Quote:The question was: "Why would any church at that time have any need to turn to a stranger outside of their own congregation when they have access to the perfect leader, jesus, in their prayers?"
One needs to have an understanding of Marcionism to get a grasp on that.
Quote:Marcion believed Jesus Christ was the savior sent by God, and Paul of Tarsus was his chief apostle, but he rejected the Hebrew Bible and the God of Israel. Marcionists believed that the wrathful Hebrew God was a separate and lower entity than the all-forgiving God of the New Testament. This belief was in some ways similar to Gnostic Christian theology; notably, both are dualistic, that is, they posit opposing gods, forces, or principles: one higher, spiritual, and "good", and the other lower, material, and "evil" (compare Manichaeism), in contrast to the orthodox Christian view that "evil" has no independent existence, but is a privation or lack of "good",[2] a view shared by the Jewish theologian Moses Maimonides.[3]
Marcionism, similar to Gnosticism, depicted the Hebrew God of the Old Testament as a tyrant or demiurge (see also God as the Devil). Marcion was labeled a gnostic by Philip Schaff,[4] while other scholars have rejected that categorization. Marcion's canon consisted of eleven books: A gospel consisting of ten sections from the Gospel of Luke edited by Marcion; and ten of Paul's epistles. All other epistles and gospels of the 27 book New Testament canon were rejected.[5] Paul's epistles enjoy a prominent position in the Marcionite canon, since Paul is credited with correctly transmitting the universality of Jesus' message. Other authors' epistles were rejected since they seemed to suggest that Jesus had simply come to found a new sect within broader Judaism.[citation needed] Religious tribalism of this sort seemed to echo Yahwism, and was thus regarded as a corruption of the "Heavenly Father"'s teaching.
Courtesy Wiki.
Marcion established the first xtian canon c 145AD. Much of "luke" and 10 epistles attributed to "Paul." No one had ever heard of "Paul" before that time. Marcion's vision of xtianity was shorn of any yahweh shit so who better for his "proponent" than a former jew who saw the light?
