Paul's "persecution" of the early Christians?

[CapnAwesome]

Of course Paul doesn't have historical credibility though, but for less subtle reasons, like he was writing about supernatural events that obviously didn't happen, because supernatural events don't happen.

[Jehanne]

Of course Paul doesn't have historical credibility though, but for less subtle reasons, like he was writing about supernatural events that obviously didn't happen, because supernatural events don't happen.

And, those claims, by him, were also made by others, just as they (were) are a "dime a dozen". Jesus was also not the only "Messiah" running around Palestine.

[The Grand Nudger]

Paul being an epileptic zealot is no less legendary than acts.  Ironically, this is another attempt to rehabilitate paul.

[Jehanne]

I am, of course, speaking of the early Paul. Someone wrote 1st and 2nd Corinthians.

[The Grand Nudger]

That's just the thing..you aren't speaking of early paul.  You're coming up with a different legendary paul to replace the other legendary paul. That;s how we ended up with so many pauls in the first place. People read the stories..they din't satisfy (for a wide variety of reasons - including your own), and so they came up with a new story about paul or rehabilitated an old story.

[Jehanne]

Nearly all scholars believe that a single person was the author of 1st and 2nd Corinthians, and I am taking that as being axiomatic.

[The Grand Nudger]

I'm not commenting on whether or not there was a paul, or a singular author of any specific set of stories handed down to us, as that was a given in thread.  Merely pointing out that you are engaging in the same activity -regarding the story of paul- that others before you did..and that this is part of how we got so many pauls

First, a person assumes a paul..then they read the stories..even authentic paul, and say "Well, this story is shit..here's what I think really happened."

[Jehanne]

I am not an historian, but this is what historians do, they read ancient (and, even modern) texts critically.  The Roman historian Livy, for instance, is universally accepted as having existed:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Livy

But, scholars read his texts critically, and they don't accept every single thing that he wrote verbatim:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ab_Urbe_Co...bri_(Livy)

[The Grand Nudger]

Sure, but I'm not sure what that has to do with what I was pointing out. If historians were in the business of concocting a new "legend of livy"...while they may be historians, they wouldn't be doing history when they did so.

We have no historical reason to believe that paul was a persecutorial zealot, and even less than no reason to believe that he was an epileptic. This is nothing more or less than a rehabilitation of an assumed paul. It's an atheists rehabilitation, but a rehabilitation nevertheless. I think it;s interesting to point things like this out..because we often get the "oh, so, they were just lying?" retort from batshit christers when..ofc..no one is saying that in every case, however true it was of some cases.

You read a story of paul...some of it appears to be legendary paul..but ignoring that, you've rehabilitated early paul so that it fits with other assumptions you've made. This is -exactly- how legendary paul was concocted in any case in which there was no intentional malfeasance. That, imo, gives us more insight into paul than the contents of the rehabilitations. What do you think?

[Minimalist]

Nearly all scholars believe that a single person was the author of 1st and 2nd Corinthians, and I am taking that as being axiomatic.

Actually, scholars have come to realize that "2d Corinthians" is a compilation of letters by a later redactor rather than a single letter.

http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/2corinthians.html

However, there are difficulties that have suggested to several commentators that 2 Corinthians has been compiled from several pieces of correspondence. Since the "sorrowful letter" mentioned in 2:4 does not describe 1 Corinthians, we know that Paul had written at least three letters to the Corinthians. A quite reasonable suggestion is that the last four chapters contain the "sorrowful letter" that is mentioned in 2:4.

Of course the question of when this paul character would have been writing to alleged xtians in Corinth remains open.