(15 votes, average: 4.93 out of 5)
Loading...I was recently recording the monthly Q&A that I do with Gold members of the blog (if you’re not a Gold member, this is one of the perks of moving to that level: every month Gold members ask me questions — in writing — and I record a 50-55 minute audio Q&A answering them; since the Gold members get audio versions of the posts, as well as written, this is an add-on they get every month. Think about joining!). In this Q&A I received a lot of really interesting questions, but one was very important for understanding the life and ministry of Paul. And now I see that it was closely related to a question I received on the blog years ago, which is exactly what I was going to post on today anyway! Here’s the original blog question and response.
QUESTION
What do you make of Paul’s statement that he didn’t get the good news (= the resurrection and thus the triumph over death) from other humans but from the ‘risen Christ’ himself? If he persecuted the Christians because of a resurrection belief then he would have heard about it before, from other humans, no?
RESPONSE
Ah! Several people in their comments over the years have pointed out that if Paul claims to have “received” the teachings about Jesus’ death and resurrection from others (1 Cor. 15:3), then it is hard to make sense of what he says in Galatians 1, that he received his “gospel” directly from Jesus himself. How could Paul have it both ways?
This is a particularly important issue for anyone interested not just in Paul or the New Testament, but for the entire phenomenon of Christianity as it eventually developed into a non-Jewish religion with decidedly Jewish roots. Wanna read my response? Join the blog. Click here for membership options
Dear professor, i often wonder: “Salvation from what”? What’s gonna happen if I reject or don’t receive the salvation, according to Paul (or early Christians)? Is it the imminent coming of the Kingdom and ressurection to eternal perdition, And the salvation means ressurection to eternal life? I know it’s a Basic question, but since it’s still advertised today, I wonder what’s the offer actually about. Thanks you
Not basic but fundamental! Yes, they thought that those who were not “saved” would be “destroyed”
Thank you professor. I don’t want to go too much into theology here, but isn’t it a bit silly to “offer” it today? I suppose nowadays it’s more like salvation from hell, but see, due to your scholarship, i know it’s all baloney 😉
Professor Ehrman,
What you have stated aligns pretty closely to what I was taught as a fundamentalist, except the part about Jews continuing to keep the law. Can you tell me which teaching of Paul brings you to that conclusion?
I want to thank you for this post and all you do! Your blog has become daily breakfast reading.
It may sound like that, but it’s not. Paul was arguing against the need for followers of Jesus to convert to Judaism, and that’s not something fundamentalists ever even thing about….
Bart.
Has anyone, in an attempt to explain the apparent contradiction between 1 Cor. and Gal.1, suggested that *all* the information Paul says he received in 1 Cor. came from the direct interaction he believed he had with Jesus? Is that a plausible interpretation?
The language he uses in 1 Corithians is the common way of talking about receiving a tradition (from sooen) and passing it along (to someone else). I think the contradiction is indeed just apparent. In Galatians he is decidedly not referring to the death and resurrection of Jesus when he refers to “my gospel” (though obviously it was a major point of his preaching) he means “his version of the gospel,” that is, that Jesus’ death and resurrection is ALL that is needed for salvation and that therefore gentiles do not have to become Jews. Since the people he argues against aare those who think otherwise on just that point, that appears to be what me means by saying h got themessage straight from Jesus.
What about I Corinthians 11:23, where Paul says, “For I received FROM THE LORD that which I also delivered to you” and then describes the night of the Lord’s Supper?
James Tabor in Paul And Jesus makes a compelling case that Paul believed he was taught about the faith directly from God in visions, perhaps while in Arabia (Gal. 1:17).
It’s certainly possible. But Paul doesn’t say anyting about having visions in Arabia or being taught this message there. In the early church as today people often understood that they got messages “from the Lord,” for example when a preacher would say something that resonated with them (The Lord has been speaking to me through you) or, in ancient Christianity, through a prophet who literally spoke the word of God to people.
I understand that there is a tradition of pagans wanting and being accepted in some Jewish religious service. As they began to hear about jesus, Paul could not persecute them because they did not fall under Jewish rule but he was impressed by something in their belief or action which caused him to see things in a different way.
There were certainly gentiles who were attracted to Jewish worship (though not a lot). But Paul could persecute anyone he wanted. He was not under orders from someone else. He was doing it as a private citizen, and possibly simply doing it an an ad hoc basis (maybe even just roughing up a few people who were spouting this offensive message).
To expand on what I previously wrote about Paul perhaps fitting the profile of an upstart cult leader (a la Joseph Smith, Koresh, Moon), his mission to gentiles might have a simpler explanation than the reception of divine revelation. That is, Paul perhaps saw the gentile “market” as having richer possibilities than the hard and often fruitless work of trying to convince Jews that Jesus was the messiah. I realize this is a cynical lens with which to view Paul, but on the other hand, I feel it’s useful to examine maverick religious leaders’ possible human tendencies before concluding their actions were guided by selfless divine inspiration.
It’s always been my understanding that Jews didn’t care what non-Jews believed; after all, they welcomed the “God-fearers” into their synagogues and homes without asking them to give up sacrificing to the Roman gods. So that raises the question of just who Paul was on his way to persecute when he was on the road to Damascus? Was it a group of Jews who had decided to believe in Jesus? Or a group of Gentiles who had converted to Judaism (circumcision included) in order to believe in Jesus?
Fredriksen argues that Paul wanted the Gentiles to believe in Jesus but not to become Jews because of the Isaiah passage that “all nations” will come to God’s mountain qua gentiles. I read that as supporting your argument here, albeit from a different angle. Do you agree?
Ah, one last question: It seems to me that Paul only abrogated certain laws, ones we might call cultic (circumcision, etc.), but insisted the Gentiles obey laws against porneia and idolatry, even suggesting they could lose their salvation if they don’t. Do you think this was a dilemma for Paul that he never fully solved?
I don’t think the story of the road to Damascus is historical (it’s only in Acts). But he certainly was persecutiong peopel Since his problem appears to have been with Jews who thought a crucified man was the messiah presumably it was Jews, especially since we hve no evidence of non-Jews converting yet. I have never been convinced that there wsa this group of “God-fearers” who were gentiles who came half-way to Judaism and frequented the synagogues. I agree with Fredriksen on her point. And I wish I knew whether Paul felt conflicted about his view or not; my sense is that he always found himself completely consistent.
“The road to Damascus” makes a nice metaphor, whether it’s historical or not! Another line in Acts was Acts 13:16, where Paul addresses the Godfearers in the synagogue. If nothing else, it shows that the author of Acts knew (or believed) there were Gentiles in attendance. Fredriksen lays out a case for the Godfearers in Paul: The Pagan’s Apostle, citing to sources such as Juvenal and Josephus; there were also some donation plaques by “theosobeis” (though the one she specifically cites is from the fourth or fifth century). Shaye Cohen also has a detailed argument in The Beginnings of Jewishness.
How much do think that his innovation was due to religious conviction and how much due to tactical considerations, e.g. it would be a lot easier to convince Gentiles to get on board without all those Jewish law requirements? I know that it is hard to get inside someone’s head but any insights that you can provide would be appreciated.
Yeah, I guess I agree it’s impossible to get into his head. But based on his rhetoric, I don’t see him as a tactician, but as a massively convinced believer in his view.
1. “And if they’re Jews, presumably for Paul they should continue to live like Jews”
It seems like Paul moved toward not living like a Jew and living like a Gentile:
1 Corinthians 9:21 (NRSV) To those outside the law I became as one outside the law
I’m sure other Jews saw this as a very off behavior of Paul, right?
2. Also, since we know that Paul did not receive a message from Christ, he must have created his gospel himself or with others. Maybe with Andronicus and Junia, his compatriots who were in Christ before he was.
Yes, Paul’sviews required him sometimes to do things outside the bounds of the law — e.g., joining gentiles at non-kosher meals. Highly observant Jews woudl have found that unacceptable. It’s not clear to me that all Jews at the time, though, were highly observant. 2. I wouldn’t say we “know” that, but it’s certanily the case that I don’t think he had a divine source for his ideas. But I don’t sense that people’s ideas have to come from cooperation with other people — sometimes, a lot of times, an idea hits them and they run with it; for highly religious people often when that happens they believe their idea has come from a divine source.
I think many, perhaps even most, Jews in the Roman empire did keep kosher at least to the extent of avoiding pork, since the satirists mocked them for it. And that leads me to another idea why Paul abrogated the kashrut, Sabbath, and especially circumcisions laws: they were making it more difficult for Gentiles to “convert” to the worship of Jesus. So he had practical reasons in addition to the theological ones.
Sabbath, and especially circumcisions laws: they were making it more difficult for Gentiles to “convert” to the worship of Jesus. So he had practical reasons in addition to the theological ones….
Yes !!! I don’t even think he had any “theological” reason… only practical ones !!!
I subscribe to Paula Fredriksen’s argument that Paul did have theological reasons for insisting that Gentiles not “convert” to Judaism: his reasoning, she says, was based on passages in Isaiah that, in future days, all nations would come to worship God. In order for that prophecy to be fulfilled, the nations would have to do so AS nations, not as Jews.
But I also submit that, in addition to the theological reasoning, Paul had a practical reason: not requiring circumcision, etc., made Jesus more attractive to the Greek world.
Yes. I attended a church years ago where the pastor said many times that God placed things that he said on his heart to seemingly give his statements authority.
My thought on Paul is that as you say, he heard the Jesus message before he started his ministry. He seems to always had people working with him. My guess is that “his gospel” was a group effort rather than his alone.
But then to give it authority, he does not just say that it came from a divine source but he goes further and says that he had a vision of the Christ who personally gave him the message.
It seems that the Jews of Paul’s day had a difficult time believing him (just as many people today don’t believe a pastor who claims to receive messages from God).
Is this one of the issues that Jews had with Paul?
The message Paul is referring to that Christ gave to him is specifically the message that gentiles do not have to keep the law to have salvation thropugh Christ.
How would you explain Paul’s vision of Jesus? Epilepsy perhaps?
Yes. And most Jews took issue with that message, right?
My point is that I do not think that Paul came up with the message that gentiles do not have to keep the law to have salvation through Christ by himself. He found out about the Jesus movement Jews from others and he always had others working with him.
He claims that this message came from Christ to give it authority so that people will listen to him.
Most Jews of course didn’t think faith in Christ was at all plausible. But Jews among the followrs of Jesus broadly thought otherwise in Paul’s early years, at least.
I think some of Jesus’ closest followers had visions of him after his death. That is understandable considering they were traumatised by his crucifixion. What is less clear is the cause of Paul’s vision on the road to Damascus.
(Just joined the blog; sorry I’m late to the discussion)
Dr. Ehrman- How do you think we should best reconcile the way Paul’s relationship with the Mosaic law is portrayed in Acts 21 (ie. “..that all may know that those things of which they were informed concerning you are nothing, but that you yourself {ie. a Jew} also walk orderly and keep the law.) and the fact that in his own letters Paul seems to describes himself as no longer obligated to keep the Mosaic law- in spite of the fact that he was a Jew?
It seems as if James (in Acts 21) is so sure that Paul is and should still be living as a Jew, but Paul isn’t so sure….
Yes, this is one of those (big) points on which I think Luke is not accurate.
I know you’ve written about the discepancies between the way Luke quotes Paul’s teachings/speeches in Acts, and Paul’s teachings in his own letters. Does this mean that you consider the episode in Acts 21 completely contrived, or (just) inaccurately reported? I mean- do you think Paul in Jerusalem might have presented himself as “Torah abiding” to accommodate James and the others, while on his own mission abroad he was less committed?
I think it’s a Lukan portrayal of Paul (the faithful Jew to the end who never violated the law) that is not true to historical reality.
Why is there any contradiction between 1 Cor 15:3 where Paul lists the information he has received and Galatians 1, where he says that he received his gospel through a revelation of Jesus Christ, if he received information from several sources? If the disciples told Paul that they had seen the resurrected Jesus while Paul received “his gospel” directly from Jesus and received information from the scriptures that Jesus had sacrificed his life to atone for human sin and had fulfilled ancient prophesies, is this not compatible with both statements? If the disciples believed that any gentile who wanted to be a believer in Christ needed to become Jewish, how could they have accepted Paul’s gospel that Jesus’ death and resurrection brought salvation to all people?
I don’t think so. In 1 Cor 15 he is referring to the message of Jesus’ deah and resurrection; in Galatians when he refers to *my* Gospel he means the good news that Christ’s work brings salvation to both Jew and Gentile — the laatter without becoming Jews. THAT he got straight from Jesus. The other he had heard before he became a believers.
Hi Bart,
When Jesus talks about seeing the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven, do you think he meant that literally?
Thanks!
I sense so, but it’s impossible obviously to get into his mind to know.
Mr. Ehrman, if you lived in Paul’s time and you got to know him in person, what do you surmise (or maybe not surmise, you already know) would repel you most about him?
Probably the fact he hadn’t bathed in months, like just about everyone else in that world. Otherwise, probably his view about his own importance in the history of the world as the one predicted by the prophets as the climax of God’s plan of salvation.
Yes, these two sound pretty solid reasons!
“If following the law could bring about salvation, Christ would not have had to die”.
I guess the obvious rebuttal would be that following the law was not enough to bring salvation but it was taken for granted to be a necessary part of what was required.
I still don’t know how he could sell people on the idea that they had to believe something that was not readily apparent. And they had to believe not in a tentative way as lay people believe the claims of science but whole-heartedly and without reservation.
So, it wasn’t Paul who first came with the idea that Jesus’ death and resurrection brings salvation and takes away our sins? Then, who came with this idea and how did it originate?
No, he heard it before he converted — that’s why he was persecuting the Christians. I deal with your question at length in my book How Jesus Became God. It appears the disciples of Jesus came to this view just as soon as some of them said they had seen Jesus alive, and they “realized” he had been raised from the dead.
It seems to me that Paul’s initial vision of Jesus convinced him that Jesus really was the Messiah, but at that point he was persecuting Jews who believed in Jesus, not Gentiles, and it seems strange that he would jump from being a nonbelieving Jew to apostle to the Gentiles. I think he had later “revelations” (maybe just deep thoughts?) and that’s when his gospel to the Gentiles came to him; I think that subsequent revelation is what he refers to in Galatians 2:2. If only Paul had chronicled his journey in more detail!
My sense is that once he came to believe the death of the messiah is how God brought salvation, he realized nothing else would and that eliminated the need for Gentiles to keep the Law (as if that could help). He seems to tie this “revelation” to when he saw Jesus at his conversion in Gal 1. And yup, I’d love some more detail!
One thing that has struck me recently is just how convenient Paul’s message was — combining the attractiveness of joining an ancient faith, while taking away elements of the faith that made it so hard to gain converts (food laws, circumcision, etc.). Have scholars speculated at all that Paul’s motives were less than pure? It just sounds too neat and tidy that Jesus appeared to him and told him it was OK to remove the major impediments to gaining converts. Or am I just too cynical and not seeing evidence of Paul’s sincerity?
I’ve never heard a modern scholar speculate that but I’ve heard dozens of blog members do so!
Why do modern scholars not go in this direction? It seems to make sense. We would certainly would speculate that if someone today made claims similar to Paul’s.
Mainly because of close and careful reading of his letters simply doesn’t suggest that.
I find that the following suggests that Paul is inventing and misleading with what he says:
1. In order to give himself authority to be called an apostle, he invented his “vision” of Christ.
2. He consistently states that he is not lying indicating that others have accused him of lying.
3. His message changes throughout his writings.
4. When he states that he can be a Jew when with the Jews and a Gentile when with the Gentiles, I am sure the Jews found this to be hypocritical to say the least.
5. With Paul’s bragging in 2 Corinthians 11: 24-27, how is he still alive?!? I do not believe any of this. I think he is obviously lying to his audience.
6. His bragging of being of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews and a Pharisee cannot be verified by anyone who he is telling. He wouldn’t even know if he is of the tribe of Benjamin.
I am sure there is an explanation for all if these points that can be used to say that Paul is sincere, but I do not believe it.
I left out Paul claiming to be caught up to the third heaven (2 Corinthians 12: 1-4). How convenient that he cannot talk about what he saw! Mystic or not, wouldn’t you say that most people then and now would not believe someone who said this?
I’d say lots of people do believe others who say such things!
Haha! Yes they do. But my point is that “most” (I would say most) do not believe such things. When someone claims to have went to hell and back and then write a book, people will buy the book. But most people will know that the person is a fraud.
I think that a lot of Paul’s issues were due to people (a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles) not believing what he was saying, be it his message or the manner of which he claims to have gotten the message.
Didn’t Jesus’ disciples likely not believe that their risen Jesus appeared to Paul and gave him a different message to preach? Didn’t most Gentiles not believe that it made sense to give up all their other gods for Paul’s one?
Doesn’t it seem to be that Paul was not actually very successful with what he personally did in his lifetime? Maybe due to people not believing him?
We don’t know what the disciples actually thought — but Paul insists that he was not preaching a different message from them. He was arguing that the message they shared applied to gentiles as well as Jews and that they, in principle, agreed with him. But Paul appears to have been unusually successful; some of his churches appear to have become quite large even in his day (e.g., in Corinth) and he appear tohave planted a large nuumnber of them.
2 Questions for Professor Ehrman:
1. Is it possible and even likely that the Jerusalem apostles never subscribed to a substitutionary theory of atonement but rather believed –like the author of the gospel of Luke– that Jesus’ death drives people to repentance, and that it is this repentance that brings salvation (i.e. moral influence theory of atonement)?
2. If the Jerusalem apostles subscribed to a moral influence theory of atonement and Paul was the first apostle to subscribe to a substitutionary theory of atonement, wouldn’t this far more heretical theological “innovation” better explain why the Jerusalem apostles insisted on the need to keep the Law?
1. I’d certainly possible; since none of them left us any writings, I’d say it’s impossible to say. 2. I don’t think I see the logic in that really; if repentance is what was needed (as Jesus himself seems to indicate) then anyone could do that without being a Jew (as in Jesus’ parable of the sheep and the goats in Matthew 25).
The logic would be that, in the view of the Jerusalem apostles, atonement is achieved through repentance (regretting/acknowledging/confessing one’s sins and correcting them however possible) which must be followed by a new or renewed commitment to live immediately according to a radical ethic of inward and outward righteousness based on upholding the Mosaic Law (as in the story of Jesus and the rich young man).
In Galatians 2:6-10, Paul meets with James, Peter, and John. It certainly sounds like they agreed on the gospel.
Yet later in the same chapter (Galatians 2:14) , Paul very strongly rebukes Peter, because Peter was forcing gentiles to follow Jewish customs. (In order to be justified, I assume,) Apparently they were teaching completely different Gospels.
I don’t understand how to reconcile those two issues. Did they agree on the gospel or didn’t they?
That’s Paul’s point, actually. First Peter agreed with him and then we reneged on his agreement. That’s one of the reasons Paul considered him a “hypocrite”
In the last part of Galatians 2, do you think Peter is actually forcing the Gentiles follow Jewish customs in order to be *justified*? Or do you get the sense that Peter is concerned that he simply shouldn’t associate with Gentiles who don’t follow Jewish customs, for whatever reason… But not because following Jewish Customs has anything to do with justification?
I don’t think he was insisting the gentiles become Jews; but I do think he thought Jews could not have meals with gentiles, even if they were all followrs of Jesus. That’s what Paul objects to.
Seems you can divide a religion into two concepts
Who is God, or the alternative to God
What then to do about it
Someone in early Christianity decided God was Father and son
Paul then decided what to do about it
As I’ve heard of a Christian putting it, Jesus is God and Paul is His Messenger. When Christians decided he was the son of God exalted to His right hand, they decided the latest and greatest addition to the God pantheon (n=2) was the big deal that mattered most. Father God yes-he does all the creating and providing and stuff.
But LORD Jesus he does all the deciding what to do and not to do, and its through Him we are made right with God and not sentenced to damnation. Its through him the law of God Himself is abolished and replaced with faith in his sacrifice and revival.
In Galatians 2:1, Paul waits 14 years to talk with the Jerusalem apostles about the gospel message. He later rebukes Peter for forcing Gentile converts to follow Jewish customs.
Doesn’t that mean that for well over a decade, Peter and the Jerusalem apostles were teaching a false gospel? (Or at least a gospel that, according to Paul and to most Christians today, would be considered a false gospel?)
Wouldn’t that also mean that (* assuming* Jesus taught a gospel consistent with Paul’s gospel)… That Jesus did *not* have a talk with his disciples? (“Hey guys, when I die, I need you to teach converts that they don’t have to follow Jewish customs in order to be justified.”)
He actually doesn’t say that he went to learn from them the gospel they were preaching. He says he went to explain what *he* was preaching and they agreed with it. And I don’t think Jesus’ message *was* the same as Paul’s.
Dr Ehrman,
Wonderful post…thanks!
1. Was there ever an option for Gentiles, around Jesus time, to join the Jewish religion:
a. As complete converts?
c. As part-converts?
2. Was there ever a salvation plan in 1st Centaury Judaism for gentiles?
1. Yes, they could become Jewish by converting. And they could join Jews in worship without necessarly becoming Jews, but they would not be among the chosen ones. 2. Not a plan for “salvation” in the sense of devising a strategy to make it happen, no.
Interesting thoughts about the gospel revealed to Paul. I know the apparent conflict between Paul’s statements in 1 Corinthians 15 and Galatians 1 is one of the reasons that Robert M. Price has unconvincingly argued that 1 Cor. 15 is an interpolation.
Yeah, I suppose so. But there’s no contradiction. He inherited the view that Jesus’ death and resurrection would bring salvation, but when he says “my gospel” in Galatians he is referring to his “good news” that gentiles do not need to become Jews to receive that salvation (the letter clearly shows that’s what he means)
This is just a comment about Paul,
I have heard a remarkable note from Bart Ehrman, in one of his talks, that Christianity will progress to its current level regardless of Constantine involvement. I think this is logic: ‘European Paganism’ does not have a chance with Christianity, as it lacks the spiritual dimension which is evident in Christianity.
Equally, I think that Christianity will progress to its current level regardless of Paul involvement. Paul did not create Christianity, and the Greek started to form Churches in their land before Paul, including the church of Rome. Furthermore, I really don’t think Paul could have a chance with ”James the Just”, as people would refer to Paul as the man who saw Jesus in a dream, while they will always refer to James as “the brother of Jesus”. I would assume that Paul was desperate in his last visit to Jerusalem to make amends with James, but he failed.
To continue in the next comment.
Following from previous comment:
I also would assume that Christianity would not have separated from Judaism if it wasn’t for the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD. This act destroyed the “central recognized authority” of the follower of Jesus. This allowed the Greek churches to be independent.
In general (though not an exact principle), a religion without centralized authority will tend toward liberalism, and in Christianity’s case, churches started to move toward liberalism from the law of Moses. At this specific time, the letters of Paul became useful because it provided the arguments to justify the new movement. But even if Paul did not exist, the new movement will invent similar arguments.
I think there are two motivations that need to be considered when analyzing the early history of Christianity after 70 AD to 330 AD: 1# the liberal movement toward the law of Moses. This movement had put high emphases on faith rather than deeds, which is the mark of liberalism toward all religions. 2# the Greek philosophy which seems it was embraced by many of the first fathers of Christianity, which at the end invented the principle of Trinity.
Interesting point about the Temple! I haven’t thought that.
Thank you for a brilliant post! I’ve read Paul as well as many of your comments about Paul’s message. This is the clearest statement of Paul’s message that I’ve ever seen.
Yes, I’m not clear what Paul thinks will happen to all those not reached by the gospel.
I know that all will be judged, quick and dead, but then is it only those who had faithfulness who get the new uncorruptible bodies, and assist Jesus in running the new kingdom?
Jesus himself thought the twelve disciples would be the ones who helped him run the kingdom. Paul doesn’t talk abuot that specific issue, but he does think that only those who have been raised in Christ at the resurrection will be saved from the destruction that is coming.
With what we know today about hallucinations and delusions, many would see certain behaviors of people in the first and second centuries in the light of modern science, and therefore argue that Paul was having a delusional episode on the road to Damascus. Similar to the idea that ” demon possession ” is understood as a form of psychosis and/or schizophrenia. Actually, much of the miraculous reportings along with personal revelations can be seen in much the same way. Perhaps Paul was simply mentally ill. Many mentally ill folks are also quite brilliant……. I know, such heresy !!
Dr. Ehrman – Have you read “Paul and Jesus” by Pauline scholar Dr. James D. Tabor?
Dr. Tabor postulates that Paul’s own letters state that Paul had distanced himself from the Jerusalem Nazarene leaders James ‘the Just’ and Peter and had received his own special ‘Gospel’ directly from the risen spiritual Jesus through decades of personal revelations.
The book also makes the claim that if the above is true then the four Gospels of the New Testament followed the theology primarily derived from one original source: Paul.
This would make Paul the ‘Joseph Smith’ of today’s Christianity.
Yes, James is an old friend and a member of the blog — and has guest posted several times (and may be doing another guest post soon). My own view is that we don’t have good evidence of large numbers of revelations to Paul over the years, but it’s certainly possible. I don’t, though, think that the Gospel writers got their theology from Paul. I don’t see any convincing evidence that they had *read* any of Paul’s letters — even Luke, whose hero is Paul but, even so, has a contrary view of whether Jesus’ death was an atonement for sins.
In his ‘Paul and Jesus’ book, Dr. Tabor addressed whether or not Jesus was brought down from the cross.
If I’m not mistaken in your earlier writings you had described your research on crucifixion noting that you only found one instance where someone was taken down from a cross. Your research showed that allowing the body to ‘rot’ on the cross to be degraded by scavengers was part of the punishment and Pilot was not a man to give any care about Jewish burial laws. (Sorry, I’m paraphrasing here.)
However, Dr. Tabor quoted Josephus:
” Nay, they proceeded to that degree of impiety, as to cast away their dead bodies without burial, although the Jews used to take so much care of the burial of men, that they took down those that were condemned and crucified, and buried them before the going down of the sun.”
This may contradict what I believe was your position on this matter. Did I misunderstand your writing on this subject?
You understood me correctly. I discussed the Josephus passage on the blog at some length; if you look up “empty tomb” you’ll see the posts.
Do you believe that James’ (Jesus’ brother) epistle in the New Testament is directed against Paul, who cared less about people doing good works d than about whether they believed Jesus was resurrected?
I imagine I’ve posted on this before. MY view is that hte letter was not actually written by Jesus’ brother (I explain why in my book Forged, and a detailed analysis in my book Forgery and Counterforgery) and that the author is not attacking Paul but later Pauline Christians (such as the author of Ephesians) who took Paul’s teaching of faith apart from the works of the law in a directdion Paul himself never intended.
Thank you.
I did wonder why, if it was standard practice for the Jews to take down crucified criminals bodies before sundown, then what was the point of Joseph of Arimathea going to Pilot to ask for Jesus’ body?
/ delete the following line… Thank you Bart for all of your books. They are part of my ‘therapy’ and Christian de-programming. You along with Carl Sagan, James Randi, and Noam Chomsky are my modern intellectual heroes. 😀
Yup, the point is to allow Jesus to be buried on that day so his body could be discovered three days later. But it’s historically implausible.
Paul has more fellow visionaries than Yahweh’s wrath had victims.
Countless people have made similar claims throughout all of history and all around the world — from the pythias in Greece (the future) and Lot’s family in Israel (a trio of angels) two millennia before Paul, to a trio of Catholic kids in Portugal (the BVM) and a Kool-aid dispensing, cult leader in Guyana who saw (God-knows-what) two millennia after.
Such claims — nowadays, at least — elicit more skepticism than belief. Yet Paul’s alleged vision of the risen Jesus assigning HIM the mission of “Apostle to the Gentiles” over anyone he ever knew (including his designated successor, his “beloved disciple,” and his own brother!) is ingenuously accorded unquestioned acceptance?
No one has the slightest doubt about these claims? Neither Paul’s identification of an ethereal presence as the risen Jesus, whom he never previously met and despite contradictions in the accounts of the experience, nor the confrontations he had over what Jesus taught with the actual disciples (who ought to know), without so much as a raised eyebrow?
“Paul’s Innovation” undoubtedly saved the early Christian movement — by throwing Jesus and his message of salvation under the Holy Land tour bus!
Paul had one, rather significant obstacle to his “mission that the Gentiles would be brought into the fold” — Jesus.
A salvation that “comes only through faith in the death and resurrection of God’s messiah” has to get around the fact that this messiah — throughout his entire ministry — cited gentiles as, at best, negative examples (Mt 5:47 and Mt 6:7 and Mt 6:32 and Mk 10:42//Mt 20:25//Lk 22:25), if not the enemy (Mt 10:18 and Mk 10:33//Mt 20:19//Lk 18:32 and Lk 21:24.)
While Jesus did sometimes help and even praise gentiles individually, e.g., the Centurion (Mt 8:5-13//Lk 7:1-10) and the Syro-Phoenician woman (Mk 7:24-30//Mt 15:21-28), it was only after THEY approached him — and he took the opportunity to make the faith of a pagan into an object lesson for his fellow Jews (on the latter occasion initially rejecting the request and actually comparing his importuner to a dog BECAUSE she was a gentile!)
If it is “only the death and resurrection of Jesus that makes a person right with God,” how could that not make Jesus WRONG when he said that one can “inherit eternal life” by following the commandments, loving God and neighbor, etc.?
“But wait… there’s more!” 😉
It is incumbent upon a putative “Apostle to the Gentiles” to explain how it could be that the corporeal Jesus was crystal clear about having been “sent ONLY to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Mt 15:24) — and why he EXPLICITLY instructed his disciples that they should, likewise, limit themselves to that same mission and “go nowhere among the Gentiles” (Mt 10:5).
While “It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs” (Mk 7:27//Mt 15:26) because you “do not give dogs what is holy,” neither should you “throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot and turn to attack you.” (Mt 7:6//Th 93)
It’s no surprise the man who only had a vision of Jesus before appointing himself an apostle for the messiah he never met ran into some issues with “the Jerusalem apostles, who were made up of Jesus’ disciples and his brother James” since they had actually KNOWN the living, breathing, walking and talking Jesus during his life — and KNEW what he said!
Should Peter & Co. have been grateful that Paul at least allowed for the possibility that “Jews TOO could be among the people of God”? 😯
There’s no question that Paul’s Innovation was a stroke of genius. For overcoming the obstacles to growing the Christian movement “Substitutionary Atonement” was six different kinds of ingenious!
1. It rendered moot the weird and onerous demands of the Jewish “Law.” No more endless, ritual ablutions or strange, dietary restrictions or — especially — deal-breaker circumcision.
2. It replaced the quixotic, incredibly austere, vagabond lifestyle that Jesus preached as the way to inherit eternal life. If salvation comes solely from belief in what Jesus DID, it doesn’t matter what you DO. Relax, eat, drink and be merry for on the night your soul is required of you you’ll already have a Pearly Gate pass in hand. We can play the game of life any way we want because the horrifying death of Jesus got us all a “Get Out of Hell Free” card!
3. It resolved the conundrum — for Jew and pagan alike — of how it could be that the “Father” of whom Jesus had spoken so frequently and rapturously condemned his own “Son” (to which subsequent church doctrine would eventually add “ONLY”) to so gruesome a fate.
But hang onto your yarmulke…
4. It removed the “stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles” of the Messiah having been an uneducated, unconnected, peasant rabbi from the Galilean hinterlands who was ignominiously executed by the Roman governor. Spiritual, rather than temporal, salvation made expectations of a conquering king or divinely empowered High Priest to free God’s Chosen People from foreign occupation into a mere misconstrual of prophecy.
5. It recast the Messiah as a blood sacrifice Yahweh made to himself to finally settle the grudge he had harbored against all the generations of mankind ever since the Garden of Eden. Although Jesus was “one who hangs on a tree,” he was NOT thereby “cursed by God” because this had been Yahweh’s plan for his Son all along. Only a human sacrifice could sate his thirst for vengeance at the insolence of the first human.
6. It made the Father’s “sacrificial lamb” HIS OWN SON — an exquisitely spot-on homage to the Father of Jewish race, transforming the venerable story about the Jewish patriarch into a prophetic parallel.
Rebranding the Christ as “the Son of God who died for the sins of the world” was probably the greatest masterpiece of marketing in all history.
Bonus Benefit.
Paul probably didn’t survive to see this one. But if he was right about Jesus being the once-and-for-all sacrifice that finally satisfied the bloodlust of the vengeful, grudge-harboring Yahweh, the Temple became moot.
It didn’t matter that in the 70 CE sacking of Jerusalem the Roman forces also reduced the Temple to a single wall, leaving the erstwhile, animal sacrifice cult of the Jewish God nothing more than a place where his Chosen People could wail over their travails.
Part of the Good News is that it ended the need for any more ritual sacrifices (which must have been especially well-received by a whole lot of Palestinian sheep and pigeons. 😉)
I’d like to take a moment to juxtapose Paul’s view of how Jesus’ death and resurrection makes salvation possible with Luke’s view of it as an occasion for repentence.
One question worth asking is whether Luke’s view could have possibly made sense to the earliest believers, and if not, why not. (Suggestions: Too much of a leap from established Messianic expectations? Too dependent on Greek rather than Jewish ways of thinking in some way? Fails to reckon with the fact that people already repent and have no shortage of occasions to do so?)
Then again, Paul’s view didn’t make sense to most people, either.
Another question worth asking is how the two views differ in their practical implications. For example, take Paul’s view that a Gentile choosing to follow the Jewish law places their salvation in jeopardy. Paul’s reasoning rests upon his particular understanding of the link between faith and salvation, and would seem not to apply for Luke.
Interested in your thoughts.
1. My sense is that Luke’s views simply would not have occurred to anyone at first; they were trying to understand the significance of God requiring his messiah to die, and sacrifice is just what occurred to them. 2. I shouldl think Paul could have applied Luke’s view of forgiveness and still insisted that gentiles could be equal with Jews.
I agree that Luke’s view is harmonious with gentiles being equal with Jews. But I don’t think it’s harmonious with the idea that Gentiles not only need not, but must not follow the Law.