Loading...In my graduate seminar this semester we had an interesting and intense discussion about Paul and Jesus. In particular, we delved into the issue of what Paul knew about the historical Jesus and whether he knew more than he said and if so why he didn’t say more and if not how that could be.
In an earlier iteration of my undergraduate Introduction to the NT class, this was what I had my students debate. I never could figure out a good way to word the resolution, but most of the time I gave it as this: “Resolved: Paul Knew Next To Nothing About the Historical Jesus.” The problem with that resolution is that it asserts a negative, so that the affirmative team is arguing for a negative resolution. Not good. But I couldn’t come up with anything I liked better, and so went with it.
Most students are surprised to find that if they simply make a list of what Paul says about Jesus between the time of his birth and the time of his death, they don’t need much more than a 3×5 card.
I discussed this issue some years ago on the blog. It’s one I think about a lot, so here I will deal with the whole thing again. I’ll devote a couple of posts to what it is Paul says about the historical Jesus, and then a couple others to the question of why he doesn’t say more.
I have taken the following discussion from my book Did Jesus Exist. So, what does Paul tell us about the historical man Jesus?
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First, Paul indicates unequivocally that
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Dr. Ehrman,
If Paul says Jesus came to save Jews, why did’nt Paul either stick to that plan or tell us that when Jesus appeared to Paul, Jesus changed his position and wanted gentiles to be saved as well. It seems Paul was making some pretty big changes on his own authority.
Paul doesn’t think that God did change the plan. THe salvation of gentiles had been the plan all along. Jesus was the beginning of the fulfillment of the plan (for Paul).
Oh Jesus,
“First, Paul indicates unequivocally that Jesus really was born, as a human, and that in his human existence he was a Jew. This he states in Galatians 4:4: “But when the fullness of time came, God sent his son, born from a woman”
Does that sound like Jesus was unequivocally human (rhetorical). You are now a Skeptic, right. Why are the only choices you either believe or don’t believe Paul. Try collecting on life insurance with that:
Given name? ___
Mother? ___
Father? God
Age? ___
Location of body? ___
Cause of death? ___
Date of birth? ___
https://thenewporphyry.blogspot.com/
When Dr. Ehrman says that Paul claims Jesus was born as a human, he is not only repeating what Paul says (Jesus was “born of a woman”) but he is also saying something Christianity teaches: that Jesus was fully human. That’s the orthodox Christian view, that Jesus was unequivocally human (and also unequivocally divine). In your attempt to criticize Ehrman, you appear to be objecting to Christian doctrine.
I’ve often wondered if Paul was at all aware of the virgin-birth-of-Jesus tradition. Perhaps he’d heard about it but rejected it. Perhaps it was a later development. (It’s not in Mark, right?) Galatians 4:4 could, I suppose, be read as a subtle affirmation of the tradition. Any thoughts?
My sense is that if Paul thought Jesus was born of a virgin he would have said it. It’s almost certainly an idea he had never heard of.
> My sense is that if Paul thought Jesus was born of a virgin he would have said it. It’s almost certainly an idea he had never heard of.
Nor, I imagine, would have Jesus during his lifetime. I don’t think the historical Jesus would recognize much of what Christianity became.
From where/whom did Paul derive his authority. Were people following paul like a current day evangelist??
His authority comes directly from his vision of Christ who gave him his Gospel (unlike modern evangelists who based their authority, as a rule, on biblical writings)
What do you make of Romans 1:3, where Paul refers to Jesus as “the seed (spermatos) of David by way of the flesh”?
I think that is an earlier creedal statement that Paul has taken over that portrays Jesus as a direct descendant of DAvid. It’s interesityng Paul never says so, but he certainly thinks Jesus was the messiah and so probably had no trouble imagining he was from DAvid’s line. Whether Rome 1:3 proves Paul did not believe in a virgin birth … I don’t know. Plenty of Xns accept Rom. 1:3 and think Jesus was born of a virgin…
Is a third option that Judas was replaced? Isn’t there a tradition in Acts that Judas was replaced by someone? What are your thoughts about that option?
Yes that happens in Acts 1. But it’s only after Jesus has appeared to teh apostles and returned to heaven.
Bart, do you think Paul’s Jesus needed to be born of a virgin?
Thanks,
Jerry
Nope, not at all.
Those of the Richard Carrier School of Mythicism will insist that we can’t say Paul is referring to the twelve “disciples” because he never uses the word “disciples” in his epistles. Is this fair? Is it presumptuous to import the Gospels’s understanding of “the twelve” as “disciples” into Paul’s epistles? Or is Carrier (as I believe) taking the caution of not reading the Gospels into Paul to a methodologically artifical extreme?
One of the main reasons I find dealing with Carrier so tedious is that he makes arguments that don’t work but it takes a lot of work to show why they don’t work; but it’s almost always easily shown if you do the work. But why do all the work when anyone who can use a Greek lexicon can see what the problem is after three minutes of work? Yes, the word “disciples” does not occur in Paul’s epistles. Or in any other book outside of the Gospels and Acts — that is, only teh books of the Gospel writers who discuss the twelve men who were chosen by Jesus to be his disciples. The term disciple did not function in the early church. What Carrier apparently has NOT pointed out is that “the twelve” is a *synonymn” for those particular disciples in teh Gospels. The term used again and again is simply “the twelve.” It is NOT “the twelve disciples.” Paul too uses precisely this term that is used abundantly in the Gospels, “the twelve.” IT’s code langauge. He ain’t talkin’ about The Twelve Eggs.
I thought that the Twelve were Christ’s Apostles, and that the term Disciple simply referred to his devout followers ( perhaps hundreds or more) in general.
It depends how one uses the words. But usually “the” disciples refers to the twelve followrs of Jesus during his lifetime (the twelve men he chose). The term “apostle” means “one who has been sent” and it is used to refer to those to whom Christ appeared after his death to commission them to spread the Gospel. In this casee there is no set number, but in the New Testament they include the eleven (after Judas’s death), Paul, Barnabas, Junia and Adronicas (both from Romans 16:7), and presumably others.
Why did the Romans not write more about Jesus at the time?
As far as I know, Josephus, Suetonius, and Tacitus mention the Christians, the followers of Christ. If Jesus was as remarkable a man as people think now, some historians would probably have written about him at the time. Were there historians, contemporaneous with Jesus, who you think might have written about Jesus if he had been as extraordinary as people say?
That is, were there historians who wrote about Roman Judea during Jesus’ time? If such writers existed but omitted to mention Jesus in their accounts, it suggests that Jesus was not remarkable, but rather an ordinary ‘messiah’ of the times.
It’s a great question, much mulled over. I think the answer is almost certainly that Jesus made almost no impact on events in his own day, however important he became afterward.
Is this why I heard you say somewhere (maybe a debate) you didn’t think he drew “massive crowds”?
Yes, it’s related. No huge crowd, no large impact.
Prof Ehrman with regards to the gospel of Q, how much of Q do you think didn’t make it into Matthew and Luke and is forever lost to history? And why do you think Paul never seems to mention the gospel of Q even though it was written around the time Paul was active?
It’s an imporant question and in my opinion it is impossible to know what was left out or how much material it acontanined. I don’t know if it was around when Paul was writing or not. If it was, there’d be no reason to suspect it would be in any of the communities he spent time with, since his communities were ones he was starting or had started, and Q would have been produced in a different community.
Is there anyone who thinks the gospel of Matthew mentioned by the early church fathers as a “sayings gospel” is Q?
Yes, some have suggested that. But Q had to be written in Greek; otherwise the agreements of Matthew and Luke could not be verbatim.
How is Q dated and how do we know Q was not being produced from Paul’s communities?
1. All we know is that it is earlier than Matthew and Luke 2. We don’t know that, but there’s never been any reason for thinking it *was* fro mone of his communities, especially since he himself does not seem to know the sayings of Jesus.
Why is the Book of Mark said to have been written after the fall of the temple?
I have read that the following line is used to infer that the temple would have been destroyed at the time of writing:
‘Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.’
Why? Would not a person cognizant of the political atmosphere at the time have made a similar statement as a warning of what might happen if war broke out between the Jews and the Romans?
Yes, I think the historical Jesus probably did predict that the temple was going to be destroyed, that he saw the hand writing on the wall. The arguments tend to involve teh specificity of Mark’s description in Mark 13 and the suspicion that he had some knowledge of what had already taken place.
One must wonder if Mark wrote to counter Paul’s version?
It’s possible. He certainly emphasizes other things than Paul. On the other hand many of his theological views about Jesus’ death and teh means of savlation are similar, so it’s hard to know if he was countering Paul or complementing him or if, rather, he was just doin’ his own thing. I tend to think the latter.
Acts 5: 38, 38 Gamallel apparently knew Jesus, how much do we know about Pauls Teacher ?
I don’t think Acts 5 can be accurate on this point. Luke wants to portray Paul as exteremly well trained in Jersualem, but Paul himself shows almost no evidence of even knowing Hebrew, let alone having studied with one fo the greatest rabbis of the day.
I’m not sure that Acts 5 necessarily shows that Gamaliel *knew* of Jesus outside of the hearing that was being conducted before the Sanhedrin. I think it’s just as likely that Gamaliel showed up at the meeting and heard complaints about yet another self-described prophet whipping up crowds..
Gamaliel’s answer might have been just his standard policy about such matters: “Well, we’ve seen this before. When their leader is out of the picture, these groups dry up and go away. If this one doesn’t, then who knows? Maybe he really was a prophet.”
Two questions:
1. Is it possible that Jesus really was a decendent of David
and that this could be the reason he thought of himself as special and someone
who has the right to gather the future 12 rulers of Gods kingdom?
2. When Paul says “as do the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord” is it really
plural brothers? I hadn’t noticied that before. Does that mean that at least one
other brother besides James was also a follower of his brother Jesus?
It’s certainly possible, but there’s no way anyone wold have have been able to know (they didn’t keep records) 2. Yup, plural! And yup, that appears to be what it means.
By that logic, couldn’t you argue that Cephas and James (Jesus’s brother) were not apostles?
I believe that Jesus had brothers, but it seems to me that any way you parse it, this statement does not make complete sense. I think Paul just had trouble expressing his thought.
Sorry, I don’t see how the logic applies that way. ONly some Christians were apostles and only some people were Jesus’ brothers. Cephas is an interesting case. I think I use this in my article on Cephas and Peter to argue that Cephas was not an apostle.
If Paul spent fifteen days with Cephas and James, it’s at least reasonable to suppose that those two talked about Jesus and their experiences with him. In that case, nothing they told Paul registered with him as anything important or worth mentioning. Or, they talked about something else. Or, even to James and Cephas the historical Jesus was irrelevant. Or, Paul assumed that details of the actual life of Jesus were common knowledge and it would be redundant to speak of such things. Or, Paul actually did lie, and simply made the claim of this meeting in order to bolster his creds. It does seem odd that he would feel a need to insist that he did not lie. Did Paul have a reputation as one who could not be trusted to tell the truth? If not, then why does he insist that he is telling the truth? Every one of these alternatives is problematic.
When reading Paul, I get the sense that he did in fact know a good amount of Jesus’ teachings as he is able to quote them when he wants. Divorce for example. It seems most of the time he just doesn’t need to bring up Jesus’ teachings as they don’t relate to whatever he is addressing in his letter. I imagine when he was actually out there evangelizing in person and trying to convince pagans to believe in the Jewish God and of the good news of the kingdom of God, which Paul does reference, he would’ve brought up Jesus’ teachings.
Could it be that Paul in his dispute over Jesus’ message with James rarely talked about Jesus’ life because much of what he heard did not support his gospel? His opponents would have correctly pointed out that Paul never even met Jesus so how could he know Jesus’ message better than Jesus’ disciples who spent so much time with him? So Paul emphasized his encounter with the risen Christ and the gospel given to him by Christ as his authority. He centralizes his message around Jesus’ death and resurrection rather than anything that Jesus said or done while he was alive. Does that sound plausible?
I’d say the very few of the recorded sayings of Jesus could be used to counter Paul’s preaching directly.
You say – ‘we delved into the issue of what Paul knew about the historical Jesus and whether he knew more than he said and if so why he didn’t say more and if not how that could be.’
Clearly historians can only go on the evidence, but is it not a reasonable assumption that, if he was with Peter for 15 days, besides being there to confirm his gospel, that they would have discussed Peter’s experiences with Jesus at some point?
Yup, that would be reasonable. And then the question re-arises: why then doesn’t he say much at all about what he knew? It’s not an easy question to answer. Every answer is problematic.
Dear Sir: I am a new subscriber and I have 2 question
1) according to what mentioned above, how do you interpret what comes in 2 Cor 5: 16 (we once knew Christ from a human point of view)?
2) Paul was jew. but is this statement is correct? : Paul is the inventor of Gentile Christianity.
with all my regards
1. It’s debated, but these days it is usually meant that he knew Christ from his own human perspective before he converted.
2. Yes he was definitly a Jew, but was a Jew who realized that the Jewish messiah was the savior of Gentiles.
How do we understand Paul’s very next verse, namely First Corinthians 15:6, about the Resurrected Jesus appearing to 500 people when the Gospels make no mention of such an event? One would think that such an event would have been significant enough to appear in the Gospels. Thanks
It certainly seems so. It’s hard to explain where Paul got that idea from and why no one else mentions it. Maybe it was a false memory of what he heard!
I still wonder if the Jewish leaders handed Jesus over to the Romans, this became the Jews “betrayed” Jesus to the Romans, then it eventually became a disciple named “Judas,” which basically means “Jew,” betrayed him. Perhaps Mark developed the story to emphasize how poorly the disciples understood Jesus, that one even betrayed him. The gospel writers add the part about Judas loving money and accepting silver as part of their anti-Semitic theme, a stereotype that unfortunately has carried down to our own day. This would explain why Paul does not seem to know about Judas, and why Luke and Matthew came up with different stories of his death, because there was no historical story to pass on (like their Jesus birth stories). It’s possible there was a disciple named Judas who betrayed Jesus for money, but the story as told sure seems to fit the Gospel authors’ agenda rather closely, and our earliest author Paul shows no knowledge of it.
John Spong proposes that the character Judas is based on the OT character Ahithophel who betrayed King David (II Sam 15:12 – 17:23).
or better yet, a compilation of OT traitor story details, for example Zech 11:12, 13 for 30 pieces of silver, David’s captain Joab betrays his replacement Amasa with a kiss of friendship.
That’s an interesting thought. But I think having a traitor in the group is a common theme in story telling, so the Ahithophel and Judas stories may just be following a common literary trope rather than one being based on the other, but still worth considering, especially since Ahithophel betrayed David and Jesus was thought of as the Son of David.
I am almost sure you have stated before that on that 3X5 card the students would note that Paul knew Jesus was betrayed one night after a ‘Last Supper’ (1 Corinthians 11:23-29). Noted: He doesn’t say Judas did it for 12 pieces of silver, he never mentions Judas. Still, would you then mind expanding a bit on this as time allows:
“The fact that Paul speaks of “the twelve” as having seen Jesus at the resurrection either means that he does not know the stories about Judas (as was possibly true of Mark and John as well) or, as I have suggested, that the name “the twelve” was attached to this group as a group ….”
What would the idea be? Paul could be referring to someone else, other than Judas, betraying him? Corinthians is referring to another type of “betrayal”? I can’t make sense of the idea, but then I don’t study the original texts.
No, I don’t think the betrayal by Judas would be on the 3×5 card. I may have thought that many years ago, probably did. But there are powerful reasons for not thinking so, the main one of which is that 1 Cor. 11:22 does not use the standard word for “betray” but “handed over,” (on the night he was handed over): elsehwere Paul uses the word to refer to GOD handing Jesus over to his fate, and that’s probably what he means there.
Dr. BDE, how is it that none of the canonical gospels indicate that Jesus’ brothers were followers of Jesus and Mark says Jesus’ mother and brothers thought Jesus had gone nuts and wanted to put him away, yet in Acts it says that his brothers had joined the Jesus cult after the untimely and somewhat unexpected passing of Jesus. In fact, Paul and Acts suggest that brother James became a leading figure in the Jesus cult after Jesus passed. Why would the closest followers of Jesus embrace James as a leader of their cult when James seemed to have no interest in the ministry of Jesus when Jesus was preaching?
The assumption seems to be that they converted after his death to believe in his resurrection. I wold LOVE to know what really happened….
Apparently most Europeans alive today are a descendant of Charlemagne.
It’s possible that most Jews born in 1st century palestine were a descendant of David – but with no way to recreate a genealogy.
Would you say that not only does Paul not know much about Jesus but he also believes what he received from the Christ has more authority than what the twelve learned directly from Jesus?
Yes, he thinks his view is definitive — read Galatians 1: his view is more authoriative than any angel’s!
Since Paul did not really have a visit from or was taught by “Christ,” do you think Paul was taught his ideas from other people he knew in Damascus? Or received the ideas during his extended time in Arabia?
He certainly had heard things about Jesus from others (which would be why he was persecuting them). But the “revelation” he claimed to have was somethign that came into his head and not others.
Was the “revelation” mainly that Jesus also died to save the Gentiles?
YEs, that’s a big part of it; the other part is essential too though: Gentiles who accepted his salvation did *not* have to become Jews. That was the sticking point with other ealry Xn leaders.
As far we know, did all other Jews before Paul think that Gentiles had to become Jews first?
Yup.
I think Jesus was a Son of David through Joseph and Mary both. I’ve seen a family tree that seemed to make sense, although it’s probably not entirely from scripture. Jusef bar Jacob + Mary of Joachim. Josephus I think mentions Jusef bar Jacob as the Mater Builder of the Temple under Herod, which might fit with Joseph the Carpenter. Mary’s property might have been not only the house where St. Anne’s church is today, up at the sheep’s gate (NE gate of the Temple), but also the shepherding land at Bethlehem where David grazed his flocks. As I remember Joachim owned not only sheep but donkeys and cattle, or oxen probably, as a business. The sheep sacrificed in the Temple had to be free range under the stars for 365 days to be a pure sacrifice and also descended from David’s original flock. Possibly Mary’s family was supplying the Temple with sheep in Jesus’ generation. I think Jesus was the rightful King, the Messiah, of Israel. Messiah means anointed king. Jesus might have been born too on Mary’s property, i.e. Bethlehem, and related somewhat to the shepherds there.
I have never thought about it before, but why did he only see Cephas and James during those 15 days? Were they isolating Paul for fear that he might corrupt other Christians with bad doctrine?
Did the agree that he could preach to the Gentiles thinking that he would little success or that some of the pagans might kill him?
Maybe because of Covid? OK, seriously, I have no idea and have often wondered too….
We don’t know why they agreed or really much about what they actually discussed. Wish we did….
Dear Dr. Ehrman,
I have read most of your books and listened to most of your Great Courses lectures. I see that you now have a new course on sale titled “The Triumph of Christianity.” Am I likely to get much new material from that course that I haven’t already seen in your books or heard on previous Great Courses lectures?
Many thanks,
Phil Kershner
It’s all new! Well, nearly all.
Many scholars contend, 6 of the 13 epistles of Paul are written by others and after Pauls death. Why do so many (often the same) scholars refer to them when discussing the theology of Paul?
Most scholars stick to just the 7, unless they really think Paul wrote the others. Which scholars are you thinking of?
What about Paul’s ethical exhortations in Romans? For example Romans 2:1 (don’t judge others), Romans 12:14-17 (bless those who persecute you, weep with those who weep, repay no evil for evil). These sound a lot like sayings of Jesus from Q. Also in 13:7 telling people give whatever is owed sounds like “give to Caesar what is Caesar’s”. It almost seems like much of Romans 12 and 13 are drawn from teachings of Jesus that Paul was aware of. How come these ones are not also considered as possibly coming Jesus? Thank you.
Yes, there are a lot of sayings of Paul that sound like things Jesus said. The question is whether he knew Jesus said them, and how you can know. Lots of Christians would have been saying these things and Paul could have heard them from any of them.
Regarding the 1 Corinthians passage, it strikes me that, while I think your conclusion about the meaning of “brothers” is correct (simply because there is no modifier such as “in the spirit” or any contextual cause to differentiate the word from its ordinary meaning), I think the argument you use is weak. If we are to object to a meaning of “spiritual brothers” on the grounds that it seems to be distinguished from “apostles” (which would be a subset of brothers, in that sense), what are we to make of the similar specific mention of Cephas? Is he not also an apostle? Or is there some subtle nuance in the Greek (of which I know nothing) that makes this a non-issue?
I”m still not following your logic!
Isn’t the Christianity that endured (the Orthodox ideas) based mostly on Paul? The Synoptic Gospels seem to be read (were always read?) by believers through the lens of Paul’s ideas, allowing the Gospel of John precedence. I would say that John sounds like Paul.
The idea that Jesus was the head of an apocalyptic sect probably means he didn’t intend to establish anything enduring and those left behind at his death were on their own. Paul, being the most charismatic and willing to expand, pulled together a believe system that worked for others in the Hellenistic world in the wake of the missing Jewish messiah.
Can Christianity be seen as an atonement by Paul for the evils he allegedly inflicted on Jesus’s followers upon Jesus’s death? Some psychological transformation (and I don’t think it was an actual visitation) caused Paul to change from persecutor to proselytizer. It is tempting to wonder if Paul didn’t inflict the ultimate evil by erasing the religion of Jesus and replacing it with his own.
Do scholars have an idea who it was that Saul/Paul said he persecuted, if indeed such events are believed to have happened? Did early church “fathers” seem to know who the historical Paul was, that he actually existed?
What would have been the beliefs that so offended the Jew Saul? What authority do scholars think Paul had to inflict pain on Jesus’s followers?
We often talk about the historical Jesus . . . what do we know about the historical Saul/Paul (Robert Eisenmen not withstanding)?
Is all we know about Paul from Paul’s own writings or from Luke/Acts? Is there any historical/archaeological evidence for the churches Paul allegedly founded and wrote letters to?
We know a good bit about Paul; I lay out the most important points in my six chapters on him in Peter, Paul, and Mary. He almost certainly persecuted Christians, and it was almost certainy because they were saying that a crucified man was God’s messiah; He probably didn’t have any “authority” for his persecution. As far as we can tell, he was taking Christian preachers out back and beating them up. And no, there’s no archaeological evidence for Paul, Jesus, or, well, 99.999% of the people who lived at their time! Ugh!
“As far as we can tell, he was taking Christian preachers out back and beating them up.”
If this is the case, and the Christian preachers had the ability to do so, wouldn’t we think that they would fight back and beat Paul up?
I thought all Paul could do was encourage the synagogue leaders to flog the Christian preachers that he disagreed with? That Paul was not actually the one administering the persecution?
Yup, they may well have done. His other enemies did later. No, there’s nothing about Paul urging synagogue leaders to flog others, either in his own letters or Acts.
I’d say Paul was very important, but so were lots of other figures — the writers of the Synoptics, and of John, etc. The very big problem is that we have such sparse records of the early years — who were the other missionaries, e.g., and what did they think and teach?
The author of Paul’s letters was not so brazen as to point to the concrete historical contact of the imaginary figure of Paul with earthly Jesus. His hero experienced the revelation, just as Ptolemy had a dream of Serapis. Isn’t it elegant? Even though these made up stories about the historical Jesus were on the market, he decided to cut himself off from them. At the most, it turns out that this stories is lame and Paweł’s vision will not lose its beauty.
The author of Paul’s letters was skeptical about the earthly Jesus because it was so safe for his work. He saw no need to jeopardize the letters by tying them tightly to someone else’s stories. Nothing unusual. The market potential of the gospel was not yet apparent, and it came from the popular imagination and religiosity alien to his sophistication. Cheeky gossip sold to the little ones by the smarts.
PS. The same was experienced by Islam in its early development – the mass production of Muhammad’s alleged adventures. Unfortunately, he was wrong. The Gospels proved to be an effective weapon of mass destruction, even though they were not authoritative yet for Justin Martyr.
I would like to make a simple statement about this blog. The dialogue is interesting and informative. It is a learning experience for me. How many blogs can say that?
Thanks!
Yes, there IS A LOT new in Bart’s new course on GCPLUS.
What’s common to Paul and Jesus is that establishment wanted to kill both. General public on their own lifetime must have understood their message very differently compared to us today. Early Christians met in secresy and likely for a good reason. The stories of historical Jesus could have been created after Paul’s death to mock the competing religious beliefs of the time like the stories of the flying spagetti monster today. That is why Jesus was the new Adam, Lord, Messiah, King of Jews, God, Gnostic saviour, redeamer from Platonic Hell, you name it, what ever any other religious groups wanted believe and worship. Jesus’ resurrection was a proof that people can survive from death without believing in such a mambo jambo. Thats is why it Paul’s primary focus was on the resurrection and not on the made up stories of Jesus.
What’s your opinion of Prof. Tabor’s suggestion that, rather than the Road to Emmaus story in Acts, in which he immediately goes to Jerusalem, we instead look to Paul’s own account in which he says he went to Arabia for three years? Prof. Tabor asks whether Paul might have gone to Mt. Horeb, where Moses received his inspiration, and this is where Paul had his own ecstatic visions. Paul later says that God singled him (Paul) out before birth to offer salvation to the Gentiles, i.e. the rest of the world. So it would seem that Paul acknowledges that Christ was sent to preach to the Jews but that he, Paul, was sent to save the world. He considered himself the Chosen One.
Interesting. I haven’t read James’s discussoin of this. I’d say it’s impossible to know where Paul went, though usually it is thought to be somewhere in teh Nabataean kingdom. He may have gone to proclaim his gospel rather than to learn more….
James Tabor’s comments about Paul’s post-conversion experience can be found in Chapter 4 of Paul and Jesus: How the Apostle Transformed Christianity.
Or maybe – just maybe – The gospel stories where almost completley fabricated. Made up stories about Jesus’s life. So, of course, Paul did not know them becuse they never happened. Just made up stories years after Paul’s death.
Just a thought.