what I mean is the KJV and NRSV say have “declared to be son of god”

brenmcg said

godspell said
On the basis of seven legitimate letters, written some years after Paul converted, we have no basis for assuming he and Peter and James were on the same page with regards to who Jesus was, and there’s ample reason to believe they weren’t.  Because lots of early Christians weren’t, and that was the case for centuries to come.

We do have a basis for it because Paul says in his letters that he presented his gospel to the leaders in Jerusalem because he wanted to make sure they agreed with it.

Paul says he was preaching the faith he tried to destroy. 

He says God was at work with Peter as an apostle to the circumcised and was at work with him as an apostle to the gentiles.

There’s no 1stC material contradicting any of this – you may be right in saying Peter and James disagreed with Paul on the nature of christ, but its speculation, there’s no historical basis for it.  

Well first of all, of course he’d say that.  He’s not going to say “I am preaching something at odds with the leadership in Jerusalem, who have a false idea of Jesus, even though they knew him and I didn’t.”  His ‘gospel’ probably was pretty close to theirs, because he’d gotten his original ideas from Christians he’d met (and in some cases, persecuted).  His idesa kept changing as he went along, as his mind began to rework what he’d learned from them, trying to systematize it, make it jibe with his personal vision.  

Even Martin Luther started out by differing with the Vatican only on matters like indulgences.  Difference there is that Christianity was well-established throughout Europe, and Luther didn’t have to worry about people sliding back into paganism.  

Paul wanted a unified church he could spread his ideas through–just like Augustine did later.  And yet we know there was huge disagreement in the Christian church during Augustine’s era.  And really, through all of Christian history.  Unanimity in the early church, if it ever existed at all, was gone once they started converting people who had never known Jesus.  New minds, new ideas.

My point is, you can’t say “They agreed about everything” based on seven letters, which only mention one serious point of difference, that isn’t really doctrinal.  Paul didn’t care if gentiles became Jews in order to be Christians.  He could see what perhaps Peter and James couldn’t at first–that they weren’t Jews anymore–not in the sense they had been.  They were moving away from Judaism, into something related, but very different.  

Again, he had to change the entrance requirements.  He was determined to be the apostle to the gentiles, and having made that determination, he had to fight like hell for letting them in without having to follow the Jewish laws–or his mission would fail (and history would look a whole lot different).  He did not have to make everybody believe Jesus was a pre-existent divine being in the way he imagined, and in fact Christians had a lot of very different ideas about Jesus in the centuries to come, and many still do.  He was only partly successful in convincing people.    

Muhammad agreed passionately with the OT and NT, and look what happened.  Ideas mutate.  Individual minds put their own stamp on what they learn.  Paul doesn’t explain what he meant by his ‘gospel’ but presumably it was “Jesus is the Messiah.  He was crucified under Pontius Pilate, died, and rose from the dead, and will return again to judge us all.”  That is what they believed at that point. But having come to believe that, they still had to decide what it meant, and they came to different conclusions.  

Paul did believe Jesus was coming, true–but when?  He’s already behind schedule.   Maybe it won’t be for a long time–the world around Paul hasn’t changed in the slightest.  Anyway, Jesus clearly said people could be saved simply by treating other people kindly, and avoiding sinful behavior themselves.  Paul hadn’t read the gospels, but he’d heard some of the same stories that ended up in them.  Jesus didn’t care about converting people.  In this sense, Paul is correct in his debate with Peter–Jesus wasn’t out to make more Jews–where Paul errs is in thinking Jesus wanted some new improved version of Judaism.  Jesus thought religion only mattered in the world of men.  In the Kingdom of God, it would matter not at all.  Meaning neither would Paul.  

Your error is assuming people are incapable of divisions in their nature, conflicting agendas.

Paul is good at this.  He’s finally found something he can do better than anyone else, even Peter.  He wants to go on doing it.  He wants to build something that lasts.  A new religion.  But in the Kingdom, what need would there be for religion?  

Augustine said it better than anyone–“Oh God, make me virtuous–but not yet!”  In Paul’s case, it’s “Oh God, come and make my work pointless–but not yet!”  People can want very different and opposing things at the same time.  Peter and the others who knew Jesus yearn to see him again.  Paul, who never knew him as a man, loved him as a man, doesn’t feel that same yearning.  He’s a born missionary (in a twisted way, he was trying to express that talent through his persecution of Christians), and there would be no need for missionaries if Jesus returned.  So he at the same time would like to see Jesus in the flesh, have his faith in his vision confirmed–and to never see him, so he can go on doing what he’s good at.  Knowing full well how dangerous it is.  He’d have made a fine Jesuit (I mean that as a compliment–mostly.)

We can agree to disagree–neither point can be proven to everyone’s satisfaction.  But let’s just be clear that you have not proven your point.  And Paul’s actual behavior speaks pretty strongly to mine.  Always believe what people do more than what they say.  But Paul says nothing about having spoken to Peter or James about his Christology, and the mere fact that he is trying to persuade these people he’s converted to believe his vision of Jesus proves that not all Christians believed in his vision of Jesus.  

Again, pay more attention to what people do than what they say.

I agree, he didn’t consciously set out to do this, but this is what he loves, and that comes through in everything he writes, and every story we have about him.  

I specifically said Paul wasn’t out to create a new Judaism, so there we agree.  He was out to create a CHURCH, and that’s what leads to creating a new religion.  There’s no need for all this organization if Jesus is coming soon.  It starts as giving people the good news so they can enter the Kingdom (except Jesus didn’t believe people had to have heard of him in order to enter the Kingdom), and ends as something else.  

Just as Luther set out to reform Catholicism, and ended up being the most influential figure in a permanent split in the church.  

Seven letters isn’t really a lot to work with.  Look at what he did.  He was trying to make something that didn’t make sense if the Kingdom was coming soon.  

Steefen said
Paul redefines “apostle” to one who has seen the risen Christ so he could be on par with the 12 apostles.

The historical James the Just probably was not the head of a group of followers of a character of historical fiction who swapped the body and blood sacrifices of the animals at the Temple for the body and blood sacrifice of the biblical Jesus.

With Paul inventing not a Life of a Christ biography but a Death of a Christ, it was his idea to name drop James the Just to build up the fictional Jesus he invented. Everything else was: “let’s just go with Paul’s construction and put the gospels on top of it.”

I would say, James the Just was as pious if not more pious than John the Baptist. I would also say, the historical James the Just would be as deserving of a place in the gospels as John the Baptist (birth narrative) or the Beloved Disciple.  

The historical James the Just would be surprised to hear his elder brother described as a character of historical fiction (or the son of a virgin).  

😉