Paul of Tarsus

(See also: Bible conspiracy theory). Canadian singer-songwriter Neil Young's "Cortez the Killer" from Zuma (1975) refers specifically to Cortés, Montezuma and the Spanish conquest of South America. Both state their belief that Paul was used, along with Josephus, to start a peaceful messianic movement to undermine the unrest and rebelliousness of Judea. In Mexico today he is condemned as a modern-day damnatio memoriae, with only one statue – but half a million descendants, and one of the most remarkable stories in history. Joseph Atwill, in his book, Ceasar's Messiah, and David Icke, among others, believe that Paul was an agent of Imperial Rome in general and of the Roman Emperors in specific. It is extremely difficult to characterize this particular conquistador – his unspeakable atrocities, the brilliant military strategies, his desperate maneuvers to keep the ruinous plantation economy out of Mexico, the rewards for his Tlaxcalteca allies along with the rehabilitation of the nobility (including a castle for Moctezuma's heirs in Spain that still stands), his respect for Indians as worthy adversaries and family members. If Sanders' perspective was true, the traditional Protestant understanding of the doctrine of justification may have needed rethinking, for the interpretive framework of Augustine of Hippo and Martin Luther, which had dominated Christian thinking for almost two millennia, was called into question. He left his many mestizo and white children well cared for in his will, along with every one of their mothers.

Sanders reframed the context to make law-keeping and good works a sign of being in the Covenant (marking out the Jews as the people of God) rather than deeds performed in order to accomplish salvation. Like Columbus, he died a wealthy but embittered man; he had not become the great Caesar of Charles V's Western Empire. Traditionally, it had been assumed that 1st century Judaism was a religion of "works" whereby Jews believed they had to earn their salvation by keeping the Law, and therefore when Paul spoke about "justification by faith" or the "justification of faith", he was referring to a new non-works-oriented way of salvation (being declared righteous by God) announced in Christ. Cortés died in Castilleja de la Cuesta, Seville province, in 1547. Sanders in his 1977 book Paul and Palestinian Judaism, in which he argued that the Judaism of Paul's day had been wrongly caricatured by Protestant theology. But the Castilian bureaucrats began to arrive, undoing all his work, and he left with his eldest and favorite son, La Malinche's child Martín Cortés, to find China, eventually returning to Europe to fight in Italy with the same son. P. He served a term as Governor-General of "New Spain of the Ocean Sea" (as Juan de Grijalva had named Mexico before Cortés ever saw it), bringing stability and surprising civil rights to the country.

The "New Perspective on Paul" rose to prominence as a result of the work of E. When Cortés returned to New Spain from Honduras, barely alive, he was greeted with joy by a desperate, lawless population. Again when he spoke to the Greeks about a divinity in their pantheon called "The Unknown God", it can be understood that he was trying to de-paganise their native religions for the sake of their own salvation. (Perhaps he could no longer bear to see him limp from his disfigured feet.). This is further backed up by Paul in his first letter to the Romans when he compliments them on their religion. He became paranoid as well, having Cuauhtémoc hanged over the strong objections of his men. In recent years perhaps the most exemplary developers of Emden's view are the Orthodox Rabbi Harvey Falk and Pamela Eisenbaum.^[3] In this view, Paul is seen as a rabbi who understood the ruling that, although it would be forbidden to a Jew, shittuf (believing in the divine through the name of another) would be permissible for a Gentile despite the Noahide ban on idolatry. He took off on a senseless, death-defying expedition through Guatemala to Honduras to punish a fellow Spaniard who had betrayed him, and with his departure all shadow of personal authority left Mexico.

He did however insist that any man born of a Jewish woman be circumcised (for example Timothy upon whom he himself carried out the ceremony) and live under the Law. He never forgave himself and seems to have gone somewhat mad. Paul insisted that they need only their purified faith and was firmly against proselytizing. Cortés famously put Cuauhtémoc's feet to the fire to find the gold lost on La Noche Triste, but notarized testimony at his many subsequent trials (for murdering his legal wife, etc.) has abundant testimony from friends and enemies alike that this crime ruined Cortés. But he opposed the Jewish Christians who insisted (under some kind of Shammaite influence) that Gentiles were beyond salvation unless they became Jews. The last Aztec emperor, Cuauhtémoc, surrendered to Cortés on August 13, 1521. Paul believed the advantage of the Jews was their being entrusted with the oracles of heaven, and that the law was upon them. In the end, almost the entire city of Tenochtitlán was destroyed and some 120,000 to 240,000 Aztecs killed.

His view, based on the medieval Toledot Yeshu narratives, was that Saul of Tarsus was a devout and learned Pharisee, who (turning away from his early Shammaite views) came to believe in salvation for the Gentiles and under the guiding authority of the very learned and devout Simon Kepha (i.e., Saint Peter) set about refining a Noahide religion for the Gentiles based around the Jesus movement. Cortés genuinely wanted to spare the beautiful city, but with so many Mexica attacking them from the roofs, they were forced to pull houses down street by street. Another alternative view was first set forth by Rabbi Jacob Emden (1697–1776). Still, they fought on long after a European city would have surrendered. (An assessment of Paul of Tarsus from this viewpoint can be found online at The Pauline Conspiracy.). Cortés's Indian allies suffered as well, with an estimated 40% mortality, but the effect on morale in Tenochtitlán, as they began to starve as well, must have been horrendous. Using the New Testament works themselves as his primary source, Garaffa offers a reinterpretation of key passages, and suggests an aggressive power struggle is preserved in the canonical New Testament writings themselves. The siege of Tenochtitlán began at a time when smallpox struck with a vengeance.

He maintains that Paul of Tarsus effectively usurped the authority of the remaining disciples, and the original Jerusalem Church operating under James the Just. They hid the pretty ones in the bushes, sleeping with them during the night, and setting them free in the morning (or marrying them, now that their husbands had been devoured). Victor Garaffa. Spanish foot soldiers helped kill Indians for their allies to "dress out", but also rescued many of the women Cortés planned to brand on the face as slaves. A more critical view of Paul of Tarsus comes from the comprehensive work of A. The Tlaxcaltecas subsisted on the flesh of their massacred enemies while the "Christians" looked the other way, living on dogs and corn. While the teachings of Jesus may be the basis of Christian ethics, they view Paul's teachings as the true basis of modern Christian beliefs such as the atoning death of Jesus and the concept of original sin. Still, this phase of the campaign was arduous and brutal.

They see Paul as an apostate from Judaism. The Mexica-Aztecs had been dominating other Aztec city-states for over a century, demanding ever more sacrificial victims and other tribute. Some small modern religious groups share Maccoby's views on Paul's doctrines. Indian porters brought all the supplies stripped from the original fleet over the mountains from the coast, while Cortés and his allies secured all the towns around the Tenochtitlán lake system. In this regard, 1 Corinthians 9:20-22:. Cortés ordered his master shipwright, Martín López, a Basque who was arguably his most critical survivor, to build 12 brigantines for a siege of the city. Maccoby questions Paul's integrity as well:. (A third died, apparently leaving behind her infant by Cortés, the mysterious second "María" named in his will.) This major Aztec victory is still remembered as "La Noche Triste", the Night of Sorrow.

Maccoby also contends that Paul invented many of the key concepts of the Christian religion, and that the Gospels and other later Christian documents were written to reflect Paul's views rather than the authentic life and teaching of Jesus. The women survivors included La Malinche, ten conquistadors, Alvarado's lover and two of Moctezuma's daughters in Cortés's harem. Maccoby considers Paul's claims to a Jewish background and Pharisaic education to be false, claiming that a number of passages in Paul's writings betray his ignorance of the Jewish Law. Over 400 Spaniards and some 2,000 Indian allies were killed, but Cortés, Alvarado and the most skilled of the men managed to fight their way out of Tenochtitlán and escape. Maccoby believes that Paul's revelation was thus actually a resolution of his divided self; Paul subsequently fused the mystery religions, Judaism and the Passion of Jesus into an entirely new belief, centered on the death of Jesus as a mystical atoning sacrifice. The gap in the causeway, removed to prevent their escape, was so filled with bodies the fugitives just ran across. Paul's work persecuting the enemies of the High Priest led to an internal conflict in his mind, which manifested itself while he was travelling to Damascus on a covert mission. Surely the offering of the heart of such a warrior would win back their god of war, Huitzilopochtli.

He found work in Jerusalem as a police officer of the Sadducee High Priest, who was at that time a de facto Roman quisling in Jerusalem. Cortés only survived because the Mexica-Aztecs wanted him alive to sacrifice to their god of war. In his books The Mythmaker and Paul and Hellenism, Talmudic scholar Hyam Maccoby proposed a theory that Paul was actually a Gentile raised in an environment influenced by the popular Hellenistic mystery religions centered on dying and resurrected savior deities, who later converted to Judaism, hoping to become a Pharisee scholar. The fighting was ferocious, and many of the Spaniards were hindered by having loaded themselves down with as much gold as they could carry. (MacDonald, 1983). On the night of July 1, 1520, Cortés decided to try to break out by muffling the horses' hooves and carrying boards to fill in one of the causeways (which had been opened to prevent escape), but a woman saw them and alerted the city. MacDonald suggests that the context of the Pastoral Epistles associated with the name of Paul -- emphasizing order within conventional family formulas and the social legitimacy of the Church -- should be seen as counter to the radical preaching and story-telling of roaming celibate women, represented in the legends. Moctezuma was jeered and stones were thrown at him injuring him badly, and Moctezuma died a few days later.

The literary version of these traditions was so despised by the Church, that only in the 20th century has a coherent text been pieced together from surviving fragments. Cortés ordered Moctezuma to speak to his people from a palace balcony and persuade them to let the Spanish return to the coast in peace. The simple folk who were endorsing such material were not reading it from a text, but transmitting oral traditions that seem to originate in the eastern Mediterranean (MacDonald). Cuitláhuac ordered his soldiers to besiege the palace housing the Spaniards and Moctezuma. According to the writing, she had been commissioned to do so by Paul himself. When Cortés returned to the palace, however, he found that Alvarado and his men had massacred the Aztec nobility and the survivors had elected a new emperor, Cuitláhuac. The main vehicle for the Pauline legend-cycle is the Acts of Paul and Thecla, which Origen mildly approved, but which attracted Tertullian's attention at the end of the 2nd century; he complained that the example of Thecla was being employed to legitimize women teaching and baptizing. Years later, when asked what the new land was like, Cortés crumpled up a piece of parchment, then spread it out: "Like this," he said.

The oral tradition was transmitted above all among women, MacDonald has asserted, and women appear more centrally in the legend than in the epistles, where they are relegated to the periphery. The arduous trek back over the Sierra Madre Oriental began. The pastoral epistles were accepted into the canon, as it developed in the 3rd century, while the legends continued their parallel, apocryphal career. (Narváez lost an eye, but worse awaited this great loser of the conquest in Florida.). Their tradition has been characterized (MacDonald 1983) as being in competition with the Pauline pastoral epistles. When Cortés told the defeated soldiers about the city of gold, Tenochtitlán, they agreed to join him. From the mid-2nd century, orally transmitted legends that had grown up about the figure of Paul were embodied in written narratives, that applied contemporary literary conventions of realism and authenticity in order to give weight to this legendary oral core. He left Tenochtitlán in the care of his trusted lieutenant Pedro de Alvarado, marched to the coast, and defeated the Cuban expedition led by Pánfilo de Narváez.

The following epistles, agreed to be pseudepigraphical (non-canonical), present themselves as if written by Paul:. At the worst possible moment, news from the coast reached Cortés that a much larger party of Spaniards had been sent by Velázquez to arrest Cortés for insubordination. Two further Pauline epistles have been lost:. After some weeks in Tenochtitlán, knowing their leader was in chains and having to feed not just a band of Spaniards but thousands of their Tlaxcalteca allies, the strain began to weigh on the city. The Pastoral epistles are usually considered a separate category, no longer generally attributed to Paul, save by traditionalists (also possibly pseudonymous):. Cortés then seized Moctezuma in his own palace and made him his prisoner as insurance against Aztec revolt, and demanded an enormous ransom of gold, which was duly delivered. The Deutero-Pauline Epistles(suspected to be pseudonymous). All his demands were met.

Undisputed Pauline Epistles (almost certainly authentic). Christopher be set up in their place. The Pauline Corpus: those considered to be the "prison-letters" are marked with an asterisk (*). He also demanded that the two large idols be removed from the main temple pyramid in the city, the human blood scrubbed off, and shrines to the Virgin Mary and St. Since at least 1750, a number of other letters commonly attributed to Paul have also been suspected of having been written by his followers some time in the 1st century—so early that religious writers like Marcion and Tertullian knew of no other author for them. Cortés asked for more gifts of gold as a vassal of Charles V. His possible authorship of the Epistle to the Hebrews had been questioned as early as Origen. Moctezuma had the palace of his father Axayacatl prepared to house the Spanish and their Indian allies.

A subgroup of these letters, written from captivity, are called the "prison-letters", and tradition states they were written in Rome. The two halves of the planet had found one another. Those letters that have survived are part of the New Testament canon, where they appear in order of length, from longest to shortest. Moctezuma welcomed Cortés to Tenochtitlán on the Great Causeway into the "Venice of the West," probably the largest city on earth, and many people mark this moment – when two high civilizations met after 40,000 years of isolation – as the true discovery of the New World. However, not all have been preserved; 1 Corinthians 5:9 alludes to a previous letter sent by him to the Christians in Corinth that has clearly been lost. How could God allow heathens such splendor? The expedition arrived in the Mexica-Aztec capital on November 8, 1519. Paul wrote a number of letters to Christian churches and individuals. Surely it was the most magnificent city in the world.

See also Authorship of the Pauline Epistles. When the Spaniards saw the island city of Tenochtitlán for the first time, from the ring of volcanoes around the Valley of Mexico, they asked each other if they were dreaming. The true subversive nature of Paul's ethic was not that the Church seek to subvert the Empire (vindication in full had already been promised), but that the Church not be subverted by the Empire in its wait for Christ's return. Terror was one of his many powerful tools, though much of his military genius can be ascribed to La Malinche, who had her own motives for revenge. The christianity which Paul envisioned was one in which adherents lived unburdened by the norms of Roman and Jewish society to freely follow the promise of an already established but not yet fully present Kingdom of God, promised by Jesus and instituted in his own Resurrection. Cortés then sent a message ahead to Moctezuma that the lords of Cholula had treated him with disrespect and had to be punished, but if Moctezuma treated him with respect and gifts of gold, the Aztecs need not fear his wrath. The ethic being that the Christian's life is not to be lived out of hope for what the Roman Empire could provide (legal, martial and economic advantage) or the pharisaical system could provide (legalistic, self-dependent salvation), but out of hope in the Resurrection and promises of Jesus. Although he did not know if this was true or not, Cortés ordered a preventive strike to serve as a lesson: the Spaniards seized and killed the local nobles, set fire to the city and killed an estimated 15,000 to 30,000 of the inhabitants.

If Jesus is lord, then Caesar is not, and so on. After Cortés arrived in Cholula, the second largest city of the Empire, La Malinche relayed a rumor that the locals planned to murder the Spaniards in their sleep. Paul used these titles to expand upon the ethic of Jesus with words from and for his own place and time in history. He also purchased cotton armour, seeing how much more effective than chainmail it was against Indian arrows. Ancient Roman inscriptions had called Augustus the evangelon (good news) for Rome. The Tlaxcaltecas agreed; Cortés then continued his march with some 2,000 Tlaxcalteca warriors and perhaps as many more porters. When Paul refers to Jesus' life as the "Good News", evangelion in Greek, he is using another title claimed by Augustus. Otherwise, Cortés threatened, he would kill everyone in their entire nation.

Augustus had claimed the titles "Lord of Lords", "King of Kings", and "Son of God" (as he was the adopted son of Julius Caesar, whom he declared to be a god). Cortés's "lord" was Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, to whom he made his case by letters, over the head of Velázquez, who, in turn, was trying to make a case over the head of Diego Colón, son of Christopher Columbus and thus Admiral of the Ocean Sea. Paul used titles to describe Jesus that were also claimed by the Caesars. Cortés said that if the men of Tlaxcala would accept Christianity, become his allies and vassals to his lord, he would forgive their disrespect and overthrow their nemesis, Emperor Moctezuma. Paul was not only establishing a new cultural awareness and a society of charity, but was also subverting Roman authority through language and action. The Tlaxcaltecas attacked his troops, but Spanish crossbows, broadswords, battle axes, horses, war dogs and firearms quickly won the battle. Due to his authority, these views have had an influence in Western society into modern times; Paul's apparent failure to explicitly condemn slavery in his Epistle to Philemon may have been sometimes interpreted as justifying the ownership of human beings. Cortés arrived at Tlaxcala, a small independent state within the empire's sphere of influence.

7:21ff.). Cortés then led his band inland towards the fabled Tenochtitlán. Paul may have been ambivalent towards slavery, saying that pending the near return of Jesus, people should focus on their faith and not on their social status (1 Cor. He ordered all his fleet scuttled (not burned as legend has it), except for one small ship with which to communicate with Spain, effectively stranding the expedition in Mexico and ending all thoughts of loyalty to the Governor of Cuba. 5:21-33). While some of the expedition wanted to get such gold as they could quickly by trade or theft and then return to Cuba, Cortés had seen the results of this sort of plunder and had plans to build a working empire of his own. 7, Eph. (One-Reed was, in this particular 52-year "century", 1519, adding to the extraordinary luck of this conquistador.) Aided by the advice of his native translator, La Malinche, he took full advantage of the Quetzalcoatl myth, inflicting Moctezuma with what writer Octavio Paz described as "sacred vertigo".

4:1-6), and marriage (1 Cor. Cortés learned that he was suspected of being Quetzalcoatl or an emissary of Quetzalcoatl, a legendary man-god who was predicted to one day return to reclaim his city in a One-Reed year on the cyclical calendar. 1:10-17, Eph. It had the opposite effect, of course. 11), the unity of believers (1 Cor. Soon ambassadors from the Mexica/Aztec Emperor Moctezuma II arrived with additional gifts, apparently hoping to keep him at a distance by satisfying him with gold. 2:6-23), proper worship and church discipline (1 Cor. He learned that the land was ruled by the great lord in the city of Tenochtitlán.

8, Col. The local Totonac from Cempoala greeted him with gifts of food, feathers, gold – and women, who always had to be baptized before the eager Spanish soldiers were allowed to let them "fix supper for them" ("grind their corn"). 5, 1 Cor. By establishing a municipality, he could "reluctantly" proceed to claim land for king Charles V of Spain by popular mandate of the city magistrates he had appointed, his friends. Other Pauline teachings are on freedom in Christ (Gal. After short stops in Yucatán where there was little gold but the priceless gift of two translators, one "La Malinche" later made legendary even if not quite an Aztec princess sold into Mayan slavery, another a shipwrecked Spaniard who had also learned a Mayan dialect during seven years of slavery, Cortés landed his party in a location he named Veracruz ("True Cross") on March 4. 3:1-17). In 1519 Cortés fled Cuba with 11 ships, 500 men, and 15 horses.

5:21–33, Col. He was forbidden to colonize, but calling upon what law he had studied and his famous powers of persuasion, he tricked Governor Velázquez into inserting a clause about emergency measures that might have to be taken without prior authorization, "in the true interests of the realm." At the last minute, the Governor sensing that Cortés was too ambitious for his own good, changed his mind. 5:27|27-28; see also 1 Cor 6:9ff.; Eph. Cortés eagerly sold or mortgaged all his lands to buy ships and supplies and arranged with the Governor of Cuba, Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar, another distant relative and his father-in-law, to lead an expedition, officially to explore and trade with the rumored new lands to the west. 6:18) -- based on the moral laws of the Old Testament and the teachings of Jesus (Matt. Expeditions to Yucatán by Francisco Hernández de Córdoba in 1517 and Juan de Grijalva in 1518 had returned to Cuba with small amounts of gold, and tales of a more distant land where gold was said to be abundant. All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body" (1 Cor. The brutality of the Cuba campaign and the subsequent extinction of the Indian population from disease, overwork and despair would later influence Cortés's more careful treatment of the Mexicans as Captain-General of New Spain, making possible, ironically, the survival of so many "genotypically" full-blooded Indians, Indian tribes, and Indian languages in Mexico today.

Paul condemned sexual immorality, saying "Flee from sexual immorality. This was the encomienda that had worked so well in the conquest of the Canaries (eliminating the indigenous Guanches) but would prove devastating in the New World. 3:1-17). He took part in the conquest of Hispaniola and Cuba and was granted a large estate of land and Indian slaves for his efforts. In the same passage, Paul extols the virtues of compassion, kindness, patience, forgiveness, love, peace, and gratitude (Col. Due to several setbacks, Cortés did not arrive in the New World until 1506. He condemns such things as impurity, lust, greed, anger, slander, filthy language, lying, and racial divisions. He had a choice between seeking fame and glory in a war in Italy, or trying his luck in the Spanish colonies of the New World.

These standards have highly influenced Western society for centuries. Cortés took classes at Salamanca but bitterly disappointed his parents by returning home in 1501 at age 17, rather than studying law like his grandfather. In his letter to the Colossians, Paul expounds on how a follower of Christ should live a radically different life - using heavenly standards instead of earthly ones. Through his mother, he was second cousin to Francisco Pizarro, who later conquered the Inca empire of modern-day Peru (not to be confused with another Francisco Pizarro who joined Cortés in conquering the Aztecs). Paul's writings on social issues were just as influential on the life and beliefs of Christian culture, as were his doctrinal statements. Cortés was born in Medellín, (Extremadura), in the Kingdom of Castile in Spain, the only child of Martín Cortés and Catalina Pizarro Altamirano. Paul's notion that the Holy Spirit dwells within all believers at the time of their conversion, is integral to his soteriology, ecclesiology, missiology, and eschatology. .

These references would later take shape as the doctrine of the Trinity. Hernán Cortés, marqués del Valle de Oaxaca (1485–December 2, 1547) (who was known as Hernando or Fernando Cortés during his lifetime and signed all his letters Fernán Cortés) was the conquistador who conquered Mexico for Spain. Much of Romans, and particularly the ending to 2 Corinthians, portrays the Spirit in equality with the Father and the Son. The Rain God cries over Mexico by László Passuth. Paul also manifests a strong doctrine of the Holy Spirit. Prescott ISBN 0375758038. His missionary work amongst non-Jews helped to raise Christianity beyond its initial reputation as a dissident (if not heretical) Jewish sect, at least with the populace, if not the Roman Imperial party. History of the Conquest of Mexico. by William H.

While a number of passages in the Gospels (e.g., Mark) acknowledge that Gentiles might enjoy the benefits of Jesus, Paul claims to be "The Apostle to the Gentiles" -- a title that can be traced to Galatians 2:8. Cortés and the Downfall of the Aztec Empire by Jon Manchip White (1971) ISBN 0786702710. One development clearly not original to Paul, (for example see Isaiah 56:6-8), but for which he became the chief advocate, was the conversion of non-Jews to Christianity. Conquest: Cortés, Montezuma, and the Fall of Old Mexico by Hugh Thomas (1993) ISBN 0671511041. Paul was also one of the first Christians to expound the doctrine of Christ's divine nature. The Broken Spears: The Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico by Miguel Leon-Portilla ISBN 0807055018. This doctrine was confirmed at the Apostolic Council (see above). Bernal Díaz del Castillo, The Conquest of New Spain – available as The Discovery and Conquest of Mexico: 1517-1521 ISBN 030681319X.

His writings also express the doctrine that salvation is not achieved by conforming to Mosaic Law, but through faith in (or the faith of) Jesus. Hernan Cortés, Letters – available as Letters from Mexico translated by Anthony Pagden (1986) ISBN 0300090943. In the New Testament, the doctrine of original sin is most clearly expressed by Paul's writings. Related to Paul's interpretation of the resurrection are his concepts of faith, which he explains through his explanation of Abraham, and of righteousness and the forgiveness for sins, using language that Augustine of Hippo later elaborated upon in his formulation of original sin. Roman Catholic and Orthodox theology disputes this, asserting that passages cited in Paul are being misinterpreted, and that this interpretation is directly contradicted by James 2:24: "man is justified by works, and not by faith alone." (KJV).

Most Protestant denominations assert that Paul's teachings constitute a definitive statement that salvation comes only by faith, and not by any external action of the believer. justification by faith and works. This belief leads directly to the modern argument of justification by faith vs. However, there is some evidence suggesting that Paul's concept of salvation coming from the death of Jesus was not unique amongst early Christians; Philippians 2:5–11, expounds a Christology similar to Paul's, and has long been identified as a hymn of early Christians dated as existing before Paul's letter.

The assumption that Paul was anti-Law, (indeed that even Jesus was anti-Law), found its largest proponent in Marcion and Marcionism. Paul goes to Herod's Temple with four Nazarite pledges to show that he is not; however, when some people from Asia Minor (Paul's home area) see him, it starts a major riot. For example, in Acts 15 he accepts a subset (see Noahide Laws) of the Law for new Gentile converts; in Acts 16 he "personally" circumcises Timothy, even though his father is Greek, because his mother is of the Jewish faith; and in Acts 21, James challenges Paul about the rumor that he is teaching rebellion against the Law. The Acts of the Apostles definitely depicts Paul as a Mosaic Law-observant Jew.

The Ethiopian Orthodox, who claim to be the only church free of Marcionism, still observe some Mosaic Laws.^[2] The Apostolic Constitutions, generally dated around the 3rd century, though they claim to be from the Council of Jerusalem, are pro-Mosaic Law (see 2.36, 6.19, 7.23). The Didache does not have this concept. It was not until his later letter to the Corinthians that he alluded to the possibility of eternal life, that one often hears about in more conservative churches, and in turn was held to supersede the value of the Mosaic Law -- a belief often expressed as "Jesus died for our sins." It is unclear how much of this idea is original to Paul; Jerome notes the existence in the 4th century of a Christian sect in Syria called the Ebionites who still observed the Mosaic Law, thus suggesting that at least some Christians may not have believed in the salvatory qualities of the Passion. (Romans 3:22, Galatians 3:22, etc.).

The first was that of the centrality of faith within the life of Jesus, and the ability to attain righteousness through such. Paul had several major impacts on the nature of Christian doctrine. It is commonly accepted that Paul died as a martyr in Rome. While there is little evidence to support any of these traditions, there is no evidence contradicting them either, nor any alternative tradition of Paul's eventual fate.

One Gaius, who wrote during the time of Pope Zephyrinus, mentions Paul's tomb as standing on the Via Ostensis. Eusebius of Caesarea states that Paul was beheaded in the reign of the Roman Emperor Nero; this event has been dated either to the year 64, when Rome was devastated by a fire, or a few years later, to 67. Another tradition, that can also be traced to the first century, places his death in Rome. 15:22–7), the evidence is inconclusive.

One tradition holds (attested as early as in 1 Clement 5:7, and in the Muratorian fragment) that Paul visited Spain; while this was his intention (Rom. We are forced to turn to tradition for the details of Paul's final years. While Paul's letters to the Ephesians and to Philemon may have been written while he was imprisoned in Rome (the traditional interpretation), they just as likely may have been written during his earlier imprisonments at Caesarea (first suggested in 1799), or at Ephesus (suggested in the early 20th century). Acts only recounts Paul's life until he arrived in Rome, around 61; Paul's own letters cease to furnish information about his activities long before then.

The three months when navigation was considered most dangerous were spent there, where Paul is said to have healed the father of the Roman Governor Publius from fever, and other people who where sick, and preached the gospel; but with the first days of spring, all haste was made to resume the voyage. His advice was not followed, and the vessel, driven by the tempest, drifted aimlessly for fourteen whole days, being finally wrecked on the coast of Malta. At Myra in Lycia, the prisoners were transferred to an Alexandrian vessel transporting wheat bound for Italy, but the winds being persistently contrary, a place in Crete called Goodhavens was reached with great difficulty, and Paul advised that they should spend the winter there. They skirted the coasts of Syria, Cilicia, and Pamphylia.

As the season was advanced, the voyage was slow and difficult. The centurion Julius had shipped Paul and his fellow prisoners aboard a merchant vessel, whereon Luke and Aristarchus were able to take passage. Acts describes Paul's journey from Caesarea to Rome in some detail. Paul claimed his right, as a Roman citizen, to be tried in Rome; but owing to the inaction of the governor Antonius Felix, Paul languished in confinement at Caesarea Palaestina for two years until a new governor, Porcius Festus, took office, held a hearing, and sent Paul by sea to Rome, where he spent another two years in detention (Acts 28:30).

2:10), Ananias the High Priest made accusations against him that again resulted in his imprisonment (Acts 24:1–5). Upon Paul's arrival in Jerusalem with the relief funds requested at the Council of Jerusalem (Gal. As a result, when he later raised money for victims of a famine in Judea and his journey to Jerusalem took him through the province once again, he carefully sailed around Ephesus -- instead summoning his followers to meet him in Miletus (20:17–38). Their income relied on the sale of silver statues of the goddess Artemis, whom they worshipped, and the resulting mob almost killed him (19:21–41).

He caused a great uproar in the theatre in Ephesus, where local silversmiths feared loss of income due to Paul's activities. Following this hearing, Paul continued his preaching (usually called his Third Missionary Journey), traveling again through Asia Minor and Macedonia, to Antioch and back. From an inscription in Delphi that mentions Gallio, we are able to securely date this hearing as having occurred in the year 52, providing a secure date for the chronology of Paul's life. Again he ran into legal trouble in Corinth: on the complaints of a group of Jews, he was brought before the proconsul Gallio, who decided that it was a minor matter not worth his attention and dismissed the charges (Acts 18:12–16).

First he came to Athens, where he gave his legendary speech in Areios Pagos and said he was talking in the name of the Unknown God who was already worshipped there (17:16–34); then he traveled to Corinth, where he settled for three years, and wrote the earliest of his letters to survive, 1 Thessalonians. Paul then traveled along the Via Egnatia to Thessalonica, where he stayed for some time, before departing for Greece. 2:2 KJV); the author of Acts, perhaps drawing from a witness (this passage follows closely on one of the "we passages"), explains here that Paul exorcised a spirit from a female slave—ending her ability to tell fortunes, and reducing her value—an act the slave's owner claimed was theft, wherefore he had Paul briefly put in prison (Acts 16:22). Paul himself tersely describes his experience as "when we suffered and were shamefully treated" (1 Thess.

Paul spent the next few years traveling through western Asia Minor -- this time entering Macedonia -- and founded his first Christian church in Philippi, where he encountered harassment. 4:10). Later on, there is some reconciliation—Paul mentions that John Mark is in prison with him, and tells the church in Colossae to welcome him if he comes to them (Col. However, Paul and Barnabas then had a severe falling-out over whether they should take John, surnamed Mark (Barnabas' cousin) with them, and they went on separate journeys (Acts 15:36–41)—Barnabas with John Mark, and Paul with Silas.

Acts recounts nothing of this, saying that "some time later", Paul decided to leave Antioch, (giving the impression he lost the argument with Peter) -- usually considered the beginning of his Second Missionary Journey -- with the object of visiting the believers in the towns where he and Barnabas had preached earlier. 2:11–18). Despite the agreement they achieved at the Council as understood by Paul, Paul recounts how he later publicly berated Peter (accusing him of Judaizing) over his reluctance to share a meal with gentile Christians in the "Incident of Antioch" (Gal. 2:9 KJV).

The letter also refers to Barnabas and Paul as "beloved" (Acts 15:25 KJV); compare Paul's account "James, Cephas [Peter] and John, those reputed to be pillars, gave to me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship" (Gal. (Acts 15:29). They sent a letter accompanied by some leaders from the Jerusalem church back with Paul and his party to confirm that the Gentile believers should not be overburdened by Mosaic Law beyond abstaining from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals, and from sexual immorality. Returning to Acts 15, after much debate and discussion, Peter says that "[God] made no distinction between us [Jews] and them [Gentiles], but cleansed their hearts by faith." (Acts 15:9 KJV), and James the Just states that "we should not trouble those of the Gentiles who are turning to God" (Acts 15:19 KJV).

A rumor that Paul aimed to subvert the Law of Moses is cited in Acts 21:21, however, according to Acts, Paul followed James' instructions to show that he "kept and walked in the ways of the Law". (see Antinomianism). 2:2) that he wanted to make sure what he had been teaching to the Gentile believers in previous years was correct— one interpretation is that his teaching was that Christ's fulfillment of the Mosaic Law by death and resurrection had freed Christian believers from the need to obey Mosaic Law. He stated (Gal.

2:4 KJV). 2:2 KJV), "because of false brethren secretly brought in, who slipped in to spy out our freedom which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage" (Gal. [he] preached among the Gentiles" (Gal. Paul states that he had attended "in response to a revelation", to "lay before them the gospel ..

This was said to be the result of men coming to Antioch from Judea and "teaching the brothers: 'Unless you are circumcised, according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved'" (Acts 15:1 KJV) (see Legalism). Some interpret this to mean whether Christians should continue to observe all of the Mosaic Laws, the most important being considered the practice of circumcision and dietary laws. Acts states that Paul was the head of a delegation from the Antiochene church that came to discuss whether new converts needed to be circumcised. Here the accounts of Acts 15 and Paul's Galatians 2:1-10 come at things from fairly different angles.

About AD 49, after fourteen years of preaching, Paul travelled to Jerusalem with Barnabas and Titus to meet with the leaders of the Jerusalem church—namely James the Just, Saint Peter, and John the Apostle; an event commonly known as the Council of Jerusalem. 11:24–27). He endured hardships on these journeys: he was imprisoned in Philippi, was lashed and stoned several times, and almost murdered once (2 Cor. Barnabas, Silas, Titus, Timothy, John, surnamed Mark, Aquila and Priscilla all accompanied him for some or all of these travels.

For these journeys, Paul usually chose one or more companions for his travels. These missionary journeys are considered the defining actions of Paul. 1:18–20); and though Acts states that Paul later "went through Syria and Cilicia, strengthening the churches" (Acts 15:41), it does not explicitly state that these were churches founded by Paul on a previous journey. Paul merely mentions that he preached in Syria and Cilicia (Gal.

Acts states he went to Antioch, whence he set out to travel through Cyprus and southern Asia Minor to preach of Christ -- a labor that has come to be known as his "First Missionary Journey" (13:13, 14:28). Following this visit to Jerusalem, Paul's own writings and Acts slightly differ on his next activities. He traveled to Jerusalem, where he met Saint Peter and James the Just. 11:32ff.).

1:17–20) until he was forced to flee from that city under the cover of night (Acts 9:23–25; 2 Cor. Following his conversion, Paul first went to live in the Nabataean kingdom (which he called "Arabia") for three years, then returned to Damascus (Gal. In addition, an adequate explanation for Paul's conversion is lacking in the absence of his vision. 1:13–16).

15:8 KJV), and frequently claimed that his authority as "Apostle to the Gentiles" came directly from God (Gal. However, Paul did write that Jesus appeared to him "last of all, as to one untimely born" (1 Cor. Paul himself offers no clear description of the event in any of his surviving letters; and this, along with the fact that the author of Acts describes Paul's conversion with subtle differences in two later passages, has led some scholars to question whether Paul's vision actually occurred. Acts 9:1–9 memorably describes the vision Paul had of Jesus on the road to Damascus, a vision that led him to dramatically reverse his opinion.

3:6) but later embraced the belief that he had fought against. Paul himself admits that he at first persecuted Christians (Phil. Furthermore, this view contends that Paul embraced ideas from esoteric mystery religions of the time, later superimposing them on the teachings of Jesus. They state that citizenship would have required participation in the Imperial Cult, which would have been in conflict with Hebrew religious ideals.

The Ebionites and Restorationists argue that Paul was a Roman who tried to convert to Judaism so he could marry or court a Jewish woman and that his conversion was denied. Because Paul himself never mentions this privilege, some scholars have expressed skepticism as to whether Paul actually possessed citizenship; such an honor was uncommon during his lifetime. Acts 22:25 and 27–29 also state that Paul was a Roman citizen -- a privilege he used a number of times to defend his dignity, including appealing his conviction in Iudaea Province to Rome. He was unmarried and taught that single people should remain unmarried (1 Cor 7:8).

According to Romans 16:2 he had a patroness (Greek prostatis) named Phoebe [1]. 9:13–15); according to Acts 18:3, he worked as a tentmaker. Paul supported himself during his travels and while preaching -- a fact he alludes to a number of times (e.g., 1 Cor. However, some scholars, such as Helmut Koester, have expressed their doubts that Paul either was in Jerusalem at this time or studied under this famous rabbi.

According to Acts 22:3, he studied in Jerusalem under Gamaliel; Thomas Robinson depicts Paul as coming to study in Jerusalem under Gamaliel, when Shammai became Nasi of the Sanhedrin, and during the rise to supremacy of the house of Shammai from AD 20. He was born as Saul in Tarsus of Cilicia and received a Jewish education. 1:14 KJV). more exceedingly zealous of the traditions" (Gal.

3:5), and of the "Jews' religion .. 11:1; Phil. Paul described himself as an Israelite of the tribe of Benjamin, circumcised on the eighth day, a Pharisee (Rom. There are many points of contention, even among scholars, but this outline reflects an effort to trace the major events of Paul's life.

The following construction of a possible chronology is based on this fourth approach. Brown explains (An Introduction to the New Testament, 1998), historians take one of four approaches:. Because of the problems with the two contemporary sources, as Raymond E. However, the events recorded in this work do not coincide with any of the events recorded in either Paul's letters or Acts, and scholars usually dismiss this as a 2nd century novel.

There is also the apocryphal Acts of Paul and Thecla. However, both sources have weaknesses: Paul's surviving letters were written during a short period of his life, perhaps only between AD 50 and 58; and the author of Acts makes a number of statements that have drawn suspicion (e.g., the claim that Paul was present at the death of Stephen [7:58]). In reconstructing the events of Paul's life, we have two sources, written either during, or soon after, the period of his life: Paul's own surviving letters (although his authorship of some of these has been disputed; see below), and the narrative of the Acts of the Apostles, which at several points draws from the record of an eyewitness (the so-called "we passages"). .

Many Christian scholars say that no teachings were modified, and assert that Paul taught in complete harmony with Jesus. However, this view remains controversial. Due to his body of work and his undoubted influence on the development of Christianity, many modern scholars have considered him the founder of Christianity, who modified Jesus' teachings and added important new doctrines. Some argue that he was instrumental in establishing Christianity as a distinct religion, rather than a sect of Judaism.

His epistles form a fundamental section of the New Testament. He did much to advance Christianity among the Gentiles, and is considered to be one source (if not the primary source) of early Church doctrine, and the founder of Pauline Christianity. Paul is venerated as a Saint by all the churches that honor saints, including those of the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Anglican traditions, and some Lutheran sects. He made the first great efforts through his Epistles to Gentile communities to show that the God of Abraham is for all people, rather than for Jews only, though he did not originate the idea; for example, see Isaiah 56:6-8.

Paul is described in the New Testament as a Hellenized Jew and Roman citizen from Tarsus (present-day Turkey), and as a great persecutor of Christians prior to his conversion to the religion. Many Christians view him as an important interpreter of the teachings of Jesus. 3–67) is widely considered to be central to the early development and adoption of Christianity. Paul of Tarsus (originally Saul of Tarsus or Paulus), also known as Saint Paul the Apostle, (ce.

The Legend and the Apostle : The Battle for Paul in Story and Canon Philadelphia: Westminster Press. MacDonald, Dennis Ronald, 1983. ISBN 0060155825. New York: Harper & Row, 1986.

The Mythmaker: Paul and the Invention of Christianity. Maccoby, Hyam. ISBN 0806513500. Paperback, 576 pages.

Carol Publishing Group, July 1992. The 100. Hart, Michael. Jesus, Paul and the Law 1990 ISBN 0664250955.

Dunn, James D.G. Bruce, F.F., Paul: Apostle of the Heart Set Free (ISBN 0802847781). ISBN 0385247672. Anchor Bible Series, 1997.

An Introduction to the New Testament. Brown, Raymond E. Christ the End of the Law, Romans 10.4 in Pauline Perspective 1985 ISBN 0905774930 argues that telos is correctly translated as goal, not end, so that Christ is the goal of the Law, end of the law would be antinomianism. Badenas, Robert.

(New York: HarperCollins, 1992). ^  John Shelby Spong, "The Man From Tarsus," in Rescuing the Bible From Fundamentalism, reprint ed. 4 (Winter 2000–2001). ^  Pamela Eisenbaum, "Is Paul the Father of Misogyny and Antisemitism?," Cross Currents 50, no.

^  The Ethiopian Orthodox Church, CNEWA. The Correspondence of Paul and Seneca the Younger. Epistle to the Laodiceans. 3 Corinthians.

Epistle to the Macedonians (lost). Epistle to the Alexandrians (lost). Titus. 2 Timothy.

1 Timothy. 2 Thessalonians. Colossians*. Ephesians*.

Philemon*. 1 Thessalonians. Philippians*. Galatians.

2 Corinthians. 1 Corinthians. Romans. an intermediate approach, which treats Paul's testimony as primary, and supplements this evidence with material from Acts.

(Ebionite and Restorationist view). the approach to completely disregard anything that Paul has written. the approach used by a number of modern scholars, which is to distrust Acts; sometimes entirely; and to use the material from Paul's letters almost exclusively; or. the traditional approach is to completely trust the narrative of Acts, and fit the materials from Paul's letters into that narrative;.