic) Judaism.

If one accepts Acts as a basis for reconstructing Paul's early career then it would suggest that Paul in Galatians is deliberately minimizing his post-conversion links to the church at Jerusalem.

I am doubtful if it is legitimate to use Acts to suggest that Paul pre-conversion persecuted Christians only at the orders of others, and to use Galatians in independence of Acts to minimize Paul's post-conversion links with the Apostles.

(In any case: If for example the early Christians were claiming that 'Jesus a Galilean prophet and healer recently crucified at Passover by Pontius Pilate on the basis of accusations by the High Priest and other leading Jerusalem Jews, has been vindicated and demonstrated to be Messiah by his resurrection' then I doubt that anyone involved in opposing them would have been ignorant of this. )

Andrew Criddle

Amaleq13

Which part of that would have pissed off the Jewish authorities to the point of persecution? The idea of a crucifixion victim being considered the Messiah? Actively trying to obtain converts from the Jewish population?

TedM

I guess I think of 11:23 as 'possible' because 'apo' is a possible indication of timing which is relevant enough to consider retrojection. My Bush example tried to indicate that. However, to clarify if needed when I say something is 'possible' that just means it has more than zero chance of occurring. It could still me highly unlikely. I agree that the 'apo' leaves much to be desired, but I think it raises the likelihood because of it's general usage. However, Paul could easily be an exception to the general usage, because 1. we don't have good corroberation elsewhere for how Paul uses it and 2. the general usage is apparantly NOT highly consistent.

To me your example for Bush is very close to the 11:23 situation, but 'apo' may have a stronger general meaning than the 'received' you used. I agree that the unique circumstances make any generalization to other uses of Lord without good timing detail very iffy.


Did I actually write that?

It is sometimes counterintuitive to me. I think it IS dangerous to rely on statistics that don't take into account individual characteristics. But, in the absence of the individual characteristics and clues, using general stats will more often get the right answer than not. It is the 'not' part that makes us leary of relying too much on general stats, I think.

I agree. My approach with factoring in the general use of 'apo' makes for a very fuzzy conclusion. I don't even know if 55% is closer to reality or 75%. At best all I can say is it enables there to be SOME increased chance that Paul was retrojecting in 11:23.



It looks to me like we have 5 examples of Paul retrojecting. Inserting "Risen" before "Lord" just doesn't make sense otherwise in these examples:

1. The Lord's supper ("Lord Jesus").
2. "They would not have crucified the Lord of glory"
3. 2 Cor 2:14 "knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus
4. 1 Cor 11:26 "For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes."
5. 2 cor 8:9 "For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor (even if metaphorical)

#1 includes much more detail, of course, but this many examples to me shows that Paul did engage in retrojection on occasion. 11:23 has even LESS indication of timing than #2-5, so the case rests in great part on how meaningful the use of 'apo' is. I don't really know. Also though, I think it is worth considering whether Paul talks of getting information from the risen Christ elsewhere. I don't find that he clearly says he does. On the other hand, he isn't a stranger to 'receiveng' revelation from God and the Spirit, so the idea wouldn't be shocking. Lastly, the uniqueness of the detail can argue for bizarre revelation, but I don't think of Paul as being THAT bizarre. Maybe others do.. Overall, it has to be factored in with other understandings regarding how Paul writes.

By the way, it looks to me like Rom 14:9 helps corroberate your viewpoint on Phil 2.



]

No problem at all..I know I have a tendency to harp on points and sometimes miss things you say. I respect how careful you are even if it does drive me nuts every now and then

I accept your offer to buy me a drink, as long as I can get the next round

ted

Amaleq13

Oh, I absolutely agree. It seems like you should be able to generalize a statistical description of the whole to an individual but I really don't think that is valid. Again, I'm fighting an aneurism just thinking about it but I've got a rather concrete example that seems to support my conclusion.

Polls show that about 62% of Alaskans voted for Bush. If we follow your reasoning, there is a 62% chance that I voted for Bush. The reality is that this estimation is entirely false for my individual case. IOW, just living in Alaska doesn't make you more likely to vote for Bush. That statistic only describes the existing pattern for the whole group. That number changes radically if you focus on a more specific population. Polls of college students, for example, drops that number into the 20's. That statistic tells you that it is less likely for a given college student in Alaska but it still doesn't really tell you if it is less likely for any specific student. To determine the probability for an individual choice, you have to know what individual factors make that individual choice more probable.

This is what I was suggesting with regard to Paul. We needed to look at how he actually used the word in order to establish a probability for how he intended a word in an ambiguous context. Unfortunately, he doesn't really give us a lot with which to work.

If there were specific factors that made it more likely for a given individual to choose one usage over another, we might also be able to apply that information to determine if Paul would be more likely or not to be using the common meaning. For example, one might obtain the frequency with the same educational background as Paul made the choice.

Yes. Paul is clearly attributing words to "Lord Jesus" that would have been spoken before the resurrection.

I guess so but it seems much easier to read this with an implied "one who became" before the title (ie "They would not have crucified the one who became the Lord of glory"). I would put this is the "possible retrojection" pile but on the side closest to the "definite retrojection" pile.

I don't think so. Jesus was "raised the Lord Jesus", wasn't he? At most I would think it would go on the complete opposite side of the "possible retrojection" pile from the above example.

Yeah, that's pretty much a continuation of the other one.

As a retrojection, this one takes us all the way back before the incarnation but it would be more clear if "he" was replaced with the title.

Two clear examples that are closely related to the point of being single statement repeated and three possibles of varying strength.

NOGO

Where he talks about the revelation of the mystery which has been hidden for long past and has now been revelaed throught scriptures ...

I expected Paul to also mention that Jesus himself made this revelation first.

Paul tells us very clearly the source of his faith and it is not the teachings of Jesus the man.

You are trying your best to avoid the fundaental argument which I bring in the initial post.

Paul does not credit Jesus for revealing the mystery of Christian salvation.

You cannot say that Paul does not touch on this subject because he does.

Also, and as I stated before, Paul does not try to prove that Jesus (the man) was indeed the Christ prophesied in scriptures.

Look at Romans 15:1-3 and what I say about it in my first post.
Tell me why Paul quotes from scriptures to justify his statement about Jesus?
Tell me why Paul does not tell us about when and where and in what circumstances Jesus pleased not himself?

These two elements indicate the context under which Paul operates.
Neither one point to the HJ.

This is the essence of the argument in my initial post and you have not answered it yet.

GakuseiDon

Hi Nogo, this is an interesting subject! I've been wanting to reply but had been caught up in my Doherty rebuttal.

I'd like to bring a Second Century CE perspective here. We need to be cautious, since what applied in the 2nd C might not have applied in the 1st C; on the other hand, it doesn't necessarily NOT apply.

In your OP, you wrote:
If Paul knew of messages from a historical Jesus, then we would expect him to use those, correct?

In this case, Paul and the other apostles received and continued to receive messages from the Christ Spirit within them. Other than the Lord's Supper, what messages did they receive that can't be traced back to the Scriptures?

I think that Paul was restricted to some extent on what he could discuss about Jesus as Christ. Paul definitely had his detractors, the so-called "Judaizers". If he brought in information that couldn't be used to show that Jesus was the Christ (at least the Christ that Paul was trying to push), then his detractors could claim that Paul was wrong. Imagine someone today claiming to be Christ returned, who preached a message that was inconsistent with the Gospels. Wouldn't this count against him?

You seem to be implying that Paul only had to say that "Jesus said that, therefore it doesn't have to be in the Scriptures." But that wasn't the case at all. Even in the Gospels, Jesus said that "if he testified for himself only, his testimony was not true". God had to testify for him. The key here appears to be that, for Paul, God and the Scriptures were "bigger than Christ" (maybe even bigger than the Beatles! ).

Some quotes from my article on Doherty (a bit of cross-promotion )

Ignatius said, "When I heard some saying, If I do not find it in the ancient Scriptures, I will not believe the Gospel; on my saying to them, It is written, they answered me, That remains to be proved."

Justin Martyr wrote, "For with what reason should we believe of a crucified man that He is the first-born of the unbegotten God, and Himself will pass judgment on the whole human race, unless we had found testimonies concerning Him published before He came and was born as man "

In the Epistle of Barnabas (90-125 CE), 'Barnabas' wrote, "Moreover, teaching Israel, and doing so great miracles and signs, He [Christ] preached [the truth] to him, and greatly loved him". However, though clearly stating that Christ 'taught' Israel, the author doesn't refer to teachings that he attributes to Christ himself, but instead uses the Hebrew scriptures:

All the early apologists were using Scriptures to give information about Christ. Partly because there may have been no other information around, but then why not just make things up? The reason is that if it didn't conform to Scriptures, then this would have reflected on Christ himself.

To get back to my first question: Paul definitely felt that Christ spoke through him and the other apostles: did the Risen Christ ever say anything that was not in Scriptures?

Amaleq13

How would indicating the living Jesus was the one who had revealed the mystery be considered non-Scriptural if the mystery, itself, was hidden in Scripture?

GakuseiDon

Paul wasn't taught the mystery from the living Jesus directly, though, was he? There are several 'mysteries' that Paul refers to, some of them being how Gentiles are reconciled through God. Paul believed his commission to the Gentiles was from the Risen Christ. Which mystery do you mean? Perhaps if you could cite a passage?

Amaleq13

No but that isn't the point, is it? The point is that Paul doesn't appear to suggest any information came from the living Jesus. How is that reconciled with the Gospel depiction of a living, teaching Jesus serving as the original inspiration for the subsequent movement?

GakuseiDon

I don't think we should try to reconcile Paul's view against the Gospels.

In Rom 14:14, Paul writes: "I know and am convinced by the Lord Jesus that there is nothing unclean of itself; but to him who considers anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean".

Can we assume that this an example of a teaching Jesus, living or Risen?