The Historical Reliability of the New Testament

[Mudhammam]

How indeed, but this is a question that you must answer, not me.  Yes, "Clement"...while I wouldn't lean on Clement..if I were you, isn't it starting to seem a bit odd that we are shoring up one legendary/mythical personage with another?

Lol... you haven't offered a single good reason to believe that either character is mythological or legendary. The burden is not on me to provide evidence that these writers who claimed themselves to be particular individuals addressing particular circumstances in their social lives were not in fact who they claimed to be. If you take that position about every document that survives from ancient history, and not simply Christians or who ever you feel inclined to discredit, you're really just creating a ridiculous and impossible standard in which you'll basically have to say that 99% of the data that we have from everything older than 1,000 years is fiction and that no history of real human beings has survived. Not credible.

In any case, the author wrote in the authors style (and of course the author of dracula was similarly reliable-on that count).....you keep calling him Paul, but I don't know why, given our discussion.  You ended this segment by appealing to the claims of the narrative as evidence of the claims of the narrative, I find this unconvincing.  That's the only metric I'm applying, at present.  Do you think I need more?

I call him Paul cause that's what he calls himself. The same reason that I call the authors of Plato's or Cicero's more credible epistles, Plato and Cicero, even though scholarship has debated some of their respective epistles and has more or less unanimously agreed that some are legitimate while some are written by later students or fans... of... guess who? Yeah, Plato and Cicero. Most ancient figures had pseudographs written in their name. This doesn't detract from their importance as evidence that the person who they're written under were real people, and often they give us a glimpse into what that person might have wrote (since someone writing about epicurean philosophy under the name of Plato obviously wouldn't have convinced many of its authenticity).

I'm still confused as to what it is you see as "the narrative" and if by it you mean that a man named Paul, who was "circumcised the eighth day, of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the Law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to the righteousness which is in the Law, found blameless," and became a Christian, then subsequently writing instructions to his friends and cohorts about organizing and managing churches, and including details such as that "five times I received from the Jews thirty-nine lashes. Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, a night and a day I have spent in the deep. I have been on frequent journeys, in dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my countrymen, dangers from the Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the wilderness, dangers on the sea, dangers among false brethren; I have been in labor and hardship, through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure," what reasons you have to think that I or anyone else should doubt that the man who says he is Paul wrote them. Historiography and higher criticism are not employed exclusively to biblical texts; academics apply the same standards to the New Testament writings as they do to any other ancient work. So, what's the problem? 

Then we both agree that with any given attribute of Paul, it is -possible- that the item in question is mythological, or legendary, correct?  Myth and legend are what I, personally, would call works of fiction.  You?

If you're just talking about Acts, no I don't think that the entirety of the work is fiction. We know that Herod Aggripa II and Bernice were actual people. So was Lucius Junius Gallio Annaeanus or Gallio, who was the brother of Seneca. These characters may have never come into contact with Paul---that's a historical question that is fair to ask---asking me to prove that any of the names enumerated above were *real* people and not the fictional devices of numerous unknown writers is not. But Acts is irrelevant to the question of the historicity of Paul, as even without Acts (written much later than the epistles in Paul's name, and clearly with a different purpose), we still have such information as already mentioned from the Pharisaic Jew himself. 

-and yet above, you accepted that there -was- a myth, or legend..even if there was a man?  I'm simply suggesting that the epistles -are- part of that myth, that legend..and yes...part of that genre - that they are non factual, or..if you prefer..fiction.   Which shouldn't be surprising....because that's precisely what CS Lewis -intended- to do when he wrote the damn story man......

I'm simply saying no one has any reason to take your suggestion seriously.

His personal experience with jesus.......?  A vision of the risen christ on the road to Damascus?  Is that his personal experience of jesus?  You;re assuming, in this "relentless attacks on the church" business that the narrative is true, is factual...which is precisely what -you- must  demonstrate.  


You're losing me bud..............you've done nothing but assume your conclusion in support of your conclusion for the entirety of our interaction on this subject.  What do you hope to achieve with this?  I know what the story says as well as you, you aren't going to surprise me with the narrative -itself-....so we can skip all of that.....

-if you want to surprise me, show me the evidence, not the claim.  We are not discussing whether a study of Paul is relevant to the history of the church, and no one suggested that it wouldn't be.  If you'd like to have that conversation have it with someone else who holds that position or would advance that opinion?  It does seem insanely ignorant to suggest...so why did you suggest it?

Paul's conversion experience is described by himself as a vision, a revelation, an appearance of Jesus, and he says that "I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago-- whether in the body I do not know, or out of the body I do not know, God knows-- such a man was caught up to the third heaven. And I know how such a man-- whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, God knows--was caught up into Paradise and heard inexpressible words, which a man is not permitted to speak.…" I don't doubt that, though the account of his conversion on the road to Damascus, not mentioned by Paul but by Luke, may be hyperbole/embellishment/mythological. Visions, revelations, appearances, etc. are not that uncommon---writing letters that show no sign of fictional or narrative device, and convincing others that would be familiar with you that you're a person whom you are really not, and leaving no evidence to dispute your elaborate scam, would be quite extraordinary... which is why I think you must have more faith than I do to believe that latter scenario.