Resurrecting the thread "The Mythmaker: Paul and the Invention of Christianity"

[rightcoaster]

I haven't read the book and probably never will.

I'd have to see individual arguments to know if he has any case against the received view of the majority of modern critical scholars.

I very much doubt that Jesus was a Pharisee. The passages denouncing the Pharisees seem authentic.

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Worth a read. Maccoby is a talmud scholar, and understands the rabbinic/Pharisaic method of argument. He shows that Paul flunks that test. Other examples include Paul's exclusive use of the Greek Septuagint, and that he did not appear to know biblical Hebrew, both of which would not have been hallmarks of a Pharisee trained by Gamaliel. Maccoby also points out that Pharisee Gamaliel defended the apostles in their trial, impossible if the Jesus followers and Pharisees were enemies.
Whole bunch of other stuff, not least of which is that per Maccoby the High Priests of the time were Sadducees, and were in opposition to Pharisees. Saul would not have worked as an enforcer for the Sadducean HP if he had been a Pharisee. Etc. Maccoby seems good in his wheelhouse, but perhaps not otherwise; and so are we all.