This post got I interested in Paul, so Iman did some research and am reporting back what I have discovered.
First of all Paul was an observant Jew. He was the first Christian to spread the gospel to non-Jews, up until then Jesus had been a strictly Jewish concern. He never met Jesus in person, but rather had a vision which he claimed gave him authority on par with Jesus actual disciples.
There survives a considerable body of literature which claims to be written by Paul, both inside and outside of the Bible. Less than half of this material is widely accepted by scholars to have actually been written by Paul (which is remarkable in itself, we have NO writings from Jesus or Peter), then there are a few works which scholars still debate the authorship of and then there are the rest which are undisputed forgeries (because they address people who weren't born until after Paul was dead, etc).
When InI study just the works which are most probably penned by Paul a different picture of Paul is painted than in the book of Acts which was written by the author of Luke some time after Paul was dead and gone. In fact here is a short list of differences I see between what Paul (P) says himself and what “Luke” (L) says about Paul in Acts:
P: claims pagans are culpable for the sin of ignoring the one true God
L: Paul says God forgives the ignorance of pagans
P: claims NOT to have met with the original Jerusalem apostles after his conversion
L: portrays Paul as meeting with and agreeing in all ways with the Jerusalem apostles
P: claims to have lived as a Gentile when in their lands
L: shows Paul as faithfully observant of Jewish law
P: refused to have the Gentile Titus circumcised to appease Jewish-Christians
L: Paul has Timothy circumcised to appease Jewish-Christians
P: speaks frankly about his disagreements with Peter and other apostles
L: portrays Paul as always in total agreement with the Jerusalem apostles
Paul clearly accepted the role of women in the church while the later writers of 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus (a.k.a. the Pastoral Epistles) have Paul forbidding women from even speaking aloud in church.
To see how it happens that historical figures get re-invented according to the concerns of the present one need look no further than Rastafari. When ones post things here about Bongo Watto, Ras Pidow, Sis Bubbles, Emmanuel Edwards etc., they are not dispassionate, objective chroniclers of accurate historical facts, they are representing their own beliefs by emphasizing certain things while ignoring or minimizing other things. Now consider this process taking place over thousands of years where almost everyone is illiterate, the few texts that exist are copied by hand and there is no method of research or verification available.
Taken purely on his own terms, Paul's main concern seems to be the imminent return of Jesus and the coming of the Kingdom of God, which he clearly believed in as a literal physical event which was about to happen in his natural lifetime. I see no sign of any long term planning on Paul's part, no advice for future generations that he never expected would exist.
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