(April 12, 2015 at 11:33 am)Vicki Q Wrote: Paul discusses at length the role of Jesus' crucifixion in dealing with the sin problem in his letters, the authentic ones of which are near universally dated to the 50s by scholars (i.e. a couple of decades after Jesus death). Not sure where the 1600 comes from.
I would agree that he challenged the status quo, annoyed those in power, and his views would have appeared heretical to many.
So my question to you would be this...what do you think he was saying that got him on the wrong side of so many important people, and was bad enough to get him executed?
If the story about disrupting the money changing in the temple is true, then that would have probably been sufficient justification. I believe the Romans were taking money from the Temple to build an aqueduct at some point (I can't remember if this was around 30 AD). Maybe Jesus' criticism of the temple money changers was also a criticism of Temple money going to the Romans.
There is probably more to the story than we see in the gospels IMO.
