aa5874

The authenticity of the ALL the Pauline writings are doubtful since there is NO external corroborative source of antiquity for the Pauline writers themselves and no external source to support the Pauline resurrected Jesus, apostles, theology, persecution and chronology.

The author of Acts placed Saul/Paul in a basket by the wall in Damascus AFTER the "witnessed" ascension of the resurrected Jesus and a Pauline writer ADMITTED that he was in a basket by the wall in Damascus during the reign of Aretas. See 2 Cor 11-32-33 and Acts 9.25

Now, the author of Acts claimed there was a GREAT persecution against the Church at Jerusalem and that Saul/Paul was a LEADING figure in the persecution against the Jerusalem Church.

Saul/Paul was AWARE of the Jerusalem Church BEFORE he PREACHED the FAITH.

See Acts 8. 1-3 and Galatians 1.22-23.

Both the author of Acts and a Pauline writer have Saul/Paul AFTER Jesus believers were ALREADY established in Jerusalem.

But, this is where the heart of the problem lies with the authenticity of the Pauline writings.

Did an actual Pauline writer persecute Jesus believers DURING the time of ARETAS and did write letters to, and started churches all the Roman Empire before the Fall of the Temple?

Once "Paul" had identified Jesus as a MESSIAH over 350 times then it would expected that Jewish and non-Jewish writers of that time and even afterwards would have written something about the MOST expected character of the Jews.

No external source wrote a single thing about the Pauline Messiah. No external source of antiquity can account for a CHURCH where a Pauline MESSIAH was worshiped as a God.

The worship of a MAN as a God in Jerusalem by Jews would have been MOST unprecedented, completely unheard of and even contrary the commandments of the very God of the Jews.

This is Philo in "On the Embassy to Gaius" The Pauline resurrected Jesus, and the Pauline persecutions of Jews who worshiped a God/man Messiah cannot be found in the history of antiquity.

Both Philo and Joseph wrote about Pilate and Tiberius and did NOT mention the Pauline resurrected Jesus Messiah and that Jews were PERSECUTED at any time for worshiping the Pauline Messiah.

The "history" and "chronology" of the resurrected Jesus the Messiah, and the PERSECUTION of Jews who worshiped the Pauline resurrected Jesus in ALL the Pauline Epistles are EXTREMELY doubtful.

charles

But aa5874 you are quoting from the Acts of the Apostles which most of us think is a fake history of the Church. Can you really prove anything from that document?

stephan huller

AA you are assuming that Paul thought that Jesus was the one who appeared to the disciples after the resurrection. If this is true why didn't they recognize him immediately. The manner in which the gospel narrative is EXPLAINED by Catholic theologians has infected the manner in which even skeptics INTERPRET the same narrative. Skeptics however fall prey to taking cheap shots at the pious whenever they get an opportunity. If they just held back their punches and spent the time to figure out - even SPECULATE (aghast!) what the original understanding MUST HAVE BEEN to make sense of the narrative instead of simply chanting to themselves that ALL CHRISTIANS ARE STUPID, CHRISTIANITY IS STUPID, THE GOSPEL IS STUPID, they'd actually realize that Paul did not believe that Jesus was the one resurrected from the tomb. It had to have been Christ. Irenaeus provides clear and absolutely solid evidence that the heretics separated these two figures that we skeptics still fuse together owing to our inherent intellectual laziness.

On second thought I have been told that identifying groups and individuals as 'intellectually lazy' is a serious insult around here. So I apologize to anyone I may have offended. How am I supposed to explain why no one else seems to recognize that Jesus and Christ weren't necessarily viewed as the same person in antiquity? Hmmm. Maybe its better to say that people haven't 'found the time' to read Irenaeus - our earliest historical Catholic - as well as they should.

Loomis

Are you sure?

Why can’t AA be assuming that Paul thought that Jesus was Lord, and that God raised Jesus from the dead - like it says in Romans 10:9-13?

Loomis

What’s your take on Romans 1:7b

It seems to suggest that Jesus was the Lord and that he was called Christ.

Loomis

Get a load of Romans 8:11

Loomis

Also get a load of Romans 8:34

Loomis

Why do you assume that AA assumed that Paul thought that Jesus was the one who appeared to the disciples after the resurrection?

How do you know that AA isn’t assuming that Paul thought that Jesus was the one who was resurrected in Romans 8:11, 8:34, or 10:9?

Are you guys exchanging PMs or something?

Loomis

Apparently AA thinks that these stories are fiction. And if that is true then that would mean that the disciples could fail to recognize him for no actual reason at all.

Right?

stephan huller

I SUSPECT (I don't know for sure) that the original Alexandrian tradition identified Jesus as the Father and Christ as the Son (this takes a lot of wind out of the sails of the anti-Arian propaganda). To be honest, what I usually do is check every ancient source possible to see if there is a reading which substitutes Jesus for Christ to provide some alternative interpretations (they surprisingly exist in great numbers).

My guess again is that the passage was deliberately redacted by a Catholic editor to deny that Jesus and Christ were two different people. My suspicion would be that the passage originally simply read something like:

And if the Spirit of him who raised Christ from the dead is living in you, he will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you

It's seems more natural. But again I would have already researched all the surviving sources to see if something like this already exists.

And again:

These are things that I tell you inter pares. In order to publish something like this in a serious paper I would have researched matters in greater detail