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Loading...In my last post I began to enumerate the things that Paul said about Jesus. *Most* of what he says about Jesus has to do with the significance of his death and resurrection. But what if we wanted to know about the *life* of Jesus – the things that Jesus said, did, and experienced between his birth and his death? Paul doesn’t tell us a ton, as has frequently been noted. But he does tell us some. In addition to what I laid out in the previous post, there are the following bits of information, again taken from my fuller analysis in Did Jesus Exist?
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Paul knows that Jesus was a teacher, because he quotes several of his sayings. I will deal with these later [in my next post]. For now it is worth noting that two of the sayings of Jesus that Paul quotes were delivered, he tells us, at the Last Supper on the very night that Jesus was handed over to the authorities to face his fate.
For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night in which he was handed over took bread, and after giving thanks he broke it and said, “This is my body that is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” Likewise also the cup after supper, saying “this cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, whenever you drink, in remembrance of me.” (1 Corinthians 11:22-24)
When Paul says that he “received” this tradition “from the Lord,” he appears to mean that
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Hi Dr Ehrman!
I see that chapter three of Dr Metzger’s book on the NT cannon is devoted to the apostolic fathers, titled “period of preparation”
Who were the apostolic fathers and what did they have to do with the formation of the canon?
(Feel like I need a bit of a simplified explanation before I attempt the chapter!)
Thank you so much!
THe “Apostolic Fathers” are a group of 10 (or 11, depending on you count them) proto-orthodox writers mainly of the 2nd century; they were called that because for a long time they were thought to be companions of teh apostles. The include 1 Clement, the letters of Ignatius, Barnabas, the Didache, and others. They were weriting before there was a canon, but it can be helpful to see which earlier books they appear to have considered authoritative.
Thank you! So were the apostolic fathers the ones who decided whether a book met the criteria of canonization? And then why are non of the apostolic father’s writings in the canon?
No, they were writing before these issues arose.
Why does Metzger devote such a sizable chunk of the book to the apostolic fathers then… if they didn’t have much bearing on the canon?
He is trying to show how early we can detect Christian authors using the texts that later became canon in an authoritative way, to demonstrate the early stages of teh formation of the canon. (BTW: My first PhD seminar was with Metzger, on the canon of the New Testament!)
Is there anything in Paul to indicate that the Last Supper was at Easter? If not, then maybe that’s a later tradition.
I’m not sure what you’re asking. Easter celebrates Jesus’ resurrection, which would have happend three days after the last supper.
Does Paul indicate that the last supper took place at Passover? Or could this be a later tradition?
He strong suggests that’s what he thinks when he says that “Christ our Passover has been sacrificed” (1 Cor. 5:7)
Yes, so Paul wrote about that night when God Handed over Christ for all of us.
The problem with this statement is that this was something that God had done on an earlier occasion – in the Book of Job.
Job 2:6 lxx: And the Lord said to the devil, Behold, I deliver (παραδίδωμί) him up to thee; only save his life.
God had Handed over Job’s body to Satan, but Job resisted all His trials, and finally Job received permission from God to save his friends:
Job 42:10 And the Lord prospered Job: and when he prayed also for his friends, he forgave them [their] sin.
Job’s friends did not eat his body, and they did not drink his blood, at least not literally. But they saw how his body decayed (eaten by worms) and how he scraped away his own blood. Along with Job’s teachings, this was spiritual nourishment for his friends.
If this was a teaching Paul had learned from reading the Book of Job, then he could rightly say that he had received it from the Lord himself. He had received this from the Word of God himself.
…he broke it and said, “This is my body that is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” Likewise also the cup after supper, saying “this cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, whenever you drink, in remembrance of me.”
Do you think Jesus historically said these comments?
No, I don’t. I think the later Christians commemorating that meal put these words on his lips.
I had a similar question, which I decided to hold off on asking until other people’s comments had been posted, so as not to double up. Mine approaches it from a different angle, though, so here it is:
Given that the tradition of the Last Supper started very soon after Jesus’s death (in order for Paul to have received it), and given that the historical Jesus probably didn’t predict his own death, has there been any interesting/plausible speculation on whether Jesus might have said _something_ about body and blood that was later embellished? Maybe some quip about the blood, sweat and tears he put into … something?
Yes, it’s certainly one of the options. But we don’t know how early Paul heard it. He is writing his letter to the Corinthians 25 years or so after the event, and says that this is soemething he handed over to them earlier. Presumably he means when he converted them? But that’s not certainl. IN any event, there’s no way to tell from what he says how much earlier he learned this.
So when Paul says, “For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, ” we know he did not receive this from the Lord because the Lord did not say it. So Paul is actually quoting something he heard from other people who put it on Jesus lips. This is not a Jesus quote but a quote of what others wanted Jesus to say, correct?
It’s hard to know whether he heard a prophet say it, or if he heard it from the Lord because the Lord “put it on his heart,” or that he heard it from the Lord through someone else, or something else. (I always think of my devout friends who would tell me “what the Lord is telling me today”)
Right. I always think of a former minister who always said, “God placed this on my heart,” in order to give what he was saying more authority.
When looking at what Paul knew about Jesus do you only take into account the uncontested apistles? If so, would there be any difference if one assumed they were all authentic? If the contested ones are forgeries could they have come later and had access to the gospels?
The others don’t actually add much either.
The passage you reference from 1 Thess. feels so anti-Semitic/seems like it could be used to justify anti-Semitism. I know the book of John has been historically problematic for Jewish people in relation to anti-Semitism, but are passages like this from Paul also? Do you write about Christianity’s history with anti-Semitism? If not, would you on the blog? And could you recommend scholars who study this? Thank you.
Yes, this passage and many others were used badly, and Paul has often been portrayed as an enemy of the Jews. There are lots of good books on the rise of anti-Judaism. One of my favorites is a classic, Rosemary Ruether, Faith and Fratricide.
Thank you for this recommendation. It’s on order.
Some would argue that no one would ever invent a story about a God-man dying on a Cross. This argument does not take into account what this story was really meant to convey – salvation for humanity. Sin came into this world from a tree. Theologically, it would therefore make a lot of sense if sin were also hung back on a tree. Reversal of crucial events from the Garden of Eden is therefore an important part of the crucifixion story.
For Paul, the cross was not only an instrument of torture, but also a symbol of salvation with its own healing power.
1 Cor 1: 17-18
This healing power of the cross was something that could only be compared to the power of the staff of Moses. In fact, the Greek word for Cross (σταυρός) means Staff.
It was the Lord AND the Staff, together, who saved the Israelites from captivity in Egypt.
It can be said that the Israelites had to have as strong faith in the power of the staff of Moses as the Christians had to have faith in the saving power of the cross.
This may be a bit of a silly question(!), but do we know anything about how many more letters Paul wrote (if any) that we *don’t* have, i.e. that have been lost? Is there any evidence of other churches that he set up that we don’t know about, or whose correspondence with Paul didn’t survive to make it into the NT?
It’s fascinating to think that the Christianity we see today might have been formed only by a selection of Paul’s overall letters (as well as forgeries) surviving, and that if there were other letters in his career as an evangelist that *did* survive and make it into the NT, then Christianity and the world as a whole could be totally different… (Although I suppose the canonisation process basically simulates that)
WE *don’t* know. But suppose he had 20 churches that he wrote to each twice a year for a 30 year minustry. Yikes!
We know that Paul wrote at least one more letter to the Corinthians. In I Cor. 5:9, Paul refers to an epistle that he had written earlier – before I Corinthians.
Yup! And 2 Corinthians is a combination of two letters, or possibly even more (some of us think five); and Philippians appears to be made of of two lettrs as well, spliced together.
I have often thought it interesting that Paul has so little to say about Jesus’ teachings. It seems as if Paul would be content with a Jesus that taught nothing; a Jesus that was born and subsequently died in a ritual atonement. I believe we see this reflected in certain versions of Christianity today that focus on affirmatively joining the group for whom (in their view) Jesus was sacrificed (i.e. by confessing Christ), and pay little heed to conforming to Jesus’ teachings.
I have a question:
So, which of the gospel writers might have had access to Paul’s letters?
Mark, Mathew and Luke?
Or just Luke?
Thanks
I don’t think any of them did. If they did, they give no evidence of it. Even Luke! Oddly enough.
There is plenty of peer reviewed scholarship linking Mark to Paul, I find it convincing, you may or may not. Best (and free) place to start would be 10-25-19 blog post at richardcarrier.info titled “Mark’s Use of Paul’s Epistles”. Gives a good outline of the peer reviewed scholarship on the topic and a synopsis of what’s been found. My favorite is Dykstra, “Mark, Canonizer of Paul”, and R. G. Price also worth a look.
Yes, any article in a bona fide biblical studies journal (there are lots) will be peer reviewed. There are, of course, also large differences between Mark and Paul that make it something other than a slam-dunk case….
When Paul speaks of things like 2 Corinthians 5:1 “eternal tent in the heavens.” Is he influenced by Plato’s ideas of perfect forms that exist in hyper-heavens? Are modern christians misunderstanding him by reading this as a house waiting for them heavenly realm after death?
I talk about it in my book Heaven and Hell. I think Paul thought there would be an interim existence for believers where they would be Christ before the resurrection.
This is off topic, but have you read “The Unseen Realm: Recovering the supernatural worldview of the Bible” by Heiser? It’s apparently sold 100K copies, so it’s widely read.
I’ve just started. My take so far is that it’s your skepticism combined with a Christian worldview. For example, let’s admit that there are multiple gods alluded to in God’s council, but let’s not go overboard and call that polytheism.
If you’re familiar with it, I wonder what you think.
Sorry — don’t know it!
Thank you for sharing your perspective and your insight !
Reminds me of the movie “Founder”, as in taking someone’s plan and running with it. I have sometimes said that Christianity is the religion of Paul and not Jesus. Or as someone else more eloquently put, “Christianity is not the religion of Jesus, but the religion about Jesus”. It tries my comprehension also to read from one Apostle taught by Jesus after His resurrection only to read a few words, against those who new Him and wrote decades later quoting chapters of his words. For instance, “Ich bin ein Berkiner” or “Ask not what your country can do do you, but what you can do for you country” (the one didn’t last long). What person so many years later remembers who said these words let alone the rest. Dr Ehrman I have heard you use this argument in several debates and I saw little from a room of people that could not quote the BEATITUDES in order.
When you speak of Paul not using the word “betrayed,” is it possible that the entire story of Judas’ betrayal of Jesus was something that wasn’t widely circulated until the the period between Paul’s writings and the writings of the gospels?
It’s possible. But since it’s so widely attested it seems like it must be pretty earlly. I think Paul just didn’t know that part, or if he did, he had no reason to mention it.
Towards the end of your book Heaven and Hell, you mention a number of Xtn groups in the middle of the second century. One of them held the Virgin Mary in esteem. I thought this was pretty early for her to be venerated. Am I reading you wrong?
I”m not sure! There were certainly intriguing legends about Mary floating around in the second century, including those that made it into the Proto-Gospel of James (=Protevangelium Jacobi)
Do you think Paul could speak directly with Cephas and James or do you think they needed translators?
Do you have any substernal doubt that this Cephas in Jerusalem was actually Peter?
I don’t really know, but incline to thinking they needed a translator. And yes, I do still wonder if Cephas was Peter.
What are the arguments about whether Cephas was Peter? (I thought Cephas was simply the identifier with that particular Simon and that the name, Rock, was simply translated from Aramaic to Greek as Petros.)
The best argument is that neither one was a name or a nickname (“Rock”) until one of Jesus’ followers was given it, presumably by Jesus. It would be weird if *two* early Christian leaders had the same previously unheard of nickname. (The only good explanation would be that one was given it as appropriate to him too, living somewhere else, as a character also thought to be a rock.
My apologies if there was something I missed recently, but lately when a new post is posted and I get logged in, I can only still see half the post. Are you releasing them in 2 phases or is my account broken? This post and the newest one I can only see half. I checked my account and it says silver membership. Maybe I’m doing something wrong?
That usually means that your subscription needs to be renewed. Click Help and send a query to Support and someone will help you out.
I’m not so sure that Paul actually “knew” about the Last Supper in any historical sense. He comes right out and says it: “I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you.” That implies he got it from some vision and not from a disciple, right? At least, that’s my thinking on the matter. Am I on the mark here?
He wasn’t there, no. But everyone who knew that it had happened had heard it from someone else as well. (Unless you mean something else by “historical sense”)
I know that the Christian community in Rome wasn’t founded by Paul, but considering that it was a mostly gentile community, could it be that it was founded by Paul’s followers? Weren’t Paul and his helpers the only ones who were going around preaching Jesus to the gentiles? I know his communities were often visited by “the circumcision party” but it seems like those guys were going to already established Christian communities instead of preaching to non-Christian gentiles.
Also at the end of his letter to the Romans he asks them to greet a whole bunch of people. Are all of those people he is referring to part of the Roman Christian community? Because in that case he seems to know a whole lot of people there already, once again implying that this community was founded by his followers.
It’s possible, but there’s no evidence one way or the other. Certainly whoever founded it did not think these gentiels had to convert to Judaism. But he doesn’t mention anyone in the church in his long list of greetings in Romans 16 that he credits with being the first htere.
I have this bothering me.
Why is Paul sent to the uncircumcised (the gentiles) when he supposedly knows more about the law and better candidate to convert the jews? Why not take that advantage he had over Peter who couldn’t read or write and would be harder to convince jews?
Was it because Paul didn’t speak Aramaic? Or whatever language the jews had?
Thanks
Paul says it was because he realized the “truth” about Christ when he had his vision: Christ showed him that his salvation was not just for Jews but also for gentiles, who did not have to convert to Judaism to attain salvation. Once Paul had this realization, he ran with it and spent the rest of his life trying to convert gentiles.