andrewcriddle

I think we should distinguish two issues.

IF our existing text of Paul has been significantly edited at some time after 150 CE then I agree that it is much more likely that references to a Historical Jesus would have been added than removed.

However, I think such relatively late rewriting of Paul is unlikely (you may IIUC disagree). What seems IMO more of an issue is possible rewriting of Paul at a very early stage, eg by the original collector of Paul's epistles who may also have written Ephesians. I don't, on the whole, think that much rewriting of Paul occurred at this stage (which I would date late 1st cenury CE). But IF it did, then rewriting to emphasise heavenly realities at the expense of earthly ones seems quite possible.

Andrew Criddle

DCHindley

Spin,

I think it is necessary to distinguish between hearing of traditions about the man Jesus and Paul's gospel (good news) about Jesus Christ. Paul may well have come up with his good news about Jesus Christ on account of one or more revelations, but that doesn't preclude Paul having already heard something about Jesus the man.

Let us assume for a moment that God's holy spirit did not really download the gospel to Paul like an FTP server. The natural explanation would be that Paul's gospel about Jesus Christ was synthesized in Paul's brain from previously internalized "facts" he had heard or read about Jesus. That would explain it by means of normal rational processes most of us perform all the time.

Even so, this would still leave open the possibility that the traditions he heard were not so much about Jesus the man as about a resurrected Jesus, to which Paul added bells and whistles.

DCH

gurugeorge

aa, we keep going over this again and again. I really don't understand the point of what you are saying.

Look, I'm a rationalist, I think it highly unlikely that the content of any visionary experience had by anybody throughout history has ever been true (though I don't shut that possibility out apriori). i.e., I don't think that if someone "sees Jupiter" and "talks to Jupiter" in their vision, that means there is a Jupiter that they saw and spoke to.

But I have also experimented with enough things in my life to know that one can SEEM TO ONESELF to have met and spoken to "entities" of various kinds. People have THAT kind of experience all the time, throughout history. It's not exactly common, but it's something people have regularly done, it's an experience that can be deliberately induced if you do certain things (play with breathing, mess up your regular sleeping habits, do rituals, practice lucid dreaming, do mantras, take drugs, etc.). It's also a kind of experience that comes, unwanted and unbidden, to some people (schizophrenia).

Whoever "Paul" is, he claims to have had that kind of experience (that is, unless we think "Paul" is lying, then it seemed, to him, that he saw and spoke to a deity) - or on your theory, he claims that some authentic Paul in the past had that kind of experience. The notion that any such claim must be a lie is not compelling, since such visionary experience is available for anyone who wants to get it.

IOW, it's true that someone might be lying when they claim they have spoken to God; but it's also true that they might simply be honestly reporting their experience. In view of the fact that seeming-to-talk-to-God experiences are possible, you need to have some reason to think someone is lying, rather than merely reporting their phenomenology honestly.

What motivation could there be for the later "Paul" you hypothesise to have falsely claimed that an authentic Paul in earlier times had had visionary experience? Especially at a time when personal visionary experience, prophecy, etc., was becoming frowned upon by the orthodoxy? And especially at a time when orthodoxy's claim relied not on visionary experience but on Apostolic Succession? It just doesn't gel.

gurugeorge

Yes, in the sense that he thought it was God's doing that he had met Jesus and spoken to him (or any number of closely parallel phenomena - e.g. "had Christ manifest in him" in some mystical sense).

Read it like this: "The <good news of a victory won> that was proclaimed by me is not of human origin. I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it."

If you read it that way, it's still compatible with people before him also having proclaimed <good news of a victory won> that has a slightly different content. And that gels with the texts - the Jerusalem folks' idea was that it was good news of a victory won for the Jews; Paul's specific content is that it's good news of a victory won for all people.

I get the feeling you shy away from this because it's too much like the orthodox idea, perhaps it's not crisply different enough from an HJ scenario? I dunno. To me it seems that you have enough non-HJ-support in the simple fact that nowhere, in any of Paul, is there any unambiguous evidence to the effect that any of the people Paul mentions actually eyeballed anyone called "Jesus".

Well, not the holy city of Judaism as it's represented in Christian texts. But there are some scholarly claims that Judaism wasn't nearly as monolithic AT THAT TIME (circa 0-50), as the later Christian texts represent it to have been. (And that in fact, the monolithicness of Judaism in the Christian texts betrays their later origin - i.e. Judaism did become monolithic, as portrayed in the Christian texts, but only AFTER the Diaspora.)

But clearly the "victory" is spiritual for Paul. It could have been equally spiritual (although applying only to the Jews) for the Jerusalem crowd. Ehrman suggests that proto-Gnosticism might have developed from a milieu of "disappointed apocalypticism". Some Jews had expected Jesus to come along and stick it to the Man. Claimants appeared that turned out to be false. The logical options then are: "the whole thing is bullshit", or, "we misinterpreted the Messiah concept", "we got it wrong", "it's actually like this folks" (i.e. "according to Scripture" the victory has been won, it was spiritual, but it will have military/apocalyptic effect in time, as the spiritual act's consequences filter through to the material world - hence "be ready").

Doug Shaver

That would be a natural explanation if we knew that he had heard or read any facts about Jesus. From his own words, it is hardly obvious that he had.

DCHindley

Doug,

Then why is there this statement in 2 Corinthians 5:16?

16 From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once regarded Christ from a human point of view, we regard him thus no longer.

This naturally suggests that a human being was once in mind when the term Christ was used.

Or do you think this has to do with the POV of the persons he addresses? That is, if Paul used to regard Christ from the POV of a human, he is a crucified criminal or at very least a pretender to an earthly kingship (someone to be avoided as trouble). This phrase carries a negative connotation, and no wonder he elsewhere says the crucifixion is a stumbling block (e.g., 1 Cor 1:23). But if Christ is regarded from a spiritual POV, he is a savior who sacrificed himself for faithful mankind ("but to those who are called ... Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God" 1 Cor. 1:24).

Even then, Christ must still have been known as a human being or there is no point of "regarding" him from a human POV.

DCH

aa5874

Visions are unsubstantiated claims. Claims of visions by the Pauline writers are not evidence.

This is just absolute non-sense. You are using the Pauline writers to corroborate themselves.

It is not mandatory at all that a person have visions to have a changed life. And there is NO indication external of the Church writings that any Pauline writer persecuted anyone in the first century.

There is no indication, external of the Church, that the life of any Pauline writer was changed when he was blinded by a bright light.

There is no evidence in the manipulated Pauine letters, just all unconfirmed reports.

gurugeorge

Actually it "naturally suggests" a Gnostic-like teaching to me. You know, the stuff about hylic, pneumatic and the third level (can't remember the term) teachings?

i.e. it's like, Paul is saying that the people he's talking to are now ready to view everything from a higher perspective, including even the protagonist of the cute story about a Rabbi that he initially "hooked" them with.

So, in a sense you are right, but it's STILL ambiguous between "man who actually existed" and "myth containing {man who actually existed}."

spin

Without knowing the weird thoughts that the Mormons have (perhaps you know, but I'm asking you to think of the vast majority of us know-littles) you know that they are strange when they come to the door and try to sell you a new religion. You don't need to know much to say "no, thank you", nor would people of any religion they are committed to to do the same. Paul didn't need to know very much at all about messianism to reject it, given his claimed conservative background.

We don't get a picture of any of the theology of the Jerusalem sect from Paul. All we are doing is projecting onto them what we read in Acts, which is a dangerous procedure because we know nothing about the veracity of Acts other than it has certainly been compromised , as seen in a comparison with information from Paul (and a conflict between these sources points to veracity in the Pauline work, because one smooths out wrinkles rather than introduces them -- lectio difficilior).

Acts gives the impression of putting everything in its place, suggesting it reached its final form quite late. One must be extremely cautious about it. Yet, it seems to be the source of most of the "reconstruction" of what Paul means. Shudder.

This is basically skeptically rationalizing the relationship between Acts and Paul. You have to put Acts aside for a moment and tell me what you make of Paul. What makes you think from Galatians that the people in Jerusalem believed anything about a Jesus? I think that you'll find nothing.

We know that Paul accepted an idiosyncratic form of messianism, one that doesn't reflect Jewish thought. I'd be wary of projecting such an idiosyncratic savior messianism onto a group of Jews in Jerusalem. We do know this group was somehow messianic, but they were first and foremost Jews who performed their torah duties. That's what the conflict between this group and Paul was. He wanted to abolish torah observance because of his newfound messianism and they maintained their torah adherence while being messianists. That should make their messianism plainly different from Paul's.

We don't know what that messianism was from a reading of Paul. He consistently opposes their insistence on torah observance with Jesus and his death, which suggests that Jesus himself was at the center of their conflict. All I'm doing is reducing the complexity of the scenario. He knew of messianism by opposing non-conservative ideas. He didn't need to be interested in those ideas. Then he had a revelation of his savior messiah. The fellow who was giving messianists a hard time now believes in the messiah. Hallellujah!

And I think there really isn't much wrong with this:

except that you insinuate Jesus when you can't get that from what we are told by Paul.


spin

spin

Perhaps you don't understand the fact that I know how it is often read and that I am deliberately reading it afresh and asking you to do the same, rather than restate the known.

But you don't know anything about what the people before him said.

I shy away from it because it is assumption riddled. It isn't based on what Paul says, but what one has learn to believe Paul said. You have to read the text for what it says. It doesn't actually say what you want it to. It allows me to read it the way I do, though I may be filling in too many gaps. That just may be that I'm filling them in differently from others. How do you choose which is correct without prior commitments?

It wasn't monolithic. But we know a little about Pharisaism and Sadduceeism Essenism and a little less about the nationalists. None of them suggest anything like mystery-saviorism.

Are you arguing against what could be with another what could be?

Ehrman is welcome to his opinions. Are they of relevance to the interpretation I've put forward about what Paul tells us in Galatians?


spin