Paul and the Pauline Christianity

Pauline Christianity, as an expression, first came into use in the twentieth century amongst those scholars who proposed different strands of thought within Early Christianity, wherein Paul was a powerful influence . It has come into widespread use amongst non-Catholic Christian scholars and depends on the claim, advanced in different ages, that the form of the faith found in the writings of Paul is radically different from that found elsewhere in the New Testament, but also that his influence came to predominate. Reference is also made to the large number of non-canonical texts,  some of which have been discovered during the last hundred years, and which show the many movements and strands of thought emanating from Jesus’s life and teaching or which may be contemporary with them, some of which can be contrasted with Paul’s thought. Of the more significant are Ebionism and Gnosticism. However, there is no universal agreement as to Gnosticism’s relationship either to Christianity in general or the writings of Paul in particular. The expression is also used by modern Christian scholars, such as Ziesler  and Mount, whose interest is in the recovery of Christian origins and the contribution made by Paul to Christian doctrine.

Most of Christianity relies heavily on these teachings and considers them to be amplifications and explanations of the teachings of Jesus. Others perceive in Paul’s writings teachings that are radically different from the original teachings of Jesus documented in the canonical gospels, early Acts and the rest of the New Testament, such as the Epistle of James. The term is generally considered a pejorative by traditionalist Christians as it carries the assumption that Christianity as it is known is a corruption of the original teachings of Jesus.

Paul – The Traditional Story

In the winter of 50-51 CE, a small group of early Christians listened in the Greek port of Thessalonica to the reading of a letter written by Paul. It is the earliest Christian document that we possess. It does not mean that it is the oldest, however it was written 20 years after Jesus died. It asked the listeners, in the name of the Lord himself, to refrain from sexual immorality and to be ready for the return of Jesus that, according to the author, would be soon. Those who already died in the Messiah would rise first and then those who are still alive will be taken up in the sky to meet the Lord. As we know every thing prophesied in the First letter to the Thessalonians in 51 CE turned out to be untrue since Jesus did not return on earth. However the author of this prediction still enjoys a great influence and respect among the Christians. Christians still sing hymns expecting the return of Christ. It forms part of the traditional Christian liturgy for a month each year before Christmas. To understand the author,  Paul, we must read his other writings.

 Paul often uses the words “Gospel of Christ” that means “Good news about the Messiah”. The word “Christ” or “Messiah” means the Anointed One. This refers to the Jewish belief that in the last days of this earth God would rise up and anoint a Chosen One who would then lead the people of Israel. The Good News for Paul is that, according to the Gospels, this figure has come. In the century before Christ was born the Jews believed in the arrival of a Messiah of royal birth, and descendant from King David, who would deliver them from their Gentiles oppressors, the Romans. His victory would be both military and mystical. This was believed by the Sadducees and the Pharisees, but also by the sect at Qumran on the Dead Sea. The Book of Daniel, written between 167 and 164 BC, that is before the rebellion of the Maccabees against the Seleucids, foresaw the collapse of the Greek Empire and the triumph of a Jewish hero who would introduce a government of the Holy Ones who had kept faith.

According to Paul this hero was Joshua, Yeshu, or Jesus, that means Savior. Some of the people who heard the words of  Paul may have been Jews of the Diaspora, those who did not live in the Promised Land, but the majority were Greeks with different expectations about God. For these Gentiles who were not acquainted with the idea of the Messiah, it would have been easier to identify him with a kind of demigod or a God incarnate. As soon as Paul had succeeded to implant the Jewish Messianic idea, the Gentiles had no difficulty in turning Jesus into a God. In this environment the Jewish Messiah was perceived as Divine and Jesus as a God. Paul, on the contrary, never said explicitly that Jesus was God but only that he was the image of God. However in the following years his opinion changed and Jesus became a sort of Divinity. 

As his initial prophecy did not materialize, his language about Jesus became more and more hyperbolic. The rise of Jesus became more important that his arrival in Heaven. The notion of Resurrection became central in Paul’s teaching and meant that his followers could conquer death as a result.

 This teaching had a more universal appeal that the esoteric claim that a Jewish Messiah was born, who would lead to Jewish rule by Jewish saints. The notion that the dead will rise is at the heart of Paul’s message. Jesus rose and, as a result, he brought hope of everlasting life to those who believe. By the time Paul wrote his first letter to the Corinthians around 57 CE, the mystic Messiah was a figure with a life of his own, he is the Lord of Life and the Conqueror of Death. This Messiah was Paul’s invention although he still bears the name of the historical Jesus. This First Letter to the Corinthians is the only document in which Paul makes specific reference to the historical Jesus that instituted the Christian Eucharist, and who rose from the dead. Paul also said that he did not receive this message from the Church, or from the Jesus’ friends who where present the night before he died, but directly from the Lord. In reality it is Jesus’ death that matters to Paul, the Eucharist being only a symbol of that death. Paul does not present Jesus as a moral teacher, a storyteller, a healer or a miracle-worker. He presents Him in mythological terms, Jesus is the Messiah, the Rock in the desert from which the Jews drank pure water. For Paul, the resurrection of Jesus means that death has been defeated. He told his followers that if they were baptized they would rise again with Jesus after their death to lead an immortal life in Heaven. With Paul the Catholic Christianity is born. He may be said to be the inventor of the Catholic religion but this is true up to a point since the offering of the body and blood of Christ has been invented by Jesus; moreover Jesus arose from the grave and was seen afterwards by hundred of people.

Paul is supposed to have been remote from the historical Jesus. One generally assumes that the first three Gospels tell us all there is to know about Jesus, and that the rest of the New Testaments writings are embellishments, interpretations, suppositions, … In fact all the texts including the first three Gospels are interpretative. However Paul’s writings seem to be the more accurate ones as if he was the only witness. He has written what is known about Paul in his autobiography. It is full of moral, religious and psychological contradictions, and he wrote about them. Paul alone took the religion of Jesus from the Jews and made it available to the Gentiles. From a Jewish heretic belief he constructed a Universal religion. He was, in a certain way, obsessed by the idea of Jesus during all his life, even if it is generally assumed that they never met, and that he was somehow converted on the road to Damascus.

Paul was a citizen of the Roman Empire, being a native of Tarsus in Cicilia, Asia Minor now Turkey. It was a very cosmopolitan place and the Judaism of its Jews was sophisticated and hellenized. Proselytizing was common. This kind of Jewish credo had a certain appeal and was different from what it was in Galilee or Jerusalem at that time, more genial and expansive in any case. They also were more open to the Gentile world, and that was against the Jewish law that made it impossible for the Jews and the Gentiles to socialize. It is known that Paul lived and worked in the Gentile world, in opposition to Jesus who lived in a completely Jewish one. Paul was primarily a great religious poet more that a thinker. As a Jew of the Diaspora he was more open, whereas Jesus, who only mixed with Jews, never even thought that the Gentiles could know God and his Law. At some point in his youth Paul rejected the broad-based Hellenism of his up bringing and became a Pharisee. He came to believe that men born outside the Covenant could approach God, and is loved by Him. Some even think that, at one point of his life, he persecuted the hellenized Christians such as Stephen, that he was sent to Damascus by the high Priests of Jerusalem to arrest all the Christians there. This is however difficult to believe as Damascus was outside the jurisdiction of the Sanhedrin from Judea. Outside the New Testament there is no historical evidence that the Jews were ever guilty of religious persecution, even if it is well known that they argued a lot among themselves. In any case Paul was converted on the road to Damascus.

He told the Galatians that he had never met any member of the Jerusalem Church before, which is contradiction with the Acts that tell that he persecuted them. Later on, when Paul thought that the Gentiles could be Christians in the same way as the Jews, he had a strong argument with Peter (Cephas), Jesus’ closest disciple, who was then the leader of the Antioch Christian Church. Peter wanted his church to remain in the fold of Judaism, but Paul won the argument and the Gentiles were admitted in the Jewish Church. The Acts, as the Gospel of Luke, were written about 40 years after the letters of Paul, and aims to reassure the Romans that Christianity was not threat to the Imperial Authority, that it was distinct from Judaism that was regarded by Rome, after the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem in 70 CE, as a dangerous enemy. The “Acts” is in fact similar to a political pamphlet and is not very reliable from a historical point of view, but not everything in it is propaganda. After all, Paul himself admits that he was a persecutor of Christians and that he only changed his mind after a confrontation with Jesus. This would tend to confirm that he met Jesus in his lifetime. We must remember that Paul boasted to have been a Pharisee in his youth. Now the tradition preserved in the Gospel tells us that in almost all Jesus’ clashes with the Jewish authorities, the Pharisees were involved. There is some doubt that these conflicts ever happened, but Paul believed that it was the case, and in the Gospel written by Paul’s companion, Luke, Jesus attacks strongly the Pharisees to which Paul boasted of belonging. The Pharisees believed that the Messiah could not come, and with it the redemption of Israel, until the Jews had purified themselves. They were eager to purify the daily life with trivial rules governing cooking pots, cleaning.

That the hellenized Paul, born in Tarsus, could claim to be the son of a Pharisee is difficult to believe, even if it is easier to go on with his claim that he was, in his youth, the spiritual child of this doctrine. The assumed quarrel between Jesus and the Pharisees is also difficult to admit since, after all, the teachings of the Pharisees and of Jesus are very similar. It could be that Paul meant that he was a kind a religious bigot in his youth, then things became clearer. The conflict was between the rigid legalism of his youth and his later liberated sense of Jesus redeeming the world from sin. In this sense the quarrel between Jesus and the Pharisees makes sense. It was Paul’s most important aspect of his religious experience, as it appears in his Letter to the Romans also known as the “Gospel according to Paul”. Luke thought that the Pharisees were hypocrites, empty vessels, men who pretend to be virtuous, but in reality wicked. Paul knew that the Pharisees were among the most virtuous men to have ever lived, petty sometimes in their application of Moses’ Law, but respectful of it, as it came directly from God. They did not love the law for its own sake but because they thought that, if it was followed, the Messiah would come for the glory of the Jewish people.

Paul, the hellenized Jew from Tarsus, reader of Greek literature and well-versed in non-Jewish culture, went to Jerusalem where he became the disciple of a famous Pharisee, Rabbi Gamaliel, who taught him, among other thing, to be cautious with the Sanhedrin. Rabbi Gamaliel was sympathetic to all the Galilean including Jesus; this Pharisee was against religious persecution. There is a contradiction here between Paul, fearing the universalizing and breadth of hellenized Judaism in Tarsus, and the man who, after escaping to the spiritual heaven of Jerusalem where he finds himself at home with a religious-observant group, the Pharisees. In the Gospel the Pharisees seem petty and conservative but, in their habitat, they were in fact radical. The Sadducees were conservative and regarded the Law as the final truth. On the opposite the Pharisees seemed more modern, trying to interpret and adapt the old Scriptural regulations to the contemporary life, and this must have been welcomed by the hellenized Paul. The Pharisees believed that the will of God could be seen in every aspect of everyday life and this justified, in their eyes, the search for a new interpretation of old beliefs. This opened Paul’s eyes on further possibilities that he analyzed, not as a philosopher, but as a mystic and that led him to a deep crisis. He was afraid that this would be a thread more dangerous to Judaism that anything done by the Greek philosopher of Tarsus. He soon asked himself if sin matters much if God forgives them anyway. He also wandered, as a consequence, if God loved righteous men more than sinners. Is there a higher probability to find God in the Torah or within a repentant sinner? This part of Jesus’ teaching led him, a young Pharisee, to near madness. We can also wonder, even if he never mentioned it, if he did hear Jesus speaks, being at the same time horrified by what he heard but also fascinated. A sentence in 2 Corinthians 5:16 could suggest that he listened to Jesus’ preaching. He was more interested by the mystic Christ that by the historical Jesus.

Paul is better recorded for his teaching of the notion of Grace, his theological invention, as long as it is not proved that Jesus did it. In short it means that God’s forgiveness is not dependant on human virtue, but on a free outpouring of divine love for man regardless of their moral rectitude or turpitude. To the Galatians he said that he did not hear the Gospel from any of Jesus’ friends, but directly from Jesus himself, and that the Lord’s grace is not reserved to the Chosen Race, but is available to all mankind. Up to a point Paul identifies himself with Jesus from whom he received also the stigmata of his crucifixion. The picture Paul gives us from Jesus, and his significance for all of us, is always changing in his writings. Sometimes he describes Him as the traditional Promised Messiah who will come back on earth to lead his followers to glory. Later on, Paul suggests that Jesus was divine, even before his birth, and that he had a part in the creation of the universe. However he never went so far as saying that Jesus was God. Paul always reminds us that he was a Pharisee who believed that God’s will was in the Torah, the Jewish Law. He believed that Jesus was the man who came closer to realize God’s will, even if he did not like Jesus laxity in relation to the Law, and in particular in relation with its ritual observance, as when he said that the Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath. Such a man, according to Paul, could not be the Messiah. The Pharisees must have thought that he was a false Messiah and must have been pleased to see him put to death by crucifixion by the Romans. A true prophet would never have been crucified.

Paul was never a very stable and firm man. It cannot be proved that he was in Jerusalem when Jesus was crucified but probably he was. He perhaps was a minor servant of the High Priest and was involved, in some way, in Jesus’ arrest and his handling to the Roman Authorities. This would explain why he was so preoccupied with the cross to the point that he went on to say that he too was crucified with Jesus. Paul said that he did not know any of the early Christians of Jerusalem at the time of his conversion. The “Acts of the Apostles” tells us on the opposite that he was responsible for the prosecution and stoning to death for blasphemy of Stephen, the first Christian martyr. This, however, is very unlikely, in the same way that it is not credible that he participated in Jesus’ condemnation and still became a Christian leader later on. According to the New Testament Saul, as Paul was known then, was converted on the road to Damascus after hearing Jesus talking to him. After a rest in Damascus Paul, as he was now known, went to Arabia where he remained three years. He then fell ready to go to Jerusalem where he met Cephas (Peter) and Jesus’ brother, James. Their meeting was not too cordial as Paul’s faith was not of the Galileans’ liking. For His close friends, Jesus was the last great Jewish prophet, misunderstood as all his predecessors, but speaking within the main body of Judaism. It was Paul who arrived to the conclusion that Judaism had to be overturned, but the full realization of this took a long time to mature in his mind. As Paul continued to believe that Jesus would come back on earth he never thought of creating a new religion but, rather, to adapt Jesus’ teaching to his own larger vision. This explains why Jesus remains the central point in his teaching. He was certainly convinced that he was telling the truth about Jesus, that he had discovered the real meaning that was invisible to the other Christians, even to those who had known him.

Paul was a man torn by internal conflicts: conflicts between the Law and Grace, between God’s righteousness and Man’s fallen nature. No one knows how Christianity arrived in Rome. It was certainly not through Peter, who was still the leader of the Christian Church in Antioch, and who probably never went to Rome. Claudius banned the Jews from Rome at the instigation of Chrestus because they were creating disorders. This could suggest that many of these Jews had been converted in Jerusalem to the new cult, and that they then attracted many Romans to their beliefs. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans confirms that many people of this city could understand his message, that they understood the Jewish concept of the Law and that they were acquainted with the Scriptures, even if he knew that some of them were not Jews. The number of converts was very small. Even in the time of Iranaeus (c.130-200 CE) their number was less than two hundred.

In relation with Jesus’ death there are three phases in Paul’s life. First of all he is on the side of those Jews who persecuted Jesus. This is followed by a period of guilt that led to his conversion. Finally he seems to have absorbed his guilt and he started preaching in His name, even if in a different less Jewish and more universal way. Jesus said in the Gospels that morality was not enough and, perhaps, that it was not that important. What matters is the reconciliation between God and man. Just following the rules cannot bridge the gap between God and Man. The arrival of Jesus on earth gave Man some hope to be saved by the Grace of God and rendered possible the communion with God.

Paul understood that the Gospel of Christ was not a religion, but Religion itself in its deepest and universal significance. The first three Gospels in the New Testament have been written by men who looked at things, and at Jesus, in Paul’s way and, as we know, Paul saw Jesus as a person in whom God Himself was at work. In a way the words Jesus and Love are synonymous.

The Theology of Paul

Paul was the true founder of Christianity. This statement is supported by two basic facts:

• It is in the writings of Paul that we find the origins of many facets of Christian theology. 
• Some sayings of Jesus expressly contradict what Paul taught.

The Origins of Christian Theology in the Pauline Epistles

It is in the epistles of Paul that we find the kernels of many tenets and dogmas of modern Christian theology. These teachings were to be fully developed by later Christian theologians but it cannot be doubted that Paul metaphorically planted the seeds for the subsequent development and evolution of Christian theology. It was Paul who developed the first working doctrine of what eventually became known as the Atonement . According to his teaching, God created Adam and Eve to live forever in Paradise; but they expressly disobeyed God’s command not to eat the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil: the forbidden fruit. As a result of this disobedience, they were expelled from the Garden of Eden and lost that precious gift of immortality.

It was Paul who initiated the habit of calling the Galilean navi (Prophet), Jesus Christ (See the earlier quote from I Thessalonians 1:1) as though it were a proper name, much like John Smith. This innovation of Paul’s is, strictly speaking, incorrect; for “Christ” (or messiah) is a title. It is more properly rendered as Jesus the Christ, just like John the Baptist or Attila the Hun . Paul also introduced the rudiments of the doctrine of salvation by grace through faith, which was later developed by the Protestant reformers during the sixteenth century.

Paul meant by this “faith”, not what the word is usually taken to mean today, i.e. belief without proof, but a feeling of trust in God’s promise. Paul gave an example of this faith by recalling the Genesis story of Abraham’s trust in God.

The passage in Philippians 2:6-7  shows that Paul considered Jesus as a special man that is close to God. The Judaism that Paul was brought up in has a well-established tradition that special individuals actually dwelt with God before they descend to earthen live out their earthly life. Some rabbis even believe that the Torah was a favored being who was in heaven with God before coming down to earth in Mount Sinai.
Contradictions Between Paul’s and Jesus’ Teachings.

That the central theme of Pauline theology is not to be found in the authentic teachings of Jesus is not the only disturbing thing about it. We find that in some cases Paul’s teachings were actually diametrically opposite to Jesus’. As an example Jesus, believing in the imminent coming of the kingdom during his lifetime, taught his followers not to worry about what tomorrow would bring and to first seek the kingdom of God.

Whatever we may feel about the merits of such teachings, its message is obvious: Jesus is telling his followers to eschew the normal everyday life of working for a living and to live the absolute ethic straight away while looking for the kingdom of God. But Pauline theology (written probably by one of Paul’s disciples) opposes this and calls for believers to work for a living . 

Another portion of Paul’s teaching that directly contradicts Jesus’ is on the treatment of women. Paul makes it clear that he considers women as second class believers:

 1 Corinthians 14:33-35

As in all the congregations of the saints, women should remain silent in churches. They are not allowed to speak but must be in submission as the Law says. If they want to inquire about something they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in church.

In the gospels we find that Jesus treated women with more respect than Paul. In the gospels of Luke (Luke 10:38-42) and John (John 4:1-26) we find Jesus being involved in long discourses with women. This is something, which Paul would definitely not have approved of, given the statement above. It also clear that Jesus would not have agreed with Paul’s ruling on women. Luke 8:1-3 also tells us that many of the followers, who accompanied him during his travels, of Jesus were women . The most significant difference in the teachings of these two men, however, lies in their attitude towards the Law of Moses. In fact one of the fundamental tenets of Pauline theology is that Jesus’ death actually abrogated the law. This is expounded clearly in the passage from one of his epistles:

 Galatians 2:15-16

We who are Jews by birth and not “Gentile sinners” know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one is justified.

This teaching of Paul’s is, of course, familiar to Christians today. Yet tradition preserved a saying of Jesus which stated the complete opposite of what Paul taught above. Jesus:

 
Matthew 5:17-20

“Do not think I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish the law but to fulfil them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses those of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Note the complete contradiction in the two passages above. The sentence underlined showed the contradiction even more clearly: Paul is saying “we are not justified by observing the law” and Jesus is saying, in contrast, “whoever practices the law will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.”

As Christianity ultimately accepted the Pauline view with regards to the law, there had been numerous attempts by later Christian theologians to reconcile the passage in Matthew with their dogma, Jesus statement that he has come to fulfil the law is translated (read: twisted out of all context) as: “I have come to exceed the law, to go beyond it to make it superfluous.” Using this interpretation, the passage in Matthew can be made to fit, albeit rather uneasily, into Pauline theology.

The question is this: are the theologians justified in making that interpretation? Many scholars have shown that the Greek word used by Matthew, pleroun, can mean to “fulfil”, to “deepen”, to “perfect” but never in the sense of going beyond it or making it superfluous. In a nutshell, the Christian theologians have ascribed a meaning to the Greek word, which it never had. The only accurate interpretation of Matthew’s passage is that Jesus believed his task to be to establish and defend the eternal validity of the law .

The conclusion we can draw here is simple: Paul taught doctrines that were never expounded by the earthly Jesus and doctrines, which were in complete contradiction with what Jesus actually taught.

Council of Jerusalem (a.k.a. Jerusalem Council)

The Council of Jerusalem (or Apostolic Conference) is a name applied subsequently to a meeting described in Acts of the Apostles chapter 15 and probably referred to in Paul’s letter to the Galatians chapter 2. The events described there are generally dated to around the year 50, at the latest some time before the death of James the Just in 62, and before the First Roman-Jewish War and destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE. Paul himself described several meetings with the apostles in Jerusalem, though it is difficult to reconcile any of them fully with the account in Acts. Paul claims he “went up again to Jerusalem” (i.e., not the first time) with Barnabas and Titus “in response to a revelation”, in order to “lay before them the gospel (he) proclaimed among the Gentiles” (Galatians 2:2); them being according to Paul “those who were supposed to be acknowledged leaders” (Galatians 2:6): James, Cephas and John. He describes this as a “private meeting” (not a public council) and notes that Titus, who was Greek, wasn’t pressured to be circumcised (Galatians 2:3). However, he refers to “false believers secretly brought in, who slipped in to spy on the freedom we have in Christ Jesus, so that they might enslave us” (Galatians 2:4). Paul claims the “pillars” of the Church had no differences with him. On the contrary, they gave him the “right hand of fellowship”, he bound for the mission to “the uncircumcised” and they to “the circumcised”, requesting only that he remember the “poor”. Whether this was the same meeting as that described in Acts is not universally agreed.

The Council of Jerusalem is generally dated to around the year 50 CE, some sixteen years after the death of Jesus of Nazareth. It was the first known meeting of the new community’s leaders. It took place before the First Roman-Jewish War, which broke out in 66 CE and the destruction of Herod’s Temple in 70 CE. At the time, most followers of Jesus were Jewish by birth and even converts would have considered the early Christians as a part of Judaism. According to Alister McGrath, a proponent of Paleo-orthodoxy, the Jewish Christians affirmed every aspect of then contemporary (Second Temple) Judaism with the addition of the belief that Jesus was the Messiah.  The meeting was called because “certain persons” from Jerusalem and Judea, representing the Jerusalem Church, had come to Antioch, where Paul of Tarsus was preaching (Acts 15:1), and were telling prospective converts to the new religion that they could not be saved unless they underwent the Jewish ritual of circumcision. Having disputed fiercely  with the Judaean Christians to no effect, Paul, his fellow missionary Barnabas and others from Antioch traveled to Jerusalem to consult with “the apostles and elders” of the community. (Acts 15:2).

The purpose of the meeting, according to Acts, was to resolve the disagreement in Antioch, which had wider implications than circumcision. Some of the Pharisees who had become believers demanded that it was “needful to circumcise them, and to command [them] to keep the law of Moses” (Acts 15:5).

The primary issue which was addressed related to the requirement of biblical circumcision, as the author of Acts relates, but other matters arose as well, as the Decree by James indicates. The dispute was between those, such as the followers of the “Pillars of the Church”, led by James who believed the church must observe the rules of traditional Judaism, and Paul of Tarsus, who believed there was no such necessity .
At the Council, following advice said to have been offered by Simon Peter (Acts 15:7–11), James, the leader of the Jerusalem Church, gave his decision (later known as the “Apostolic Decree”):

Acts 15:19–21

” Wherefore my sentence is, that we trouble not them, which from among the Gentiles are turned to God: But that we write unto them, that they abstain from pollutions of idols, and [from] fornication, and [from] things strangled, and [from] blood. For Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every Sabbath day..”

The Western version of Acts  adds the negative form of the Golden Rule (“and whatever things ye would not have done to yourselves, do not do to another”). This determined questions wider than that of circumcision, most particularly dietary questions but also fornication and idolatry, and also the application of biblical law to non-Jews, see also biblical law directed at non-Jews and Biblical law in Christianity.

Paul’s Arrest

From consideration about the reliability of the Luke source used in the account of Paul’s visit as well as Luke’s own modus operandi, we can extract some more historical facts about Paul’s final encounter with James and the Jewish Christians in Jerusalem. We can be quite certain that Paul did meet with James, that he somehow took part in some incident in the temple, caused a commotion and was arrested there. Keeping in mind Luke’s tendency to put a positive spin on things we can analyze Acts 21:17-36 in more detail. Let us start at the end. Note that although Luke mentioned there were many thousands Jewish Christians in Jerusalem, none came to Paul’s aid during the commotion at the temple which led to his arrest. Similarly no one from the Jerusalem church came to Paul’s defense during his trial. Many scholars have noticed this . Indeed the strange passivity of the whole Jerusalem Church is hard to explain. The only one who did anything to help Paul was his own nephew (Acts 23:16-22) .

Furthermore, considering the fact that unfriendly rumors were circulating about Paul, having him go the temple to accompany four Nazirites would surely be tantamount to instigating a riot. Some scholars have suggested that James and his congregation actively plotted to have Paul arrested by this ploy. Since they knew that something like the commotion that Luke narrated would almost certainly had to take place . Others have suggested that the proposal by James in Acts 21:22-24 was meant to put Paul in his place. Since the suggestion for Paul to participate in such a vow would show the Gentiles, who accompanied Paul with the collection to Jerusalem, that despite his protestations, the Tarsos was subordinate to the Jerusalem Church? Secondly having him participate in a Jewish religious ceremony would certainly discredit Paul’s teaching about the abrogation of the Torah and the sufficiency of Christ. The arrest was merely a “bonus” for James and his men.

With the information available, all we can say with some probability is that, whether intentionally or otherwise, the Jerusalem Church “had a hand” in the arrest of Paul. By forcing Paul’s hand to pay for the expenses of the four Nazirites, they either didn’t care what would happen to him or perhaps may even had hoped that something untoward would happen. But clearly it was Paul’s presence at the Temple in fulfillment of this request that led, almost certainly inevitably, to his arrest and final execution in Rome.

And surprisingly Luke only made one weak attempt at a positive spin, that the brethren “received him gladly” (Acts 21:17) upon his arrival in Jerusalem. We have seen that subsequent events show that this spin was the free composition of Luke with no historical basis. Thus ends the story of Paul, Apostle to the Gentiles, rejected by all the apostles who knew the earthly Jesus!

Paul’s Journeys

The First Journey -  Paul set out in the company of Barnabas from Antioch in Syria. From Seleucia they sailed to Salamis on the island of Cyprus, then traveled overland to Paphos. Thence they crossed to Perga in Pamphylia, and journeyed inland to Antioch in Pisidia, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe, and back via the same cities to Attalia, where they embarked to return to Syrian Antioch (Acts 13–14).

Opinion is divided as to whether the Epistle to the Galatians is addressed to the churches of southern Galatia, established on this journey, or those of northern Galatia founded on his second journey.

The Second Journey – Paul again set out from Antioch, this time with Silas rather than Barnabas (Acts 15: 36–41). They traveled overland to Derbe and Lystra, where they met Timothy who joined them, and on through Galatian Phrygia and northwestwards through Mysia to the coast at Troas (Acts 16: 1–8). At this point, the Acts’ account reports that, prompted by a vision, Paul crossed over via Samothrace into Macedonia, landing at Neapolis and travelling on first to Philippi and then, via Amphipolos and Apollonia, to Thessalonica and Beroea (Acts 16: 9–17: 14). Paul then traveled on to Athens, initially leaving Silas and Timothy behind, and it was while waiting for them that Paul made his speech on the Areopagus (Acts 17: 15–33). He journeyed on to Corinth, where he was joined by his companions, and stayed some considerable time, establishing the church there, before setting sail first to Ephesus, then on to Caesarea,  visiting Jerusalem before returning thence to Antioch (Acts 18: 1–22).

The Third Journey – Paul again went from Antioch overland through Galatian Phrygia and journeyed on to Ephesus, establishing the church there, and remaining for some time (Acts 18: 23–19: 41). While there he seems to have maintained contact with the church in Corinth via messengers, and it is possible that he visited Corinth himself. Paul left Ephesus after a disturbance caused when Demetrius, the silversmith, took exception to his denunciation of the making of images for the temple of Artemis. He then travelled through Macedonia and on into Achaia, where he remained for three months, before returning via Philippi whence he sailed to Troas and joined delegates from a number of churches who were also heading for Jerusalem. They sailed via Assos, Mitylene, ‘opposite Chios’, and Samos, and reached Miletus. There Paul summoned the elders of the Ephesian church so that he could take his leave of them. He and his companions then sailed via Cos, and Rhodes, to Patara where they found a ship bound for Tyre. From Tyre Paul sailed via Ptolemais to Caesarea and, despite warnings that he should not do so, continued his journey to Jerusalem (Acts 20: 1–21: 17). There he was arrested and eventually transported to Rome.