aa5874

So, how did you come up with such an opinion? Did you actually ask every-one who view this board or is it just your imagination?



How is it that false claims made by you become some other persons problem?


You have not established any case at all. You just say things as though you have presented some other case. You have already claim that you are agnostic.

You dare not put forward any case.


But, this can hardly be true or even logical. How do you depend upon so-called tirades to guage your knowledge of ancient texts?

Again, you just make baseless assertions, you do not know all that I have read.

spamandham

I presented you a list of alternatives that are all logically possible, and none of which are implausible. You simply dismiss the entire list out of hand.

This is too much of a waste of time to be worth continuing. Hopefully the mods will continue their tireless efforts of pulling your hobby horse space wasting posts out into seperate threads.

aa5874

The Roman church writers have always claimed there was one Pauline writer, but this is so far from the truth.

kcdad

They are rapidly coming to grips with reality through people like John Dominic Crossan and others.

aa5874

You have a warped view of evidence or what possibilities mean based on evidence.

You cannot ignore one possibility because the same evidence may also appear to be helpful in another way.

Consider any non-direct evidence or information not derived from eyewitnesses.

If DNA of a defendant is found at a crime scene, it can signify that it is possible the defendant committed the crime but that may not true.

But the DNA evidence cannot just be discarded or ignored because it is possible that the defendant did not commit the crime, all the evidence to show that it was possible that the defendant committed the crime must be presented and used in the case.

What I have noticed on this forum is that persons selectively isolate information or evidence one by one and discard them in the same fashion, one by one, because each piece of information on their own cannot prove a case beyond reasonable doubt.

It is always extremely difficult to find one piece of indirect evidence on its own that can prove a case beyond doubt, it must be the sum of all the evidence.

Now look at each piece of evidence on their own, individually it cannot prove a case beyond reasonable doubt.

Prosecutor--We have DNA evidence.

Defense---The DNA evidence proves nothig.

PRO------We have his fingerprints.

DEF...The fingerprints prove nothing.

PRO--We have photos of him in the area.

DEF-- The photos prove nothing.

PRO---We found shoe prints similar to the defendants.

DEF--The shoe prints prove nothing.

Judge to the foreman, "How do you find the defendant, guilty or not guilty.

Foreman, GUILTY YOUR HONOR.



Now when the NT and church writings are examined there are a host of information or evidence that can clearly show that Paul was absolutely aware of the Gospels.

1. The Pauline writer claimed he received his gospel by revelation, that must be false, he must have gotten his gospel from some other source.

2. The writer called Paul claimed Jesus revealed to him that he was betrayed in the night and supped with his disciples. This could not be true, Paul must have gotten this information from some other source than by revelation.

3. Paul claimed he met an apostle called Peter, but this can hardly be true, Peter was a fictitious character. Where did Paul get the name Peter from?
Paul must have gotten the name Peter from some source that existed before he wrote.

4. The author of Acts did not appear to know about the Pauline chronology from Damascus to Jerusalem, it would then indicate that the Pauline chronology was after Acts.

5. The Pauline chronology has more details with respect to the number of trips to Jerusalem and with respect to the time. Acts contradicts PAUL.

6. Paul appears to be correcting Acts of the Apostles. The author of Acts claimed Paul met with some disciples before he started preaching but Paul claimed he did not "confer with flesh and blood."

7. The church writers claimed gMatthew was the first gospel to be written. And no church writer ever claimed the Pauline letters were written before gMatthew.

8. Justin Martyr ,upto the middle of the second century, did not write a single word about Paul, Acts of the Apostles or his letters.

I could go on and on, but the sum of the evidence, the preponderance of the evidence will always support the OP.

Paul was absolutely aware of the Gospels.

spamandham

Well, if you're going to present a complete case, that's worth going through.

Incorrect. The writer states that the scriptures themselves were the source of revelation. Obvioulsy no god was involved, but the writer certainly could have believed a god was involved. In fact, it was an extremely superstitious period of time, where gods and demons were believed to permeate all of reality.

The vision 'Paul' describes, he admits might have been a dream...he isn't sure. Why would a forger add that bit of uncertainty? There are lots of people who have a hard time telling the difference between vivid dreams and reality. Strike 1.

...again, that fact that it can't be true does not mean the writer didn't believe it to be true. There are millions of people alive today who think they've received revelations from gods, yet I'm guessing you will not argue those people are fictional.

How do you know Peter was fictional? Within the Pauline corpus, he is presented as an ordinary person. There is nothing even remotely implausible with what Paul states about Peter. You can not use the nonsense recorded in Acts and the Gospels to discredit what the Pauline writer says about Peter. To do so is begging the question.

*no it doesn't*. This exact same bit of evidence supports the list I provided previously, and they can not all be true, therefor this bit of evidence does not help us date the Pauline corpus. You summarily dismissed my list of equally plausible explanations ...and bizarrly accused me of providing no evidence, when the evidence had already been discussed.

Do you know the difference between evidence and argument?

So what? Why should they be the same?

Is there really anything unusual about the idea that Paul would make such a statement? It's totally consistent with his claims that he was specially chosen by revelation.

You have not explained why you expect consistency between Paul and Acts.

There is no reason to presuppose an authoritative hierarchy in the 1st/2nd century. That being the case, point 7 is irrelevant to the discussion, as it is perfectly reasonable that each sect would make it's own claims somewhat independent of other sects. The conflict we see in the late 2nd century, and the explosion of bogus Acts type texts, is strong evidence of a catholicizing movement, which necessarily implies sectarianism prior to that movement.

Unless you pressupose a unified hierarchy, there is no a priori reason to expect Justin Martyr to mention Paul.

Except that most of what you've presented as evidence amounts to little more than begging the question.

DCHindley

You are quite right to question whether the author of Acts would have surely known of the epistles (which ones?) if the epistles had come first. The reverse is also true - we have to question why we should assume that the author of forged epistles would have to know of the book of Acts. Even if they had heard of them (both scenarios) we can't be sure they would have had anything like sure knowledge of their contents, especially if they circulated in different Christian circles far distant from one another. The knowledge may have only been hearsay, with the usual errors that come with hearsay transmission of accounts. In both scenarios the authors would have their own agendas for writing their accounts in the manners they chose, which will affect the presentation and perhaps altering of sources. Early Christianity was about as monolithic as the Judaism(s) of the time.

DCH

aa5874

You have just demonstrated that you have very little idea of how a case is built. All you have done is exactly as I pointed out and it is show that no single non-direct evidence can prove a case.

I repeat, the DNA of a defendant of itself proves nothing, a case must be built using all the available evidence.

You have not made a case for your position.

You are just making stuff up. Your response is just blatantly inaccurate.

Look at Galatians 1.11-12 You don't even know what Paul is talking about. This weakens your position. You are making stuff up. In the Pauline letters, the writer did not use the word "dream" or claimed he might have been dreaming.

You produce erroneous information. And your mis-leading information does not even help your position.

This is not primarily about fiction, you need to show that Paul could not have known or was not aware of the Gospel. You have failed so far.

Paul claimed that Jesus was betrayed in the night after they had supped and broke bread, this information cannot be found in the OT or the LXX, Paul must have gotten this information from some source other than revelation from Jesus Christ.


I do not deal with information in isolation. It is not the Pauline corpus alone that mentions Peter, or Cephas.

You must be joking, that is precisely how it can be deduced that Paul was a fictional first century writer.[B]You must use all the information provided by the church in order to asess the characters they presented.

After all, it is the very same church that canonised Acts of the Apostles and regarded it as authentic and genuine that gave the readers the Pauline corpus.

By ignoring Acts, you are actually trying to claim without any support whatsoever that whatever is in the Pauline letters must be true or is likely to be true when it is evident that the Pauline letters also contain fiction just like Acts.

Now, in the NT, Peter witnessed fiction and participated in the very fictitious events. Peter is fiction itself.



Absolute non-sense. You cannot show that the author of Acts wrote after the Pauline letters.

You have a chance to show the evidence now, why are you telling me about some thing you posted before.

The Church canonised Acts and the Pauline letters, they claimed Luke wrote Acts and that Luke and Paul were inseparable companions. It must be obvious based on their story that Luke wrote his Damascus-Jerusalem chronology before Paul and that is why Pauine writer corrected the author of Acts.

To show that the author of Acts was aware of the Pauline chronology.


But you are not showing that Paul could not have known or was not aware of the Gospels.

In Acts Paul was with the disciples, how does that help your case or position? Paul claimed he got revelations from Jesus Christ, this must be false.

Who told Paul about Jesus Christ.

Well, explain how inconsistencies show that Paul wrote before the author of Acts?


So why do you assume you know what each sect would do without any evidence whatsoever. Tell me the names of the sects and what each sect claimed?

You must remember, always, that the bogus Acts is part of the canon, regarded as authentic and genuine and is an independent witness to Paul as provided by the Church. Why can't the Pauline letters be bogus or catholocised like Acts.?

And how does your statement show that Paul could not have known or was not aware of the Gospels?


Justin Martyr mentioned Peter, John, Simon Magus and Marcion, why do you presuppose that Justin needs some unified hierarchy to mention Paul?

Justin Martyr spoke about meetings at the churches but did not ever mention a Pauline church.


All you do is make baseless assertions and you have not shown that Paul was not aware of the Gospels.

kcdad

So you want to go to trial over this... OJ and Robert Blake were acquitted on these kinds of rules of evidence, and how many convicted wrongly on these buildings of circumstantial evidence?

Reason is a fine tool, but only if you use it reasonably.

aa5874

So, are you claiming that because people have been convicted wrongly that all cases based solely on circumstantial evidence should be thrown out or never be tried?

My point is that once the prevailing information of antiquity is used, not just the Pauline letters alone, that is, all the information with respect to Jesus, the disciples and Paul, it will be easily seen that Saul/Paul was a first century fabrication and the authors of the Pauline letters used the existing Gospels with Acts of the Apostles to fabricate the so-called revelations of Paul.


This is my fundamental position as of now with respect to Paul based on all the information that I have examined so far.

It is my view that the Jesus story was first written sometime after the all the writings of Josephus were completed, that is, it was sometime around the end of the 1st century or early 2nd century that people started to believe in Jesus Christ and as time progressed more versions of Jesus Christ were fabricated.

Now, since the Jesus Christ story was just a fabrication, there would have been no real history of Jesus believers up to the time the Jesus story was first written.

Acts of the Apostles, the Pauline letters, the writings of Ignatius, Polycarp, Papias and Clement were fabricated to fill that non-historical post-ascension period after the Jesus story was already believed to be true.

That is why, in my opinion, we have no mention of any named Gospels, Acts of the Apostles, the Pauline letters, the epistles of James, John, Peter and Jude, Ignatius, Clement, Papias, Polycarp in the writings of Justin Martyr.

Justin Matyr's writings do not at all reflect anything like Church History by Eusebius, but Justin Martyr's writings is similar only when he wrote about Simon Magus, Menander and Marcion.

Based on Marcion, after Jesus went to heaven, the Devil took over and used Simon Magus, Menander and Marcion to corrupt and sow disbelief in Jesus Christ.

Based on Eusebius, it was Peter and Paul that were spearheading the transmission of the gospels, after Jesus went to heaven, all over the Roman Empire as found in Acts of the Apostles

But, when Acts of the Apostles is examined it is found to be a book of fiction. Many of the events in Acts are fictitious, but even more alarming is that the main characters, Peter and Saul/Paul, witnessed and participated in the very same fiction.

And, finally the Roman Church produced and fabricated the Pauline letters to substantiate the fiction found in Acts of the Apostles, but this fabrication it would appear did not happen overnight, it may have taken some considerable time.