TedM

Nogo, I think you have misunderstood. Paul does talk about salvation, but his "gospel" is about salvation to all men, and his focus in his epistles was primarily on Gentiles. Rome, Corinth, Thessalonia, Galatia were all Gentile cities, far from Jerusalem. You may want to read #2 in my review of Doherty's silences for the very clear evidence that the mystery that was revealed to Paul was all about Gentile salvation through faith.

My main point earlier was that since this was his focus we shouldn't expect a lot of attribution to teachings of Jesus. We don't find teachings throughout the synoptics of salvation to all men. GJohn is an exception, however.

In any case, you said that Paul "dwells" on direct divine revelation, which I questioned. Sure he talks about revelation a few times, and the mystery once hidden but now made known, but it isn't clear to me that he "dwells" on the subject.

Thanks for the Romans reference. I agree that it says he was designated Son of God because of his resurrection of the dead. If you wish to say this must mean he was never considered such prior to that, I can see where you are coming from, though I'm not sure the wording is as definitive as that.

ted

NOGO

As he says so himself Paul was a late apostle. So even if the gospels are fictional it stands to reason that the authors avoided mentioning him. It may also be that Mark never heard of Paul.

I do not expect this at all.
I will tell you what many Christians tell me (about Paul's silence) ... you are arguing from silence.

I am not sure I understand what you mean but it also sounds like an argument from silence. Can you define "Christ Cult"? what is included and what is not? Perhaps then I can answer your statement more fully.

You got to be kidding. Paul did not know the HJ Jesus... that much we agree but if he believed this man to be the son of God who came to earth to save humanity then he was a source of revelation for Paul's faith.

Even if Paul was a moron he would have understood this. As I am often told by Christians Paul must have been taught certaing things about Jesus from other Christians. 1 Cor 15 says that he is passing on what he has received. Where does this come from if not the HJ?

Of course I believe it comes from scriptures but you believe it comes from the HJ. So how can Paul fail to mention that Jesus himself taught this?

Luke 24:27
Then beginning with (W)Moses and with all the prophets, He explained to them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures.

The Gospels have Jesus revealing scriptures to his disciples. What is peculiar about Luke 24:27 is that it takes place after Jesus' death.

One is told that this information was then passed down until it reached Paul's ears and others as well. However Paul does not acknowledge this.

It was not a coincidence. All I have to do is to show that the central Jesus story is derived from scriptures. Explain why it occurred during Pilate's time and in what sense Jesus was murdered by the Romans.

Paul tells us that Jesus will return to rule see 1 Corinthians 15 : 25 which comes from Psalms. Paul also claims that it was foretold that salvation would be brought to the Gentiles and he points to a verse in scriptures. There are other things as well which Paul derived from scriptures.

There is just one thing that you forget here. These documents were written without anyone claiming authorship. This came at a time when the Church was "creating" the apostolic tradition.

2 Cor 11:5
For I consider myself not in the least inferior to the most eminent apostles.

Clear enough?

Sure! I have read Paul's epistles so many times it is starting to come out of my ears.
Paul was a late apostle. It should come as no surprize that the Church had some leaders before Paul. What is significant is that Paul does not bow to their authority. He does not think ... these people have lived with and were taught by Jesus himself so perhaps I should listen to what they have to say.
No, not in the least.
Paul claims direct revelation and he says about other apostles
"let then acknowledge that what I says come from God"
or something like that. Paul does not think himself inferior to others simply because he has not been taught by Jesus himself.

That is why he does not acknowledge Jesus as a source of revelation.
If Jesus was a source of revelation then Peter, James and John would know things that Paul did not know. After his conversion the natural thing to have done is to go to the source. Paul does not do this. Paul is self-reliant.

It is all consitent.
Paul does not consult with existing apostles.
Paul does not claim the HJ as a source of revelation
Paul claims direct revelation.
Paul refers to the Lord's Supper but does not even hint that Jesus was with his disciples at the time he broke the bread. The Gospels add " ... and gave it to his disciples". Paul seems to be unaware that Jesus gave the bread to his disciples after breaking it. Do compare Paul's version with the Gospels.

1 Corinthians-11:23-26
For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed took bread;
and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, "This is My body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of Me."
In the same way He took the cup also after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me."

Mark 14:22-24
While they were eating, He took some bread, and after a blessing He broke it, and gave it to them, and said, "Take it; this is My body."
And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He gave it to them, and they all drank from it. And He said to them, "This is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many.

Notice the “While they were eating� and “Gave it to them� and “they all drank it�.
Notice how Paul's Jesus does not mention the presence of disciples; he essentially speaks to all Christians as the MJ would do.
The Gospels place the event in a historical context serving the apostolic tradition.

So which is the original?
Did Paul remove the disciples' presence or did the Gospel writers add it in?
Can you guess wich way I lean?

So you acknowledge that most if not all of the Gospel story is fiction?
What do you consider to be fairly sure knowledge of the HJ?

A controversy best explained by the fact each apostle read scriptures differently. Paul got his from Psalm 2:7 just as Hebrew 1 3:5 did.

Psalms 2:7
"I will surely tell of the decree of the LORD:
He said to Me, 'You are My Son,
Today I have begotten You.

From this Paul concluded that Jesus became son of God after he returned to Heaven. The earliest version we have of GLuke has these words at Jesus' baptism and spoken by the father above.

NOGO

Basically if Paul knew that Jesus had come to earth in order to deliver the message personally Paul would have acknowledge him as a source of revelation.

The fact that he does not
added to the fact that he does acknowledge direct revelation
added to the fact that he does think of himself as inferior to other disciples who have known Jesus personally.
added to other things like the issue about the Lord's supper (see previous post)

.... paints the following picture.

Paul does not know about disciples of Jesus getting information from him which were passed on and which he eventually received. This should, in fact, include the essence of Christian faith itself.

Paul considers himself equal to all apostles because he gets his information from God directly and from scriptures which he knows as well as anybody.

Paul does not once attempt to prove that Jesus was the messiah by showing some element of his life reflected in scriptures as the Gospels do.

All of this is quite damming to the HJ.
That is my position and the element that you bring in is well taken but simply does not solve the problem.

For example the point about the Lord's supper.
Which way do you lean?
Did Paul remove the reference to the disciples or did Mark added it in?

The fact that the reference is missing from Paul is complete coherent with everything else Paul says.
If Paul mentioned disciples being with Jesus during the last supper then he would have to acknowledge that some apostles have greater authority than he. He does not acknowledge this. He would have to acknowledge that Jesus himself was a source of revelation. He would have to prove that Jesus was the messiah etc etc.

yalla

"Hasn't some scholar argued that the young man (Mark 14:51-52) is a reference to Paul?"


Yep, and some have said he is "Mark" himself and there is a suggestion based on Secret Mark that he may be the lover of JC.

But I reckon it's just another prophecy made to be fulfilled by the author of "Mark" based on the Tanakh.

Amos 2.16.
" and he who is stout among the mighty shall flee away naked on that day"

So I call this young fella Amos.

TedM

Jesus didn't come to earth to deliver the message of Paul's gospel.

Very few times, and in one of those few times he acknowledges the appearance to himself of the resurrected Jesus.

He tells the Galations that he reported to them "lest he had been running in vain" with his gospel for the last X number of years. Clearly, they had something that he didn't have which he thought was important.


I've addressed this. Paul says it no differently than many churches say it today--the removal of the disciples makes it more personal to those who follow the tradition today. The silence COULD signal an MJ, but we then have to acknowledge that it is an odd kind of reference for him to make--not relying on the scriptures, and also interesting that the word he used (apo) allows for the event to have been second-hand. It may be that the absence of mention of disciples was intentional...perhaps at the time Paul was having some disputes with them..or some with closer ties to them.

Considering the above, the picture you derive is not so clear.

There is no evidence that Paul was writing to disbelievers in Jesus as Messiah in order to convince them. He was writing to people who had believed his or other's gospel messages in the past, offering advice, encouragement, and instruction. Paul therefore had no need to write of "proofs" from Jesus' life.


Since I think the overall evidence favors a HJ, I think Paul removed the references. Have you seen my recent post about the 12 disciples? It is an example of dozens of clues that we have that Jesus was at least something like that we see in the gospels. Have you read my conclusion in the review of the Top 20 silences? The historical Jesus (the Jesus portrayed as having done things in past history) for Paul, and the authors of 1 Clement, 1 John, 1 Peter, Didache, and Hebrews looks a lot like the gospel Jesus and a lot like each other.

Paul was between a rock and a hard place. It seems evident that Jewish Christians all around were questioning his authority. It is likely that those who questioned him had ties back to the pillars in Jerusalem, and therefore Paul thought it more prudent--especially in an epistle in which he is defending his rights as an apostle--to not say anything which others can use against him.

ted

NOGO

It is with answers such as this that makes me believe that you are not debating in good faith.
You are splitting hair very finely here.
The only way this can be relevant to the discussion is if you believe that Paul went around preaching only salvation to the Gentiles without ever touching upon salvation itself. Damn hard thing to do. Paul must be a computer programmed to avoid talking about Jesus and salvation itself but only speaking about salvation to the Gentiles.

Paul is a believer. His gospel includes any gospel Jesus may have taught.
You are suggesting that it doesn't.
To me that makes no sense. All Paul is doing is delivering Jesus' gospel to another audience. That does not make it a different gospel at the exclusion of the other.

Basically I do not see any common basis to continue debating this.
We will get nowhere as long as you hold to the idea that Paul's Gospel is different and separate from Jesus' Gospel.

To me Paul's Gospel includes Jesus' gospel and therefore Paul must acknowledge Jesus as a source of revelation.

To you Paul Gospel has nothing to do with the HJ and therefore justifies the fact that Paul does not mention the HJ as a source of revelation.

How can I say it...
I just don't buy it.



We only have a few letter from Paul so that is plenty.


If he thought this was important he would have consulted them long before.
Several years later suggests that this was an afterthought of little consequence.

The issue at stake here was not fundamentals of the Christian faith. Paul did not go to Jerusalem to discover what Peter and other knew about the HJ which Paul did not know. Paul did not return with fresh information about Jesus. No, the conclusion from this verse which you quote and which Paul wrote after his visit, is that Paul continued as before. No change.

Not at all. The absence of the disciples goes hand in hand with everything else Paul says. Paul negates an apostolic tradition back to Jesus at every turn.

You got to be kiddiing. Priests do that even today while addressing believers. Paul was the kind of guy who read scriptures daily and reported his latest thoughts on scripture interpretation. Cursed is he who hangs from a tree etc. If Paul knew anything about Jesus he would see it in scriptures and comment on it. Midrash was his strong suit.


You come out with the conclusion you came in with.
This not only makes Paul a liar it also demolishes all of his thinking and preaching.

For example three times Paul says to his people to love one another but he never credits Jesus for it.
In the light of his removing the disciples from the Lord's Supper one has to believe that Paul knew that Jesus had said this but wants everybody to think that he is getting this stuff from the risen Jesus himself.
Ditto for many other things.
Paul knows that the basic Christian belief came from Jesus himself but then he would have had to talk about Jesus' disciples and since this makes him look inferior he just failed to mention it.
All of Jesus' teachings while he was on earth are also kept silent or attributed to himself.
Boy was this guy devious and cunning.

I prefer to believe that Paul was true to himself.
He did not remove the disciples from the picture since there were no disciples for him to remove. And despite this his character is entirely consistent in everything he says.

TedM

Nogo, I've decided to move my response to a new thread, entitled "Jesus' Gospel vs Paul's Gospel", since we may be getting a bit off track from the OP.

Vorkosigan

I saw the thread title and assumed you were posing as a mythicist and taking questions. My bad.

This feature of Mark certainly does NOT presuppose historicity. There are several ways to understand it as fiction:

1) The "hidden divine being" is a convention of fiction of the time -- Athena who appears in the guise of Mentar, Raphael in Tobit. One could even understand that GMArk comments ironically on this idea, for if a god really appeared, everyone would follow him, as crowds actually do.

2) it is Midrash. Helms says the writer of Mark found it in Daniel, where the secret is sealed until the end of time.

3) It is apologetic, and explains why no one ever heard of Jesus prior to this narratve -- he kept his identity concealed.

4) It is a narrative device. Mary Ann Tolbert (1989, p229) argues that the Parable of the Tenants, especially in light of the story of John the Baptist in Mk 6, shows that once Jesus' true role as Heir to the Vineyard was revealed, it could only end in his death. Thus, secrecy became necessary to buy time to spread the word of the Kingdom.

5) The MS is didactic. Since the demons and crowds all reveal his true identity, there can be no secret.

My own view is that it is related to the complex baptismal allegory in Mark, but I haven't sussed that out yet.


I think this is dealt with above.

I'm out of time. More later.

Vorkosigan

Vorkosigan

Sorry, never heard that one before.

V

S.C.Carlson

I'm not aware of that, and neither are my commentaries, but I wouldn't be surprised (almost any conceivable point can and will be argued by a scholar).

In antiquity, the most common identifications are to John and to James, the brother of the Lord. In modern times, the most common positions are agnosticism and John Mark.

Stephen