For People Who Think There Was No Historical Jesus

[Confused Ape]

I've been having a look at Justin Martyrs Writings to see if there's any reason why he should have mentioned Paul.

You've never heard of the fallacy of the pre-determined outcome, I see?

What do you mean?

The key information I discovered about Justin by looking around was that -

1: Justin quoted and paraphrased the letters of Paul.

2: Marcion, who was alive in Justin's time, regarded Paul as Jesus's chief apostle whom Marcion considered the correct interpreter and transmitter of Jesus' teachings

3: Justin regarded Marcion as a heretic because he says so in the First Apology.

This indicates that Paul's writings were very important to the story even though Marcion doesn't mention Paul by name. The only people he did mention by name are Marcion, Simon the Magician, Menander, Peter and John. If we're going to take Justin's writings as the only proof that someone was known about we'll have to assume that only two of Jesus's disciples were known about because he doesn't refer to the other ten by their names.

Does any of this prove that Paul actually existed? No, but it appears to indicate that people of the time could have believed that he existed.