Paul's Writings Underpin Western Thought

[Minimalist]

Someone had to write those letters, even if not an actual Paul.

Well that is the issue.  There is little in the way of historical markers in any of the pauline corpus.  Somehow the legend progresses from saul to paul like magic.  We are told that he escaped from King Aretas in Damascus but the only time in history that Aretas (King of Nabatea) controlled Damascus was Aretas III between 84 and 64 BC.  Xtians ignore that like the plague and try to shoehorn Aretas IV into the role but in 64 BC G. Pompey, carrying out his great campaign in the East took Damascus and there is no indication that the Romans ever gave it up.  Certainly not to Aretas IV who is last seen in history fleeing from the army of Lucius Vitellius Veteris, Imperial Legate of Syria, after foolishly attacking Herod Antipas, a Roman ally.

Next anomaly is the xtian obsession with Corinth.  Corinth did not exist for a century after Mummius sacked, burned and leveled it in 146 BC at the conclusion of the Achaean War.  It was picked as a site for a Roman colony by Caesar in 44 BC but he was assassinated shortly after and so the job of carrying out his wishes fell to his successors who most likely were in no position to act on them until the Civil Wars were over - Greece being a major battleground between Octavian/Antony and the murderers and later on also between Octavian/Agrippa and Antony/Cleopatra.  But even then, archaeology indicates that first century Corinth did not grow as expected and history tells us that it was not until Vespasian "re-founded" the colony in 70-71 that Corinth actually started to prosper.  According to the tale that later xtians wove this paul guy was there 20 years before Vespasian acted.  The evidence on the ground suggests it was hardly the thriving city it later became.  Finally, the Greek geographer Pausanias, around the time of Hadrian, visited Corinth and having an obsession for religious articles noted all sorts of shrines and temples but failed to observe anything remotely "jewish" let alone xtian.  

Is it possible that Marcion got hold of a series of letters written by some long forgotten gnostic-type group?  Sure.  The evidence suggests they were scattered all over the Eastern Med.  We will never know what Marcion did with them and we can only guess what editing they underwent when the later xtians decided they could make use of them.

So, again, when someone claims that there are x number of "authentic" pauline epistles I want to know how they are defining the word "authentic."

[Angrboda]

So, again, when someone claims that there are x number of "authentic" pauline epistles I want to know how they are defining the word "authentic."

Well, for our purposes here, that simply means they were penned by the same author, and that there are no obvious signs to indicate they are pseudoepigraphical.

[Minimalist]

So if Marcion forged them all that makes them authentic?

[Angrboda]

So if Marcion forged them all that makes them authentic?

Well, given the central question in this thread, we only need an author, authentic or not.

[SteveII]

Another point one needs to be clear on regarding the central question, if we're interested in Paul's specific contributions, accepted at face value, it must be understood that scholars hold a number of the traditionally attributed Pauline epistles to be of questionable authorship, if not outright forgeries.  That raises an ancillary question of whether certain Pauline contributions are actually Paulline, and if, as may be the case, not, the question of whether those authors' contributions are likewise originators or mere hangers-on.

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In addition to the questions raised by pseudo-Pauline writings is that of whether or not there existed other writings by other authors at the time which advanced the ideas which we in our hindsight are giving Paul credit for, but which may have had significant contributors from both within the Christian movement and without.  In that case, some of the Pauline contributions are only Pauline in the sense that Paul's writings survived, and the others do not.  It's impossible to say in hindsight just how much is original to Paul and Jesus simply because any evidence of such was simply not preserved.  In addition, it behooves us to recognize that Paul's contributions would not have had any effect if not for later Christians following in Paul's footsteps, perhaps in many cases fleshing out what is merely hinted at, intentionally or not, in Paul's writings.  There are whole libraries of thought devoted to the supposed intents and meaning of biblical authors which, in some cases, may simply be an artifact of the attempt to find such meaning in the original text, which, the original author was essentially not cognizant of and not intending such meanings at all.

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Yes and no.  Someone had to write those letters, even if not an actual Paul.  Perhaps a Pauline community, similar to that at Qumran.  Ultimately, without a lot of knowledge of the actual philosophical under currents of the time, it may be impossible to attribute anything specifically to Paul.  I suspect, given other experience, that both Greco and Roman political and philosophical movements of the time were more advanced than the pro-Pauline camp makes readily known, essentially raising Paul up by pushing the contributions of those others down.  Which, in addition to our vast ignorance of the age, is one reason I'm skeptical of these types of arguments such as those of Steve, Holland, and other authors.

I think the authenticity issue would be a concern (in the 6 Disputed Letters) if you are talking about doctrines that were contained only in these books. I am not aware of any. As it happens, I only quoted from the Undisputed Letters. Any argument that uses a premise that there are disputed letters only succeeds in concluding there are disputed letters. There really is no "bite" to the objection. 

These ideas were not Paul's exactly.  Really he taught how he inductively arrive at a worldview that best reflected the basics of the gospel message and the deity of Christ. He wrote the manual on living out the gospel message, the Christian life. So his contribution was to take the monotheism of Judaism, the consequences of the gospel message, philosophical discipline, and some his status in the church to create an enduring worldview that continues to have ripple effects today. 

I'm not sure I know any examples where some big principle needed to be read into the letters at a later time (and therefore incorrectly attributed to Paul). If you have examples, I would be interested. 

We know a lot about Roman society. We can infer quite a lot about the worldview of the average man. It is this that Paul's new worldview should be compared to. We are not talking about ivory tower musings. We are talking about the real adoption of a new, very different worldview that had far-reaching effects on everyday life of everyday people: value, hope, purpose, nature of reality, etc.

[Minimalist]

Jorm, some years ago I was participating in an email group and one of the moderators was Professor Niels Peter Lemche.  The discussion started out with something about the Sea People in the Levant and, as these things do, expanded all over the place from there.  At one point I mentioned something about King Josiah from Finkelstein's "The Bible Unearthed" and he replied that there was no archaeological or historical attestation for anyone named Josiah...which is true.  I replied that there was doubtless a king in Judah, everyone else at the time had a king and we had to call him something..."Hey You" didn't seem appropriate.  And he chopped me off at the knees.  The problem with using the convention of "Josiah" is that you get stuck with all the other baggage that is loaded on to him and there is no evidence for any of it.  Better to call the king of Judah the "King of Judah" as that does not get stuck with all the holy horseshit that he was saddled with in the OT.

So I don't agree with you.  When you use the convention "paul" you are automatically giving the xhristards the home field advantage.  And they don't deserve it.

[robvalue]

I suppose "Author of Paul" could work?

[SteveII]

I don't have anything to say about the main question here, other than that I think it would take more substantial scholarship on the question than the usual facile apologetic that is offered for such things, as well as counting the positives that a Christian like Paul may have contributed to Western Civilization, one also has to keep in mind that Christianity also contributed the strain of thought which led to the extermination of six million Jews in World War II.  One has to look at both the upside as well as the downside of any such hypothetical contributions, as well as making the previously mentioned distinction as to whether the thinker was more an effect of already present cultural effects, rather than its originator, and especially whether the ideas represented were truly original with, and a consequence of, the activity of Paul.

What specific Christian-originating strain of thought led to the extermination of six million Jews? Seems to me you would need there to be some pretty substantial ambiguity to make the connection to the Holocaust.

[Angrboda]

I don't have anything to say about the main question here, other than that I think it would take more substantial scholarship on the question than the usual facile apologetic that is offered for such things, as well as counting the positives that a Christian like Paul may have contributed to Western Civilization, one also has to keep in mind that Christianity also contributed the strain of thought which led to the extermination of six million Jews in World War II.  One has to look at both the upside as well as the downside of any such hypothetical contributions, as well as making the previously mentioned distinction as to whether the thinker was more an effect of already present cultural effects, rather than its originator, and especially whether the ideas represented were truly original with, and a consequence of, the activity of Paul.

What specific Christian-originating strain of thought led to the extermination of six million Jews? Seems to me you would need there to be some pretty substantial ambiguity to make the connection to the Holocaust.

You mean besides anti-semitism in general?

[Amarok]

What specific Christian-originating strain of thought led to the extermination of six million Jews? Seems to me you would need there to be some pretty substantial ambiguity to make the connection to the Holocaust.

You mean aside the Centuries of Religiously endorsed anti-semitism.