Layman

Egads, don't they even read these Epistles before they comment on him?

Toto claiming Paul and Peter first met at their confrontation in Galatia. WB claiming Paul never claimed to have persecuted Christians or been converted near Damascus.

Sheesh.

MortalWombat

OK, my memory was faulty on that point.

Both accounts mention Damascus, but there the similarity ends. In Acts, after seeing the high priest (in Jerusalem?) he goes to Damascus and on the journey has a vision of Jesus directly coming to him. In Galations, he says only later that he went back to Damascus. But note another difference: In Acts, Jesus himself appears to Paul and speaks to him, while in Galations, he says that God "was pleased to reveal his Son in me." It is God himself doing the revealing, not Jesus.
Loosely. However, my point stands that he never ever mentioned previously being named Saul, becoming blind, or even getting his revelation directly from Jesus, or that it occured on the way to Damascus.

Egads, didn't you read my post before commenting on it? I said:

. Do you actually think that because both accounts mention the word Damascus, that they are equivalent?

I'm actually glad Atticus Finch quoted that passage in Galatians, because I noticed one more discrepancy: In Acts, after his conversion, he continues on to Damascus, stays there several days, then goes to Jerusalem. However in Galatians, he says:
1:15 But when the one who set me apart from birth and called me by his grace was pleased 1:16 to reveal his Son in me so that I could preach him among the Gentiles, I did not go to ask advice from any human being, 1:17 nor did I go up to Jerusalem to see those who were apostles before me, but right away I departed to Arabia, and then returned to Damascus.

Toto

I'm quite familiar with that passage, since it is a key bit of information in the mythicist case. I see nothing there that indicates Paul met Peter before the meeting referenced in Galatians, or that the Church of God was centered around a recently-crucified historical Jesus with any resemblance to the character in the Gospels.

Atticus_Finch

MortalWombat,

The accounts of Galatians and Acts do not contradict on the issue of Paul's trip to Jerusalem. In Galatians, Paul says that he went to Jerusalem, just not right away. Gal. 1:18

Acts Chapter 9 just says he went to Jerusalem. It doesn't say when or comment one way or the other on a trip to Arabia. The Acts account suggest that time passed for Paul to grow stronger in his faith. A likely, and workable, chronology is as follows:

Conversion
Entry into Damascus
Goes to Arabia for some period to study and pray
Returns to Damascus and then is forced to flee
Goes to Jerusalem

Please point out to me how either Acts or Galatians contradicts such a chronolgy.

Regards,

Finch

Layman

Let's look:

Galatians 2:1-14.

So there are three recorded times that Paul met with Peter before the confronation in Galatia.

First, after three years, Paul's first visit to Jerusalem (coming from Damascus).

"Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to visist Cephas, and I remained with him fifteen days."

Second, after fourteen years, Paul's second visit to Jeruslam (coming from the regions of Syria and Cilicia).

"Then after fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas.... and when they perceived the grace that was given to me, James and Cephas and John ... gave to me and Barnabus the right hand of fellowship..."

Third, in Galatia Peter arrived before "those from James" and before there was any confrontation. Only later, after others came after Peter from Jerusalem, was there a confrontation.

"For before certain men came from James, he ate with the Gentiles; but when they came he drew back..."

So please explain for me in detail Toto, how you conclude that the first time Peter and Paul met was at the confrontation in Galatia?

[ October 04, 2002: Message edited by: Layman ]

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Toto

I should have made myself clearer. I did not mean that Paul had not met Peter before the confrontation, but before the first encounter referred to in Galatians, which would have been in Jerusalem. I thought you were trying to argue that Paul had met Peter before his conversion experience.

This is avoiding the main point. You have yet to explain why Paul, after his visitation by God or the Spiritual Jesus, waited 3 years before traveling to Jerusalem to meet with those who had presumably known the human Jesus. It is part of a pattern in which the allegedly human Jesus plays a negligible role in Paul's concerns.

Layman

I am not sure you are telling me the truth Toto. You were quite clear. You denied that Peter and Paul had met prior to their confrontation in Galatia:

Toto: I'm quite familiar with that passage, since it is a key bit of information in the mythicist case. I see nothing there that indicates Paul met Peter before the meeting referenced in Galatians....

Toto earler: When he did meet Peter, he told him to his face that he was wrong (if you can trust his epistles).

Either you are lying about what you meant now or you were lying when you claimed to be "quite familiar with these passages."

Whenever you are caught (again -- Matthew Census Redux) dead to rights it's never the "main" point.

Gotcha.

Radorth

Re: braces-for-impact

It depends on which version of the facts we are arguing today, which scholarly assertions we take by faith and which presumptions we make from which "facts." Try to keep up man! Last month we were arguing whether Paul simply misinterpreted some visions, wrote half the NT in order to make a name for himself, give hope to oppressed myth lovers everywhere, and quit working for a living. Why he gave up his day job showing off his long phylacteries and persecuting Christians to preach the Gospel and make tents has never been explained. Acts claims he had some silly post-resurrection vision on the road to Damascus, but this vision is not the kind we can believe so we are forced to infer various other ones.

He had all sorts of delusions and visions, but not that one you see. The Gospels were all made up later, based on various clues and silences in the Paul's writings which Earl Doherty, et al, find compelling though other skeptics call ridiculous because their methodology is wrong or, as Toto pointed out, "old."

Anyway kindly do not pollute the thread with such inane and thought-provoking questions.

Radorth

[ October 04, 2002: Message edited by: Radorth ]</p>

braces_for_impact

Sorry. I was at work and bored, but I know that's no excuse...my humble apologies.

Radorth