“authority the Lord gave me”?
2 Corinthians 13:10 NIV
This is why I write these things when I am absent, that when I come I may not have to be harsh in my use of authority—the authority the Lord gave me for building you up, not for tearing you down.
Was “the authority” some sort of implied authority from Paul’s charisma or force of character,
or was there some sort of anointing which Paul claimed as having divine authority?
I assume the former
Welcome David! I must say it’s great to hear all the new voices entering this forum of late.
I think Paul thought he had a special status.
“For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.”
-1 Corinthians 15:9
This statement is always interpreted as an example of Pauline humility but consider what he’s saying. Paul is NOT saying he is not an apostle. You can’t be the “least” of the apostles without being one. And Paul is “unfit” to be called an apostle because somebody is calling him an apostle.
Paul taught by prophecy, based on divine revelation he claimed he received directly from God and Jesus Christ.
“The gospel which was preached by me is not according to man, nor was I taught it, but it came through the revelation of Jesus Christ.” (Galatians 1:12)
Paul isn’t referring to the canonical gospels, which he ironically cursed his followers not to read in 2 Corinthians 11:4, but to the divine teachings he received directly through dreams, visions, and in tongues and which he preached to his early followers who themselves gathered together in congregation to take turns prophesizing and speaking in tongues.
“For you can all prophesy in turn so that everyone may be instructed and encouraged” (1 Corinthians 14:31)
Many of his epistles are sprinkled over with words like knowledge and wisdom which if you research the Greek words underlying the translations are used in the sense of divinely revealed truth and spiritually discerned gnosis.
The bishop of Jerusalem, James, the leader of the orthodox Jewish faction and the brother of Jesus, contested the validity of Paul’s revelations, and implemented a requirement that no religious teachers were to be accepted unless they possessed a letter a recommendation from him or his immediate successor.
“Wherefore observe the greatest caution, that you believe no teacher, unless he brings from Jerusalem the testimonial of James the Lord’s brother, or of whosoever may come after him. For no one, unless he has gone up thither, and there has been approved as a fit and faithful teacher for preaching the word of Christ, – unless, I say, he brings a testimonial thence, is by any means to be received. But let neither prophet nor apostle be looked for by you at this time, besides us. (Clementine Recognitions XXXV)
Paul did not have a letter of recommendation.
“Or do we need, like some people, letters of recommendation to you or from you? You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everyone. You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God” (2 Corinthians 3:1-3)
Paul knew that his apostleship was contested by powerful leaders in the early church, which is why he concedes that “even if I am not an apostle to others, at least I am to you” (1 Corinthians 9:2).
Paul did not have the authority to glean legitimacy from the bishop of Jerusalem and the twelve apostles, hence why he needed “the authority the Lord gave me”.
BDEhrman
FreedomBen
evgendob
Robert
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