stj

^^^Beat me to the punch. Very interesting and enlightening work, though it tends to project later rabbinical/Talmudic Judaism backwards onto the Pharisees and assume it was the normative Judaism, disappearing Sadducees and Essenes, as well as any minor groups which left no trace. Maccoby destroys Paul's credentials as a learned Pharisee. His elaborate theory about Paul's role in the temple guard fails on the rather simple ground we don't need to take seriously Paul's claims about being a persecutor: Con men of the reformed sinner variety have a vested interest in building up (or tearing down?) the depravity that religious conversion cured.

And I've forgotten if Maccoby suggested it, but Luke's remarkable ending of Acts without a word about Paul's fate, besides falsely suggesting it was written contemporaneously, tells us that Paul's fate was not known. I picture the kind of guy Paul was as recanting, turning state's evidence if he had to, then taking the money to buy a villa in Spain!

Morton Smith's suggestion that Paul's "marks" were not the later stigmata phenomenon but mystical tattoos is obviously not provable, but should be kept in mind as well.

aa5874

But, how can you claim to know what Paul probably thought? Why should I believe you?

"Paul" claimed he was a WITNESS of the resurrected Jesus and that if the dead rise not that he was a False witness.

So whether or not Paul believed he was a witness of the resurrected Jesus it is known that "the dead rise not".

1Cor 15:15 - The dead rise not.

Paul is found to be a false witness.

jgoodguy

I think of Paul as a small time preacher, making a living at preaching his brand of Christianity, dying more or less like all small time preachers of old age in bed. By an accident of history, a group of Christians that were favored by later political events in Rome, adapted or modified his letters/sermons into their theology. I think that Paul played off of the reputation of the Jerusalem Church to his benefit and likewise used the reputation of a Jesus fellow to give his ministry credibility. Again an accident of history, the destruction of Jerusalem destroyed the Jerusalem Church, the Jesus group and anyone that could with authority object to Pauline teachings.

One implication of this is both a mythical beginning of Christianity and a Historical Jesus. It is just that there is no real connection. If as Maccoby suggests, that the Jesus movement was a major player in Jerusalem, it does not take a obscure preacher for a HJ, just a man and movement whacked from existence by the Romans, leaving little but hints in the text.

aa5874

How in the world could "Paul" be a small time preacher based on the NT. "Paul" was a Big-Time preacher, EL NUMERO UNO of the apostles, who out-performed even his own Lord and Saviour.

Jesus Christ was small time and was mainly around Galilee preaching only to Jews for about 1-3 years and wrote nothing but "Paul" preached and traveled ALL over the Roman Empire MULTIPLE times, writing letters and starting Churches for about 20 years.

2 Cor. 11 "Paul" was supposedly the Big Time apostle and "his Epistles" were canonized but now it may be a big lie.

"Paul" appears to be unknown outside apologetic sources.

"Paul" appears to be, not big-time, not small-time, but a NO-TIME preacher.

jgoodguy

Do you believe every thing you read in the Christian Scriptures.

aa5874

Apparently you don't even understand what I do.

I use the NT and Church writings to EXPOSE fraud and fiction.

Please have a look at the very last sentence of my previous post.

Based on the written evidence from antiquity I believe the NT Canon is a compilation of Myth Fables about a character called Jesus Christ, the Child of a Holy Ghost, the Word that was God and the Creator who was raised from the dead.

Now, you actually appear to be BELIEVE there was a character called Paul who was a preacher but I do not.

Why do you believe there was a character called Paul in the 1st century before the Fall of the Temple?

Because you read about Paul in Christian Scriptures?

Jedi Mind Trick

Just suppose that what Paul described, he actually believed happened to him. That does not mean anything about the veracity of the claims he made. He just had an experience.... some people see visions of Shiva and build temples by his direction, other see Allah, Mazda, some saw Zeus, others Apollo or Marduk... What does any experience really say about the truth? Nothing...

So I say, let Paul stand on his own word instead of inventing theories that are hard to support.

aa5874

Let us suppose that what Paul described never happened to him.

Let us hear what external sources said about Paul and the Pauline Jesus story.

Why didn't Paul just say that he really don't know what he was talking about?

You must remember that whether or not Paul had visions of Jesus he did claim Jesus was crucified, buried and was raised from the dead on the THIRD DAY ACCORDING to the Scriptures.

The truth really does matter.

And as Paul wrote if the dead rise not then he was a False witness.

The dead rise NOT.

Paul is a false witness of the supposed resurrection of Jesus on the THIRD DAY..

That is the truth.

JonA

Is there any reason to seriously doubt the existence of Paul?

Jon

Toto

Someone wrote Paul's letters, but if you try to show that they were written in the first century, you will run up against problems. We have no literary evidence of anyone publishing the letters before Marcion in the second century. An earlier generation of scholars worked out the dating of Paul's letters based on correlating them with events in the Book of Acts, but the current generation of scholars believes that the Book of Acts is essentially fiction and not a reliable description of events.

I would guess that Paul existed, although his name was probably not Paul, but I don't think you could prove it.

There are some long threads in the archives on dating Paul's letters.