Paulism vs Jesus

[Postman]

I've heard it said that today's "Christians" are really following a form of "Paulism" and not what Jesus would instruct.

Has Jesus' message been hijacked by Paulism?

on edit: I know next to nothing about Religion, Christianity and the like...I'm just asking....

[hedgehog]

1. I think it's safe to say that Paul's message was hijacked by other people.

A lot of the more problematic passages from Paul were tacked on to his letters by other people. On the other hand, these are the versions of the letters that were accepted by the reps of the early Churches as canonical. I say reps of the early Churches because back then priests and bishops were selected by their local fellow worshipers.IMO, some men found the message of Jesus as conveyed by Paul too radical, so they toned it down a bit by adding verses telling women to sit down, cover their heads and be quiet!

[Postman]

2. I have no religious education.....

To me, the message of Jesus is this....

Nonviolence, love your enemies, compassion and caring for everyone no matter what and a rejection of greed and an embrace of people working together to help one another.....

To me, Jesus was the original "socialist", "liberal", "communist" ----in the best sense of the word....

[MH1]

7. Interesting. a question for you

since you seem to know something about this ...

can you refer me to a good overview of how that happened (Paul's writings being "enhanced") by others, and other key facts about how the current books of the New Testament came to be chosen from the various writings? In other words what books / articles would you recommend to get a good understanding of this history?

Thanks!

[hedgehog]

8. GARY Wills (not George Wills- I thought they were the same person for years!)

has three excellent short studies:

What Jesus Meant

What the Gospels Meant

What Paul Meant

[MH1]

10. Thanks! I will look those up.

:patriot:

[Sebastian Doyle]

3. The true Christian church (i.e. the one actually founded by JC and His apostles)

Probably died when they did. Even the biblical accounts make it obvious that Peter (whom Jesus appointed the leader of the church, knowing He would be absent) and Paul were at odds with each other.

The modern church interprets this as the fact that Peter and the other apostles were Jews, and wanted to contain their movement within the Jewish people, while Paul (who was also Jewish, but had Roman citizenship) wanted to expand Christianity to the Gentile world. But then Paul was also one of those Pharisees who oppressed Christ Himself, and then did the same to His followers until his sudden "road to Damascus" conversion. You can see why Peter and the others might have a problem believing this guy. And Paul's sexual hangups are evidence enough that he didn't let go of all of his prejudicial behavior when he was allegedly "saved" by JC.

I think that the appropriation by Constantine and the Roman Empire damaged the church far more than Paul himself though. That's when it began to be used as a tool of oppression.

[Postman]

5. Thanks...

for your input...

[notadmblnd]

4. this is what I posted an another thread yesterday.

I think he was sexist and hated women

Edited on Fri Dec-04-09 02:07 PM by notadmblnd
I don't believe for a minute that Jesus struck him blind in the desert and gave him authority over mankind by speaking for God. I'm not a religious person, however, I grew up with religion. Jesus said he is the way, the truth and the light and that no man can get to god from anyone else but him. Paul was responsible for creating the Christian religion (church). Jesus was a Jew and I don't believe that he would have ever been anything other than a Jew.

I think Paul/Saul was an opportunist and a false prophet who is responsible for one of the most oppressive religions even invented by man.

[MineralMan]

6. Paul was a Roman, who adapted a Jewish messianic cult

following to the needs of Romans. Had he not done so, Christianity would have never been heard of in a couple of centuries. Instead, since it was ideally suited to replace the existing pagan Roman religion, it was spread by Rome throughout the Empire.

Due to that, alone, we have Christianity as we know it today. It is the Paulist church.

[Postman]

9. Some questions....

What were the "needs" of Romans?

Christianity would have never been heard of in a couple of centuries, because why? The original Christians were nonviolent and were being killed and refused to resist?

Do you think that Jesus' message has been distorted to suit the needs of empires?

[struggle4progress]

11. Saul/Paul was a first century Jew with Roman citizenship: then, as now, there were

various schools of Judaism, and Saul originally was not associated with a tolerant group: at one time, he supported stoning Christians for "blasphemy," for example, but later had a psychological crisis, after which he converted -- and changed his name to Paul. Tradition says his Roman citizenship allowed Paul to be beheaded rather than crucified. The Romans did not officially tolerate Christianity until about two and a half centuries after Paul's death

[dimbear]

25. This is an excellent summary of the facts on the ground. Let me add

that some current scholarship doesn't think he actually changed his name, in the sense that among Aramaic speaking Jews he would go as Saul, among Greek speakers he would go as Paul. Others feel that Paul is just a nickname, since paulus is Latin for short.

[lapfog_1]

12. And, imho, the current "Paulist" church teachings are being supplanted

by John of Patmos's teaching (Book of revelations).

Note that almost all scholars now believe that John of Patmos was not the same John who was an apostle of Jesus, and, in fact, lived some 200 years after the death of Jesus. He was a hermit who lived high up in a cave on the Greek Island of Patmos (another name for him was "the eagle of Patmos") and he may have been clinically insane (a paranoid schizophrenic). And yet many evangelicals look to this book of the bible as being the most important "literal word of God" as delivered by his only son, Jesus.

The Book of Revelations was almost left completely out of the canonized bible except that a Pope thought it made a good story to scare the uneducated into compliance with the fear of eternal Hellfire.

[tiny elvis]

18. writing of revelation guessed at about 90 ad

if you read the revelation you will see that john of patmos never heard of jesus the nazarene
he writes of a jesus in heaven who has as much sympathy for people as a roman god
he does not write of a second coming to earth, his vision is the only coming
paul also never heard of jesus of nazareth
he writes of old testament midrash and the contemporary newly revealed word of what was hidden in old scripture
if you study a little, understand the function of midrash, and understand that paul was midrashing his ass off,
you can see why paul assumed authority over his subject and emphasized the supreme importance of revelation rather than testimony
there was no testimony
paul did not ignore jesus' teaching because he presumed himself the greatest apostle
there was no teaching to ignore a century before a gospel as we know them was written
there was nothing in his time but reinterpretation of old prophecy and revelation

sorry i ran on, lapfog, most of this comment is for the op

[Execlib]

19. lapfog and GE-COS reference.

Honk...Derail Huh...I am trying to figure out who you are. I wrote Execlib III and Borak edited it for me.

Who are you....?

[madrchsod]

13. yes it was...

paul had a huge conflict with his sexuality and in my opinion distorted christ`s message. he also had to tailor his message to fit into the greek and roman society.

i believe that the coptic church is closer to christ`s teachings than paul`s roman catholic or the greek orthodox church.

[wellstone dem]

14. I'm a RED LETTER Christian

Many bibles put the words of Christ in Red Letters. As a red letter Christian, I think I do pretty well, and sleep very sound at night.

[ZombieHorde]

15. How do you determine which of those red letters to take literally and which to take non-literally?nt

[Deep13]

17. Unfortunately, the accuracy of the gospels are highly suspect.

Glad you have no insomnia, BTW.

[edhopper]

30. The bliss of

ignorance.

[Deep13]

16. "Paulism" IS Christianity...

The canonical gospels were written later, probably in an effort to attach an earlier story about a specific person to Paul's son-of-god ideas.

[Goblinmonger]

20. We have a winner.

The gospels helped to create the mythology.

[trotsky]

21. Bingo.

Paul's writings came first. He made no mention of a physical resurrection, for instance. That was bolted on later by the authors of the gospels (who were of course NOT the men whose names they bear).

[Goblinmonger]

22. Paul makes reference to the fact

that he didn't even believe that Jesus existed on earth.

We gotta stop agreeing on everything or people are going to start talking.

[rug]

23. Romans 1:1-4 must refer to someone else.

[Goblinmonger]

24. Yes, and we all know there are no contradictions in the BIble. n/t

[trotsky]

26. Romans 1:1-4

Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God — the gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures regarding his Son, who as to his earthly life was a descendant of David, and who through the Spirit of holiness was appointed the Son of God in power by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord.

Perhaps I'm missing the part where a physical resurrection is claimed. If you look at all the writings of Paul, does he ever claim to have met the physical form of Jesus? Surely if nowhere else, he must have met him at that monumental event on the road to Damascus? Yes?

[rug]

28. Paul never saw the resurrected body of Christ but he did not deny he physically resurrected.

1 Corinthians 15:12-13

Damascus was a purely spiritual experience, notwithstanding the bllindness.

What is often overlooked is that was resurrected was a glorified, yet still physical, body.

Or so goes the theology.

[trotsky]

29. 1 Corinthians 15:12-13 does not mention a physical resurrection either.

Paul never did claim a physical resurrection. Not once. It was added on later by the gospels. Or so goes your theology. It's surprising how many Christians themselves don't know this.

[rug]

31. Does too.

12 But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? 13 If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised.

Because the resurrection of the dead was preached.

[provis99]

32. Paul wrote of Jesus as an allegory.

He did not believe Jesus was an actual, existing person, as has been pointed out earlier in the thread.

[rug]

33. Do you have a more substantial citation for this proposition than an R/T thread?

[provis99]

35. Yes. My opinion means more than yours.

[Nihil]

27. Paul's writings (the original bits without the add-ons) are quite gnostic in approach ...

... which, of course, is a lot of the reason why the politicians and
other literalists leading the Church at the time needed to bolt on the
misogynistic, hierarchical, literalist bits that they did when they
got the upper hand at deciding what was to be the "official product".

(Run-on sentence FTW! :-) )

[struggle4progress]

34. Paul is a mixed bag, but some of his work is excellent:

If I speak like an angel, but without love, I am just a gong or clashing cymbal. If I can prophesy and can understand all mysteries and all knowledge, or if my faith can move mountains, still, without love, I am nothing. If I hand over everything I have to the poor, and endure hardship so I can boast, without love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient and kind. It does not envy or boast. It is not proud; it does not humiliate others. It is neither self-seeking nor easily angered. It bears no grudges. Love does not delight in evil but is overjoyed by truth. It always shelters, trusts, hopes, and persists.

Love never fails. Prophecies will cease; tongues will be stilled; knowledge will pass away. We incompletely know and incompletely prophesy, but in completeness our incompleteness will disappear. While a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But becoming adult, I put childishness behind me. What we see now is a mere reflection in a mirror, but one day we will see face to face. Now I know incompletely; one day I will know completely, and then I will also be completely known.

Faith, hope and charity remain. But greatest of them all is love.


This does not at all seem to me a "Paulist hijacking of the message of the Nazarene"