After consulting other sources about the Gospels, I continued my study of the New Testament. These were long days of reading and writing, and I am going to try to cut the comments by about half . . .
August 5
I’ve decided I’m just going to read Freeman, and not try to capture every interesting thing he says. A lot of it is stuff I already know, but there are some interesting tidbits. I like his attitude, which is that of attempting to find a historical Jesus who would have made sense to first century Jews. To understand the cultural context so that his actions make sense – but more, that the individual motives/positions of the gospel writers makes sense. He doesn’t at all say, “there are contradictions, so it must not be true.” He instead says, “There are contradictions, so there must be reasons why different people saw him in different ways.” This is the same attitude I have, the same motivation.
After building the argument that Jesus was most comfortable and successful with the “little’ people of rural, provincial Galilee, and had little success in the towns, Foster is able to make the strong point that Jesus was an outsider in Jerusalem. Barabas was, or might have been, an insider with a lot of support for his insurrection. It goes a long way to explain why the people (and Caiaphus) would use Jesus as a way to save one of their own.
He points out how difficult it was to make a charge that would stick, why Pilate would have acquicsed (fear of revolt, or being called disloyal to Caesar), and how odd it is that they didn’t go after his followers. They can’t have been considered a threat, and it supports the idea that Jesus’ actions in the temple were the catalyst.
He talks about the devastation the disciples must have felt, says Christians avoided depictions of the crucifixion for 400 years. A footnote says the 1st was an anti-Christian Roman graffito of a donkey, hanging from a cross. Their Santa Sabina in Rome had Jesus with outstretched arms and nail holes, but no cross, in the 5th century (p.359).
Paul spent 15 days with Peter in Rome, so he would have heard about the resurrection first hand. He writes about it in the 50s, at least 20 years before the Gospels. He says Peter, then 12 disciples, then 500 people, then James and the Apostles, and finally Paul. What about Mary? Is that a later fabrication, or did Peter supplant her, given the tension some (Gnostics) report between them? Haven’t yet dissected Acts, or Corinthians, but Freeman says Paul clearly thought Jesus wasn’t corporeal, but a spirit; the gospels are unclear and confused as to what sort of being he was.
The apostles are still focused on the immanent return of Jesus and the Kingdom of God. I’ll be reading Acts next, but Freeman says Peter says that Jesus ‘was a man commended to you by God” – the idea that he might have been divine was completely alien to Jewish thought, and just would not have occurred to them (p.104). Since Jesus died, the apostles cannot use the scriptures that refer to the Messiah coming in triumph and establishing the kingdom – not without serious re-interpretation. So they must turn to other scriptures which refer to one being “torn from the land . . . for our faults struck down.” Isaiah 53:8-10. From here they develop the notion of a Messiah who gives his life for our sins. That’s not as attractive as one who conquers, but it is enough for them to be able to call him Christ, even though he apparently failed. A footnote says Jews reject this and point out that in the original context, the person described is not a messianic figure. So they were really reaching, as I think is clear in Matthew’s attempts to bend and torture scripture and the life of Jesus to fit. First use of the term “Christians” comes from Antioch.
That’s all of Freeman I want to read right now. May read parts of Armstrong and Pagels that deal with the gospels.
Armstrong p.8: “The Psalms sometimes refer to David as the ‘Son of God,’ but that was simply a way of expressing his intimacy with Yahweh. Nobody since the return from Babylon had imagined that Yahweh actually had a son, like the abominable deities of the goyim.”
Armstrong suggests Jesus' arguments with the Pharisees may really be with the even more stringent school of Shammai (pg. 81). “there was nothing particularly unusual” in a voice from heaven identifying someone as “son of God” or “Beloved Son” pg.81, and she cites examples.
Jesus stressed that all could do the same miracles, if they were like him, I.e. surrendered themselves wholly to God’s will. She talks about Paul’s break from the early disciples over whether gentiles could be followers p.83, and says, “Paul never called Jesus God.” He calls him Son of God in the Jewish sense, but “he certainly did not believe Jesus was the incarnation of God himself.” (p.83).
Armstrong places the urge to deify Jesus in global context. She points out that all of the Axial Age religions, which around 500 BCE made the move from local, partial deities to universal beings/processes, all begin around 10o BCE-100CE to develop personal devotion. The Mahayana Buddhists invent the concept of bodhisattva in the first century BCE, the first statues of the Buddha are put up at Gandhara and Mathira (p.84). [Bodhisattvas are those who sacrifice themselves for the salvation of the world]. And in Hinduism, bhakti yoga develops.
People who cannot relate to the austerity of the Upanishads personalize Brahman into the trinity of Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva. And Vishnu incarnates himself in avatars, particularly the beloved Krishna, who is both loved as a very human human – a child, a lover of cowgirls, a devoted husband – but also reveals himself to Arjuna as The God, terrifying in his vastness, his incorporation of all things, the source and completion of all things.
Isn’t this helpful? There is again a global trend. One can easily see how Buddhism and Hinduism influenced one another. Was there something about the stage of social/political/ economic development? Or something about the stage in the cyclical/spiral development of philosophical/religious thinking?
It is a good reminder that, while it is important to understand Jesus in the local context, it is also important to pull back and see the global trends. The development of Mahayana, bhakti and Christianity “all answer the need of the masses of humanity for a personal relationship with the ultimate” p.86. In the Eastern traditions, though, the Ultimate is seen as multiple and diverse; no one depiction can contain its greatness/vastness. Why is Christianity different?
Armstrong says Paul referred to Greek rationalism as mere “foolishness” I Corinth 1:24. Later, its important to remember that the early Christians were not philosophically sophisticated and weren’t interested in creating a theology, even. Religion was not a matter of carefully considered intellectual positions, but rather a set of attitudes – a “cultivated attitude of commitment” p.93. when they said their “creeds,” they were “assenting to” an emotional, not a logical or intellectual proposition. “Credo” meant to “give one’s heart” not “I think.”
Justin of Caesarea (100-165) was one of the first Greek Christians to try to explain Christianity to the rational Greeks. Armstrong describes him as not very bright, having studied under 3 different philosophers and understanding none of them. He said Christians were simply following Plato. Argued Jesus was the Logos, the Divine Reason – but he couldn’t explain this very well.
Basilides and Valentinus in Alexandria were Gnostics, who taught that first there was the Godhead, the ineffable One, Source, Simplicity, No-thing. It wasn’t content to be alone, so It generated “emanations” similar to the pagan mythologies. Gets complicated, but one of the main points is that one of the aeons, in a fit of pique, created the earth (as a result of his fall). Thus the Logos, another one of the aeons, had to come to the rescue by incarnating as Jesus (p.96). They never meant these to be literal – they were ‘symbolic expressions of an inner truth.” A quote from one of them sounds an awful lot like Buddhism.
Marcion, 100-165, a Roman who founded his own church, makes a good point. If a sound tree produces only good fruit, as Jesus said, then how could the world have been created by a good God? I asked my Dad the same question as an early teen. Dad’s answer was the devil, which didn’t satisfy, because why does a good God allow the devil to exist?
Marcion’s answer was that Yahweh was an entirely different God than the one Jesus talked about. The Hebrew scriptures don’t mention, even hide, the existence of this good God. He counseled throwing out the Old Testament and just concentrate on the teachings of Jesus, and he attracted a huge following. Armstrong points out that he’d put his finger on something important in the Christian experience – we don’t know what to make of the Hebrew God (p.97).
Tertullian (160-220), a North African theologian, pointed out Marcion’s god was more Aristotle’s Unmoved Mover than Jesus’ god.
August 6
The Sunday-school trained girl in me is worried that the God of the Hebrews is not happy with me for all the questions I’m posing. But the Hindu-influenced speculative me thinks perhaps this is precisely what the One, the God-Who-Was-Alone, wants; that this is what he/it created us for. To ask and ask and figure out what it is. Possibly because it doesn’t know, Itself.
It is gratifying that greater minds than mine have asked the same questions, been disturbed by the same things. Makes me feel less alone. People today take it so for granted that Jesus was the incarnation of God, as if it were something obvious. But it wasn’t obvious. In fact, the thought was not only foreign, but repellent, to Jews, Greeks and Romans alike.
Clement of Alexandria (c.150-215) thought the God of the Jews and of Plato were the same. He called Plato the Attic Moses p.98. “His god was characterized by his ‘apotheia’; he was utterly impassible, unable to suffer or change.” This doesn’t sound much like Jesus’ or the Hebrew God to me! But Clement figured the way to be close to this god was by mimicking him. Be calm and quiet, and one would discover the Quietness within. Seems a little Buddhist influenced, without really understanding it. He did think Jesus was God, but he thought we also could become divine. If we followed his program we would be deified and participate in divine life.
However, he didn’t think Jesus did it that way. Jesus was the logos, by which Clement meant ‘divine wisdom,’ who had “become man so that you might learn from a man how to become God” p.98. Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons (130-200), was teaching the same thing. But how do they square this with the God of the Torah? He is anything but calm and impassive. As Armstrong points out, Clements’s theology left a lot of unanswered questions. How does the logos become human? How can Jesus be god, and there only be one god? Armstrong says that Christians, as the notion of Jesus’ divinity developed, became anxious over that last question, as well they should.
Sabellius, first century Roman in Rome, suggested the biblical names “Father, Son, Spirit” were like the masks of actors. Most Christians, Armstrong says, were distressed at the idea, because it suggested that the Father, supposed to be impassible and omnipotent, had suffered with the Son on the cross, and this they didn’t accept. But Paul of Somosota, Bishop of Antioch from 260-272 almost lost his see when he said Jesus was just a man in whom the word of God dwelt, p.99. So, they aren’t happy either way. None of these formulations fit their experience, I guess, which is now 100-200 years after Jesus lived.
And then there was Origen. I’ve summarized him elsewhere, but his general idea was that we all, at one time, were in the presence of God, got bored contemplating his face, fell, were arrested by our bodies, and were now forever searching to get back. Jesus isn’t/wasn’t God, but his was the one soul that didn’t fall. He came to earth to show us how we could once again ascend the chain of being and be back in God’s presence. Belief in “Jesus’ divinity was only a phase; it would help us on our way, but would eventually be transcended when we would see God face to face” p.100. Origen was later declared heretical, in part because he didn’t believe God created the world ex nihilo, but also because he didn’t believe Jesus “saved” us; we save ourselves by following his path.
Plotinus (205-270), who studied in Alexandria, joined the Roman Army in hopes of going to India and eventually founded a prestigious school in Rome. I really like him – he seems to be attempting to merge Eastern and Greek philosophy. I’ve summarized him before. Armstrong covers his philosophy p.101-105.
After Plotinus, Armstrong discusses Montanus, a guy in Phygia, now Turkey, who lived after and around 170. He claimed to be an avatar of God (Hebrew?). “I am Father, Son and Paraclite” he claimed, as did his companions, Priscilla and Maximilla. He sounds pretty weird and crazy. Preached the immanent return of Christ, urged followers to extreme asceticism and celibacy and martyrdom. Death for the faith would “hasten the coming of Christ” p.105. Engaged in battle with evil forces. It spread all over Turkey, Syria, Gaul and North Africa! Even attracted Tertullian (p.105), the leading theologian of the Latin Church!
Armstrong points out that in the East, a Christianity was developing that preached “a peaceful, joyous return to God,” but in the West, a “more frightening God demanded hideous death as a condition of salvation.” P.105.
12:30 am. Since I’m up, I think I’ll go ahead and read Acts. I’d like to avoid commenting on every little thing, so I’m going to focus on: the view of Jesus, the early church, and the politics of that church. There’ll likely be other things I can’t resist.
Acts is thought to have been written by Luke, a companion of Paul, after his gospel. So circa 90-100 AD.
Anyway, in Acts 2:22-23, Peter refers to Jesus as “a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders . . . this man, delivered up by the predetermined plan.” No hint there of Jesus being God. In v. 24 he says it was impossible for Jesus to be held by death’s power and quotes David as saying “I was always beholding the Lord in my presence; For He is at my right hand, that I may not be shaken. . . Because Thou wilt not abandon my soul to Hades, nor allow They Holy One to decay. . . “ Then Peter argues that since David in fact did decay, he must have been prophesying about Jesus.
Acts 2:33 “Therefore having been exalted to the right hand of God . . .” Seems to say Jesus was a man, who through his goodness was rewarded by a special place/relationship with God.
2:36 “Let all Israel know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.” From the context of another quote from David (that Jesus also quoted to stump the priests in one or two of the gospels), “The Lord said to my Lord,” one could argue that Peter is saying Jesus was made divine, made equal with God. All in how one interprets “Lord.”
Right away they gain 3000 converts, and begin to live communally – sell their property, share with all as anyone had need, “continuing with one mind the temple” and eating from house to house “taking their meals together” praising God, and “having favor with all the people” 2:44-47. Sounds great, doesn’t it?
In chapter 3, Peter and John heal a man, and in Peter’s second sermon which follows, he refers to Jesus as a prophet “raised up his servant,” and “raise up” a prophet. Not incarnate.
4:32-36 More communalism, all selling and sharing their property with one another. Renounce private property. Ananias and his wife sold their property, but kept some money back, and Peter calls them on it. Not for keeping the cash, but for lying. And the guy falls down dead. So, some seeking personal glory. His wife also dies. Peter, in Luke’s account, doesn’t seem to be dealing with them harshly, it is God, or their own shame/guilt. Certainly would have scared everyone else!
The group is really making quite a scene, now. Hanging out in the Solomon portico, attracting more and more converts, and people are bringing their sick from all over for healing. They lay them in the street in hopes Peter’s shadow will fall on them and heal them. Unquestionably, he is the leader. 5:12-16. Again on trial with the Council, Peter says of Jesus, “He is the one whom God exalted to His right hand as a Prince and Savior” 5:31.
5:33-42 tells of Gamaliel, who was a student of Hillel’s and a highly respected teacher in his own right. He councils the priests to leave the disciples alone, and cites two other recent cases of men who claimed to be the Messiah and attracted followings – Theudas, and Judas of Galilee.
By chapter 6, they are getting big enough to have internal squabbling, and the need to organize/institutionalize daily life – they select 7 to oversee all of that – food, serving, etc. Stephen was one of them. Stephen, of course, gets stoned to death, having driven the priests over the edge. That seems to be the signal to open season against the church (yes, they are calling it that – probably ecclesia). And Saul is in the thick of the rounding up. 8:2 The followers scatter. What might have happened had the priests followed Gamaliel’s council?
Phillip is told by the Holy Spirit to go to the road to Gaza, where he meets and converts an Ethiopian Jew, and immediately after baptizing him, he is “snatched by the Holy Spirit” and deposited in another town, where he keeps preaching 8:39-40. Wow, don’t remember that.
August 7
. . . And God sends them out as missionaries. It isn’t clear how God is communicating His will. Sometimes people have visions, sometimes, like here, it just says, “the Holy Spirit said.” 13:2.
13:16-42. As to who Jesus was, he says that through David’s link, “God has brought to Israel a Savior” v.23. And cites Psalms, “Thou art my Son; Today I have begotten thee.” V.33, in reference to the resurrection, not the birth.
In chapter 15, a real bone of contention. Some men come to Antioch from Jerusalem and tell the gentile converts they must be circumcised. Barnabus and Paul had “great dissention and debate” with them. They realize they need to figure this out, so send B & P to Jerusalem, where a council occurs. Peter sides with Barnabus and Paul, saying if God made makes no distinction (I.e. the Holy Spirit entered uncircumcised men) then why should they? James also agrees, but with a few stipulations (don’t eat things sacrificed to idols, or blood, or things strangled and don’t fornicate). Everyone agrees, so they send Barbabbos and Silas with B & P back to Antioch with a letter, the tone of which speaks well for the early church 15:23-29. Also shows that B & P are “beloved” of that church, with no tension apparent.
Hmm – first sign of tension? When B & P are ready to set out again, Barnabus wants to include John (Mark) who went with them a little ways before. Paul doesn’t want to, as he feels John deserted them when it got tough “And there arose such a sharp disagreement that they separated” 15:39, Barnabus taking John and Paul taking Silas.
In 16:16, says they passed thru Phrygia and the Galatian region “having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia.” Why? And the spirit of Jesus didn’t permit them to go to Bythnia. After 16:11, Luke is saying “we” though he never described joining them.
God calls them to Macedonia and the first European convert is Lydia. 16:4. Note how, when people convert, their “households” are baptized. Do slaves have no free will? Again in 16:31, the jailer, Paul tells him to believe in Jesus and his whole household will be saved. Chapter 17 – says it is Paul’s custom to spend 3 Sabbaths trying to convert the Jews in the temple before giving the message to gentiles. Keeps getting thrown out, and Paul goes to Athens, where all the idol worshipping really bugs him.
Ahhh – 7pm, much better. A little rest, a little food, a pill working, and I’m good to go. Go where? Back to Athens with Paul, I guess. It is kind of fun to see it through a Hebrew’s eyes, or even a Greek’s (Luke) who was not familiar with it. How strange it must have seemed – the spirit of philosophical inquiry so very foreign to the Jews.
The Athenians saw him preaching in the marketplace and invited him to the Areopagus: “Now all the Athenians and the strangers visiting there used to spend their time in nothing other than telling or hearing something new.” 17:21. As if that is a bizarre thing to do! No wonder it took so long for Christianity to catch on in Greece. They must have seen Paul and his message as backward, unsophisticated, uneducated, provincial, etc.
In explaining his beliefs to them, he describes Jesus thus: “He (God) will judge the world in righteousness through a man he has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising him from the dead” 17:31. Claudius kicked all the Jews out of Rome (the city) 18:2. When? Why? Will look it up, but I'd guess he required them to worship him and they refused.
Big hullabaloo in Ephesus, home of Artemis and the “image that fell down from heaven” 19:35, which Luke attributes to the silversmiths, who were losing business in figurines of the goddess. Luke seems to have joined up with Paul again after that, in Macedonia. And Paul brings another back from the dead 20:9-10. Only fair, since he talked so long the lad fell asleep and out of a 3rd story window. But if Paul was really doing all Luke says, its no wonder people converted. He even blessed cloth, which healed people when carried home to them 19:11.
Passing Ephesus, Paul prophesies his death, or at least that he’ll never see them again. When he arrives in Jerusalem, the elders tell him the Jews will be after him due to stories they’ve heard that he’s counseling Jews to break the commandments. So they devise a plan for him to publicly demonstrate he’s kosher. 21:15-26. It doesn’t work; the Jews beat him up anyway, and he has to be rescued by a Roman soldier. He lets Paul address the mob, and Paul establishes his Jewishness, partly by saying he was a student of Gamaliel, the Pharisee, 22:3.
Its also fascinating to see the rights of Roman citizens. It gets Paul out of trouble several times. Again in 23:6 he says he is a Pharisee and son of one. That gets them on his side against the Sadducees.
If Acts is accurate, there were quite a number of Jews who were really angry at Paul, and maybe Christianity in general. In 23:12 it tells of a conspiracy to kill Paul that included 40 men who vowed not to eat or drink until he was dead, and got the chief priest and council involved in the plot. Why Paul particularly? The whole group of apostles live there, and don’t seem to provoke such ire – at least not at that time. It speaks to how threatened the Jews in Jerusalem must have felt. Or something. The Romans don’t really seem to care, so one can see how Medieval Christians came to blame Jews.
Jews point of view, thru Tertullus, the lawyer for the priests before Felix, governor (of Syria?): “For we have found this man a real pest and a fellow who stirs up dissension among all the Jews throughout the world [inhabited earth] . . .”24:5. In jail under Felix 2 years! Because the Roman governors, Felix, the Festus, wish to do the Jews favors. So Paul appeals to Caesar, which I guess is any Roman citizen’s right. Great description of Festus’ loss at what to do with him 25:14-22.
What Jesus said to Paul on the road to Damascus has grown longer and more specific 26:15-18.
I wish I had access to my Oxford Guide to the Bible. It is time to begin Paul’s letters, and I’d really like to have all we know about the context. From my Bible, looks like the Galatians might be the earliest.
August 8
How can Galatians be first, when it is part of Asia, and Asia was off limits to begin with? I’m tempted not to begin with Paul at all, but with James or Peter. No, I’ve found where my Bible says I Thessalonians was the first of Paul’s letters, written around 51 AD. The others either appear to have been written later or I don’t have a date right now. So First Thessalonians it is.
The church at Thessalonica was established on Paul’s 2nd missionary trip. He wrote the letter from Corinth, and in general is pleased with the church at Thess. (which appears to be in Macedonia – but may be part of Greece). Verse one includes greetings from Paul, Silvanus and Timothy. Yes, it is Macedonia. In 1:10, Paul says, “to wait for His Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead.”
Chapter 2 reminds them of how the missionaries behaved when with them, pointing out all the bad things they didn’t do. A warning against false messiah’s, or prophets? At the end he says he tried to get back there several times, but “Satan thwarted us” 2:18. he includes in 4:3-11 a reminder to be moral sexually, to abstain from sexual immorality and possess either themselves or their wives in sanctification and honor, not lustful passion. Guess the word for vessel he used can be interpreted several ways. It does make a difference; can a man not greet his wife with lustful passion? And that no man transgress and defraud his brother in the matter. What could that possibly mean?
Timothy had just returned from a visit there (3:16), so likely the whole letter is in reference to specific questions and situations, and they would have known exactly what he meant. Interesting that sex is mentioned right off the bat.
II Thessalonians was written a few months later, to clear up misunderstandings occasioned by the first letter. The Church is still being “afflicted,” persecuted (tho not with death, as later). He says it is only fair that on judgment day those afflicting them will be afflicted, and they’ll be rewarded. “ . . . Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, dealing out retribution.” 1:7.
They must have received a fake letter, because Paul tells them not to be gullible, or disturbed “either by a spirit of a message as if from us” saying the day of the Lord has come. He says that day cannot come until after the “apostasy,” or “falling away” from the faith 2:3. Does it say that in the gospels? This must be a new message to Paul – he seems to be referring to the anti-Christ. Hmmm. Revelation wasn’t written until much later – 40-50 years later. Actually, none of the gospels were written yet, tho I’m sure those procrites were making the rounds. I can’t recall any time Jesus specifically referred to an anti-Christ, or one who “sets himself up in the Temple . . . displaying himself as being God” 2:4, tho he does mention false prophets.
He is teaching this all over, that there will be this false messiah. “For God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they might believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth” 2:12. So here is that tricky, trickster God of the Hebrews again, who seems to delight in devising new ways to make people fall, the punish them eternally. Is it just Paul’s Jewishness causing him to misinterpret? Is this a belief widely shared with those who lived with Jesus? Is it just rhetorical, use of extreme language to make a point? Hyperbole?
Paul issues a number of commandments. He now commands them to “keep aloof from every brother who leads an unruly life and not according to the tradition which you received from us” 3:6. It is maybe about communal life, because he goes on to talk about how they worked and were not lazy when with them, as a model. And “if anyone will not work, neither let him eat” 3:10. Some folks are being lazy and “busybodies” and he commands and exhorts them to behave. He ends with a “distinguishing mark” so they’ll know which are truly letters from him.
Now to Galatians. Church established on his first trip, the letter written between 48-58, addressing a crisis there. Ah-ha! Forgot Freeman has an entire chapter on Paul, where he says what every scholar says about how his letters were written for specific purposes, not as a thought-out theology, and their contradictory statements. Points out that while the Jerusalem Christians were “suffused with their memories of Jesus as a human being,” Paul’s Christ has relevance only through his death and resurrection, p.107.
Speaks of his great love for the new churches, his frustrations and enthusiasms and “the demands he places on the recipient communities are heavy, and his own authority often under threat” p.107. He says the letters generally agreed to be Paul’s are Romans, Corinthians 1 & 2, Galatians, Philippians, and 1, maybe 2 Thessalonians. Many add Colossians, p.109.
Above that, he points out, citing others, that Paul has a lot in common with the Essenes and may have at least been influenced by them. He speaks of Paul’s personality – how abrasive, how conflict-ridden were his relationships, that there is not one Christian community with whom he is fully at his ease. No one could agree he wasn’t driven and committed, and mentally strong. But he was not charismatic – he pushed or repelled people, where Jesus had attracted them.
Freeman makes out that it was Paul’s inability to get along with Jews that led him to preach to gentiles, born out by Acts. And we’ll see in the letters that the Jews may have had good reason to be mad at him: he stirred up trouble wherever he went, and suggests at times that now God prefers gentiles and that the Jews are no longer his Chosen People. We saw his first journey was with Barnabus, but after that falling out he worked out a relationship in which he would be the apostle to the gentiles and go much his own way, the only sustainable relationship with the Jerusalem apostles, Freeman argues, given Paul’s temperament.
Let’s see what Galatians has to say. Whoa – begins defensively. “Paul, an apostle not sent by men, nor through the agency of man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father” 1:1.
1:6 – he’s amazed that people are already listening to someone else, who is “distorting” Christ’s message. Geez! 1:8 – “but even though we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to that which we have preached to you, let him be accursed.” So Paul’s message supersedes that of angels? He again curses anyone besides him who preaches something different. And then makes it clear he isn’t interested in pleasing men – something he may have found impossible to do in any case.
In 1:11 he makes a claim to legitimacy because no man taught him the gospel, but it was revealed to him. Case for direct revelation – equal to the 12 apostles who knew Jesus, better than anyone who learned from them. Yes, in 1:17 says after the revelation he didn’t need the approval of those in Jerusalem, and didn’t seek it. He assures them he isn’t lying when he says 3 years later he went to Jerusalem and stayed with Peter (Cephas) 15 days, and met James, Jesus’ brother, but didn’t see any of the other apostles.
August 9
I guess for now I’ll go back to Galatians, where poor Paul is suffering so much because there have been other teachers visiting the church. In the second chapter he says that 14 years later, after his first visit to Jerusalem, he went back. This is when the question of whether converts must be circumcised came up, because he says he “submitted to them the gospel I preach among the gentiles” 2:12, but not even Titus, a Greek companion, was circumcised. “But it was because of the false brethren who had sneaked in to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, in order to bring us into bondage” 2:4. Sounds kind of paranoid, doesn’t he?
He refers to “those of high reputation” with whom he consulted even tho “what they were makes no difference to me; God shows no partiality” But says they “contribute nothing to me.” Sounds like there is some real tension. Perhaps Luke smoothed it over when he wrote Acts, trying minimize the differences. Anyway, James (brother of Jesus), Peter and John gave him the “right hand of fellowship,” recognizing that he’d been entrusted with the gospel to the gentiles, as Peter was entrusted with the one for the Jews 2:7-9. But in the next breath he says, “But when Cephos came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned” 2:11. The reason is that, as Paul perceives it, Jesus broke the barrier between Jew and gentile, and taught that it is not thru observance of the Law that people will be saved, but only through faith in Him. Peter used to get that, but he’s fallen under the sway of the “party of circumcision” and swayed even Barnabus 2:21 “For if righteousness comes thru the Law, the Christ died needlessly.” There is the problem.
For Paul had dedicated himself to the practice of the Law, becoming a Pharisee of the strictest sort. Yet Jesus told him personally that wasn’t enough. He is utterly convinced that the Law is now irrelevant, that faith in Jesus is it. He also says in that passage, “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me” 2:20, which must have pissed off some of those who were there at the crucifixion.
He yells at the Galatians for having been duped, asking, “Did you get the Holy Spirit by following the Law? Or by having faith?” 3:5. He gives them a scripture lesson, and says, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law” 3:13. So he’s saying it had become a curse for them in that it had them focused on their own actions, and the details of Law, and not on God. He’s also making the argument that they are all now one people, not many, and that even the believing gentiles can now claim kinship with Abraham. God made a covenant with Abraham, which was not nullified “430” years later with the coming of Moses’ law, 3:17. “For if the inheritance is based on law, it is no longer based on a promise” 3:18. The Law was only given because “of transgressions” and “having been ordained through angels by the agency of a mediator, until the seed had come to whom the promise had been made” 3:19. So the Jews are just space fillers? They were made to sin, in order that God could extend the promise to gentiles, or fulfill the promise that salvation would come to the whole world through the Jews.
3:23-27 he says the law was just the tutor, but now that faith has come, they no longer need the tutor. He says all are now one, “There is no Jew or Greek, there is neither slave nor freeman, there is neither male nor female, for all are one in Jesus Christ” 3:28. And all are Abraham’s offspring. Sounds nice, but why then in later letters does Paul make distinctions and different rules for women? Why does he return a slave to his master? Seems contradictory.
In chapter 4 he presents a theology that must have angered the Jews still further. First he compares them, Jews, to children of a wealthy man, and the Gentiles to slaves. But when the heir comes, he frees the slaves and makes them equal to his children. Why then go back to being slaves? Equality is one thing, but then he uses the story of Abraham and Isaac as an allegory. Abraham had two sons, one through a bond-woman, one through a free-woman. One thru flesh, and one through spirit. He says Hagar is Jerusalem, for she is in slavery with her children. But the “Jerusalem above” is free, and she is the Gentile Christians’ mother. For it is written: Rejoice barren woman who does not bear, Break faith and shout, you who are not in labor, for more are the children of the desolate than of those who has a husband” 3:27. So “you brethren, like Isaac, are children of promise.” But the child of the flesh persecuted the child of the spirit then and now. But:
Cast out the bondwoman and her son. For the son of the bondwoman shall not be an heir with the sons of the free woman 3:30
Ouch!
Then he gives them instruction on how to live good Christian lives, including a description of the fruits of the spirit 5:22. After ranting at them for several chapters, he tells them to correct one another with gentleness! 6:1.
To be fair, he did catch himself earlier and said he wanted to change his tone. He encourages them not to be boastful or envious of one another – isn’t that what he himself has done? He really doesn’t see himself as boastful “But may it never be that I should boast” 6:14. Forgot to record that in 4:13 he refers to a “body illness” he had when with them, “and that which was a trial to you in my bodily condition you did not despise or loathe, but you received me as an angel of God, as Christ Jesus himself.” That almost sounds like a disfigurement, or something repulsive/disgusting about him, that it should be a trial.
I remembered because he closes the letter with a reference to how he bears “on my body the brand marks of Jesus” 6:17. Could be real brands or other scars from prison, or another reference to some physical disfiguring.
I guess I’ll go to Philippians next. Philippi was the first “European” church, in Macedonia. My Bible has the date of the letter as c.62. Oops, no, should be Romans next, written from Corinth in AD 58. So just shortly after the letter to Galatia. Bible says Romans is the most important (now) of Paul’s letters, and maybe of the entire Bible. Again, its major theme is the relationship between Jews and Gentiles. It is a long letter, with 16 chapters.
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