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Paul and His Letters

Was Matthew Attacking Paul?

On my podcast this past week (Misquoting Jesus with Bart Ehrman) someone asked me if I thought any of the Gospels of the NT were influenced by Paul. It's an interesting question that I should post on (my view: Mark, maybe; Luke, unexpectedly and oddly not; John, I doubt it; Matthew?) Ah, Matthew. As it turns out, I think Matthew shows a rather obvious and ironic connection with Paul. Did he know Paul's writings? I have no idea. Did he know about Paul? Same, no idea. Did he oppose a major feature of Paul's gospel message? Sure looks like it!! (I'm trying to say that he could be opposed to Paul's views without necessarily knowing Paul's writings; the views may have been more widely spread than just by Paul. In fact, they almost certainly were. Here's how I've discussed the matter once when I was reflecting at greater length in the issue: Paul certainly had opponents in his lifetime: "Judaizers," as scholars call them -- that is, Christian teachers who maintained that followers of Jesus [...]

BDEhrman2023-05-01T11:04:43-04:00May 9th, 2023|Canonical Gospels, Paul and His Letters, Public Forum|

Is 2 Thessalonians a Forgery? From 132 CE? Platinum Guest Post by Omar Robb

The proposition that the 2 Thessalonians was forged in 132AD by a Thessalonian priest. Omar Abur-Robb omr-mhmd.yolasite.com There have been lot of arguments discussing the authenticity of the 2 Thessalonians. Many Scholars concluded (due to many observations) that it is a forgery. I am going here to add one more observation into the list by highlighting an angle that was probably missed. I need to give credit to Joseph Turmel (1859 - 1943) who probably was the first to link this letter to Bar-Kokhba revolt, and the model that I am presenting here is not very far from his model. [Reference: Introduction by Neil Godfrey, https://vridar.org/2011/05/31/identifying-the-man-of-sin-in-2-thessalonians/] The Second Thessalonians is a letter that is attributed to Paul for the Thessalonian Christians. The main objective of this letter is a discussion about the return of Jesus in 2.1: “Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him”, and the narratives related to the antichrist: the “man of sin”. So, the explicit objective of the letter is: Jesus will not return [...]

BDEhrman2023-04-25T19:07:14-04:00April 28th, 2023|Forgery in Antiquity, Paul and His Letters|

Did Jesus Appear to 500 People After His Resurrection?

What do we make of Paul's claim that 500 people at one time saw Jesus after the resurrection (in 1 Corinthians 15:3-5)? I get this question every now and then -- maybe five or six times just this year. These days, among other things, I point 0ut something I hadn't thought about in most of the years of my existence, that there was almost certainly no Christian group (meaning: a group of people who believed Jesus was raised from the dead) of that size in Paul's day anywhere in the world! (I discuss the numbers of Christians at different time periods in antiquity in my book The Triumph of Christianity.) So on that level alone it seems highly implausible. But jut now looking through old posts from many years ago, I see I was asked the question and dealt with it in a different way. I'd forgotten all about it, but see now that I give a bit of analysis that tries to unpack Paul's claims. Here's the Q and the A: ****************************** QUESTION on [...]

BDEhrman2022-12-15T10:24:49-05:00December 20th, 2022|Paul and His Letters, Reader’s Questions|

What Would the Apostle Paul Think of The Trinity? Platinum Guest Post by Joel Scheller

Now here's an intriguing question about early Christianity, posed and answered by Platinum Blog member Joel Scheller in a guest post for all you other Platinums. One way to put the question is this: Would the apostle-Paul have been considered an arch-heretic in the fourth century? A good case can be made! Read on. And think about contributing a post yourself, on any topic connected to the blog. Have an idea/thought? Get it out there! For now -- here's Joel's most recent contribution. He'll be happy to address your comments. ****************************** I find it interesting that so much Christian teaching is based on the Apostle Paul’s influence and yet the doctrine on the very nature of God for most Christians seems out of step with what Paul has to say on the subject. To start off with, The Nicene Creed was originally provoked by the question of how Jesus was God in relation to God the Father, with the inclusion of The Holy Spirit in the creed as almost an afterthought, and whose relationship in [...]

BDEhrman2022-11-29T10:59:06-05:00December 16th, 2022|Early Christian Doctrine, Paul and His Letters|

So Which Text is Original?? My View of 1 Thessalonians 2:7

I am about ready to wrap up my discussion of the textual problem of 1 Thessalonians 2:7. When recalling his time with the Thessalonians, when he had worked hard not to be a burden with any of them, did Paul indicate that he and his missionary companions had become "as infants, as a nurse tending her children" or that they had become "gentle, as a nurse tending her children." It is not an obvious decision, whether you think the change was made accidentally or on purpose. (If you think it *is* obvious, look at the preceding two posts). It seems like it might go either way. I myself have an opinion on the matter (textual scholars tend to have opinions); but I"ll hold off on that for a minute. First: some of you might be wondering--which of these readings do the best surviving manuscripts actually suggest? Is one of the readings ("infants" or "gentle") better attested than the other? Which reading do our oldest and best manuscripts have? Here, as it turns out, the [...]

BDEhrman2022-11-27T15:43:52-05:00November 30th, 2022|New Testament Manuscripts, Paul and His Letters|

Do We KNOW What Paul Wrote? If You Think So, Answer This….

Do we really KNOW what the authors of the New Testament wrote? Sometimes we just can't decide -- despite what apologists almost always say (Most apologists, btw, have never actually studied the problem; I'm not trying to be snide or rude when I say that -- it's an empirical fact; even most PhD's in New Testament Studies have not been trained to determine which actual words of the surviving manuscripts probably go back to the authors). I am now looking at a case in point, a single word in a single passage of Paul's first epistle to the Thessalonians (see the previous post). The decision of what he wrote comes down to a single letter in the word. Scholars (especially, as it turns out, those few who ARE deeply trained to figure these things out) can't agree about the single letter. And the decision determines the meaning of the passage. Did Paul remind the Thessalonians that when he and his missionary colleagues were with them they became like “infants” among them rather than great, powerful, [...]

BDEhrman2022-11-23T16:26:43-05:00November 29th, 2022|New Testament Manuscripts, Paul and His Letters|

How Changing a Single Letter of a Single Word Can Change the Meaning of a Passage

Now that I have discussed the purpose of 1 Thessalonians I would like to discuss a scribal change of the text - a change that involves just a single letter of a single word. Which did Paul originally write? The word *with* the letter or the word *without* it? How you decide the question changes the meaning of the passage. Yikes. A single letter? The passage occurs in an earlier part of the book where Paul is reminding the Thessalonians of the time that he had spent with them when he converted them to their new faith. This is a very joyful part of the letter, one of the most sentimental passages of all of Paul’s letters, where he speaks of the relationship he had with his converts when he was there. But the description is a bit hard to pin down, in part because of the presence or non-presence of just one letter of the alphabet. Some manuscripts have it, and others don’t. And it is very hard to decide which reading is [...]

BDEhrman2022-11-23T17:25:08-05:00November 27th, 2022|New Testament Manuscripts, Paul and His Letters|

What Is Paul’s First Surviving Letter All About? 1 Thessalonians

In my two previous posts I discussed a textual variant that could be explained either as a scribal accident or as an intentional change. I thought it might be interesting to point out a few other variants that also could go either way. These are all intriguing problems in and of themselves, and by talking about them I can illustrate a bit further the kinds of quandaries textual critics find themselves in when trying to decide what an author wrote when we have different versions of his words in different manuscripts. My plan right now is to look at three variants in three different mini-threads (all of them subsumed under the larger thread of why I wrote The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture). Today is one of my favorites, a particularly thorny issue found in 1 Thessalonians 2:7. I can’t get to a discussion of that issue without providing some important background; just the very basics of the background will take me two posts, before I can even start to explain the textual problem. First Thessalonians [...]

BDEhrman2022-11-19T20:13:40-05:00November 25th, 2022|New Testament Manuscripts, Paul and His Letters|

Why Paul Was Persecuted (Or Claimed He Was). Guest Post by Daniel Kohanski

I am pleased to publish this guest post by Platinum blog member Dan Kohanski, on an intriguing and important topic for understanding both the life (and writings) of Paul and the earliest history of the Christian movement. As you know, Platinum level members get a several perks -- I do a quarterly webinar with any of them who want to come (and provide a link to the recording afterward for those who can't make it) and they are allowed to publish posts for other Platinums. Every month or so, the members vote on one of the platinum posts to appear on the blog for everyone to see. This one is the current winner! If you are interested in participating at the Platinum level, check it out: Register - The Bart Ehrman Blog And for now, check out Dan's post. He will be happy to respond to your comments. ****************************** (This article is based on research I’ve been doing for my new book, A God of Our Invention: How Religion Shaped the Western World, to be [...]

BDEhrman2022-10-31T09:59:45-04:00November 10th, 2022|Paul and His Letters, Public Forum|

Was Paul Thinking about Committing Suicide?

A blog reader recently asked me about an intriguing passage in Paul's letter to the Philippians where he says that “To live is Christ, to die is gain” (1:21) and then goes on to say that he is not sure "what to choose" -- to "depart to be with Christ" or "to remain in the flesh" (1:22). Choose? Most people have never looked at the passage carefully, but as often happens, have simply skirted over it without paying it much attention. But think about it. What is Paul saying exactly? In what sense does he have a "choice"? Is he thinking about taking matters in his own hands? Isn't that the ultimate sin? I talk about the matter briefly in my textbook on the New Testament. Here is what I say there: ****************************** In an intriguing book that discusses suicide and martyrdom in the ancient world (A Noble Death: Suicide and Martyrdom among Christians and Jews in Antiquity. HarperSanFrancisco, 1992) Arthur Droge and James Tabor argue that the modern notion that suicide is a “sin” [...]

BDEhrman2022-10-26T18:28:27-04:00November 6th, 2022|Paul and His Letters, Reflections and Ruminations|

Why Paul Was Persecuted (Or Claimed He Was). Platinum Guest Post by Daniel Kohanski

I am pleased to publish this new Platinum post by Dan Kohanski, on an intriguing and important topic for understanding both the life (and writings) of Paul and the earliest history of the Christian movement. This post is by a Platinum member for other Platinum members. You too can make a post like this. Interested? Just write something up and send it along. It doesn't need to be high level scholarship. Just write up your views about something and get some feedback from others! In the meantime, Dan will be willing to address your feedback on this one. ****************************** (This article is based on research I’ve been doing for my new book, A God of Our Invention: How Religion Shaped the Western World, to be published in early 2023 by Apocryphile Press.)[1] The claim that opposition is persecution is one that occurs throughout the history of Christianity. The last of Matthew’s beatitudes promises that those “who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake” (Matt. 5:10) will be rewarded in heaven. The First Letter of Peter reassures its [...]

BDEhrman2022-09-22T10:10:57-04:00September 23rd, 2022|Paul and His Letters, Public Forum|

Does God Create People to Roast in Hell? Anniversary Guest Post by Jason Staples

I am publishing a series of guest posts that have been generously contributed to the blog in honor of our ten-year anniversary. Each post is written by a recognized expert in our field who has previously made guest posts for us. This one comes from Jason Staples, my erstwhile PhD student who now teaches at North Carolina State and whose (long!) dissertation has turned into TWO separate monographs, the first already published by Cambridge University Press (The Idea of Israel in Second Temple Judaism), and the other now forthcoming from Cambridge (focusing on Paul). Here, after some much-appreciated kind words, Jason deals with an unusually important and little-understood topic, of ultimate relevance to us all! ****************************** Thanks to multiple best-selling books, Bart is one of the few widely recognized names in the field of biblical studies, and when people learn I did my training under his guidance, I invariably get asked, “so, what was that like?” Many of the more conservative-leaning Christians are surprised when I tell them the truth: it would be difficult to [...]

Diane2022-07-18T15:05:00-04:00July 30th, 2022|Paul and His Letters, Public Forum|

Softening Jesus’ Message on Giving up (Literally) Everything

In my previous post I showed that Jesus himself appears to have taught that his disciples (not just one or two of them) had to give up *everything* in order to be his followers. Most likely this insistence on voluntary poverty was related to his message that the Kingdom of God was to arrive soon, so people needed to devote themselves entirely to it and to spread the message before it was too late. It is difficult to imagine that the Christian mission would have become massively successful if an entrance requirement was the complete divestment of property and a life of itinerate beggary. It is no surprise that after Jesus’ death (most of) his followers modified his discourse on wealth: what mattered was not voluntary abject poverty but generosity. That view came to be endorsed in later Gospel traditions – sayings placed on Jesus’ lips by story tellers and Gospel writers– and became the standard view among Christians down till today. Already in Luke’s Gospel we find Jesus’ encounter with the fabulously wealthy Zacchaeus [...]

BDEhrman2022-07-15T12:12:25-04:00July 13th, 2022|History of Christianity (100-300CE), Paul and His Letters|

Which James in Galatians? Platinum Guest Post by Gregory Hartzler-Miller

I'm pleased to publish this guest post by Platinum member Gregory Hartzler-Miller. It is dealing with a tricky issue with broad implications. Is there more than one James active in the early Jerusalem church? Which one is Paul concerned about? Check it out and see! ***************************** Which Mary? Which James? 8 theses for distinguishing two Jameses in Galatians based on clues from Mark By Gregory Hartzler-Miller, MATS "Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses (Μαρία ἡ Ἰωσῆτος) saw where his body was placed. When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of the James (Μαρία ἡ τοῦ Ἰακώβου), and Salome bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus’ body" (Mk 15:47-16:1). “Mary the mother of Joses” and “Mary the mother of the James” are two different women. Granted, in the larger context of Mark, it is stated that Mary of Joses has another son named James. As a result, scholars tend to assume these two Mary’s are the same. Against this tendency, I will present an alternative. The evidence will [...]

BDEhrman2022-07-04T14:59:04-04:00July 2nd, 2022|Paul and His Letters|

And Did Paul Write 2 Thessalonians?

In my last post I discussed whether Paul wrote the letter of Ephesians, whose author claims to be Paul, and explained why scholars widely think that in fact it was someone else. I discuss all the Pauline "forgeries" of early Christianity (including the six in the New Testament) in my book Forged. Here I thought it might be useful to consider a second example that involves a different set of problems: the "Second letter to the Thessalonians." Again, this is taken from my book Forged (San Francisco: HarperOne, 2012). ****************************** As a conservative evangelical Christian in my late teens and early twenties, there were few things I was more certain of, religiously, than the fact that Jesus was soon to return from heaven to take me and my fellow believers out of the world, at the “rapture” before the final tribulation came. We read all sorts of books that supported our view. Few people today realize that the best-selling book in English in the 1970s, apart from the Bible, was The Late Great Planet Earth written [...]

BDEhrman2022-05-31T11:07:16-04:00June 11th, 2022|Forgery in Antiquity, Paul and His Letters|

Did Paul Write “Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians”?

Here's an important question I received recently from a blog member: Someone told me that “I should never listen to you” because you say Paul did not write six letters of the New Testament, even though the letters start with the claim he did: "Paul, an Apostle of Christ to the Church at ….." This person's main issue was: what is the evidence Paul did not write Ephesians? Your thoughts. Response This is an issue I dealt with directly in my book Forged: Why The Biblical Authors Are Not Who We Think They Are (San Francisco: HarperOne, 2012). Here's what I say there. (If you are interested in the hard-core academic and detailed discussion of the evidence, I have a much fuller discussion in my book Forgery and Counterforgery) ****************************** When I was teaching at Rutgers in the mid 1980s, I regularly offered a course on the life and teachings of Paul. One of the textbooks for the course was a book on Paul by a conservative British scholar named F. F. Bruce.[1] I used the [...]

BDEhrman2022-06-01T09:13:54-04:00June 8th, 2022|Bart's Critics, Forgery in Antiquity, Paul and His Letters|

What’s Eternal Life Like? Ask Paul…

I’ve been trying to show that Paul thought eternal life would be lived not in some kind of bodiless spiritual existence, but in the physical body. How is *that* supposed to work? And didn’t he say that “flesh and blood” would NOT inherit the kingdom (1 Cor. 15:50)? Here I explain how Paul understood it was all to happen. I pick up with the last bit of my last post, taken from Heaven and Hell (Simon & Schuster, 2020). ****************************** The future resurrected body Paul imagines will be utterly and completely transformed. It will be a different kind of body. Paul argues that the human body that goes into the ground is like a “bare kernel” of some kind of grain that grows into a plant. What grows is intimately tied to and related to what went into the ground; but it is also vastly different. When you plant an acorn it doesn’t grow into a forty-foot acorn, but into an oak tree. So too the human. When the body comes out of the [...]

BDEhrman2022-04-24T19:23:17-04:00May 5th, 2022|Paul and His Letters|

Eternal Life is in the BODY? Really?

What did Paul actually teach would happen after death? It was not that after you died your soul would go to heaven or hell. Paul taught a future physical resurrection of your *body*, to have eternal life here on earth. I started explaining that in my previous post. I continue here: Paul’s argument for a coming resurrection of the dead. Again, this is taken from my discussion in Heaven and Hell (Simon & Schuster, 2020). ***************************** Paul’s Teaching of the Resurrection To make his case (for a physical resurrection of all people at the end of time), Paul begins the chapter (1 Corinthians 15) by summarizing what the Corinthians came to believe when they first joined the Christian community, that Christ died for sins and was raised from the dead, and after his resurrection he was seen not only by his disciples but by a large number of people, including 500 at one time and, finally, by Paul himself (1 Corinthians 15:1-8). All these people actually saw Jesus. That’s because he was physically raised. [...]

BDEhrman2022-04-24T19:19:17-04:00May 4th, 2022|Paul and His Letters|

Understanding the Future Resurrection of the Dead…

One of the most important issues for the apostle Paul is the future resurrection of the dead. It is also one of the must misunderstood topics among readers of Paul today, who often claim that Paul had just the *opposite* view to the one he had. And that’s because they completely misconstrue his understanding of Jesus’ own resurrection. If I’ve heard it once I’ve heard it 834,000 times: “Paul thought Jesus was raised spiritually, not bodily.” Wrong, wrong, wrong. It will take a while to explain. I deal with the matter in my book Heaven and Hell (Simon & Schuster, 2020). Here is the first bit of what I say there. ****************************** The Glorious Transformation of the Resurrected Body Undoubtedly the most important passage for Paul’s view of the future resurrection is 1 Corinthians 15. The chapter, in fact, is often called “the resurrection chapter.” It is also one of the most misread passages in all of the New Testament. Many casual readers have thought Paul wrote it in order to prove that Jesus [...]

BDEhrman2022-04-24T19:14:22-04:00May 3rd, 2022|Paul and His Letters|

Why Paul Persecuted the Christians

Why Paul Persecuted the Christians I have been side-tracked by other things, but now can get back to the thread I started to spin, or rather the tapestry I started to weave. The ultimate question I’m puzzling over is how did Christianity become the dominant religion in the empire? My point at this stage is that before Christianity began to thrive, it was persecuted. The persecutions go all the way back. Our first Christian author is Paul, who must have converted to be a follower of Jesus just three years or so after Jesus’ death. Paul tells us explicitly that before becoming a follower of Jesus he was a persecutor of the church. And why was he persecuting it? He doesn’t say directly, but my sense is that it was for a very basic reason. He despised their message. Specifically, he could not abide by what Christians were saying about Jesus. Why was that a problem? Because they insisted he was God’s messiah. Paul Persecuted the Church. So What Happened? In my previous post, I [...]

BDEhrman2022-07-06T00:54:53-04:00April 30th, 2022|Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, Paul and His Letters, Public Forum|

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