The 13th-century Sopoćani monastery is a UNESCO World Heritage Site near the source of the Raška River, just east of Novi Pazar in the south-western corner of Serbia. After two centuries of attack, desolation and abandonment, its Church of the Holy Trinity is now rebuilt, its frescoes restored and its monastic life revived.
In the southern choir of that eastward-pointing church are frescoes of seven apostles. Five are now unidentifiable, as time and decay has literally defaced them, but each is folding a single scroll. Matthew is identifiable and he is holding the book of his Gospel. But the most clearly identifiable is the leading figure on the choir's east wall. It is the apostle Paul, complete with his recognizable receding hairline. His right hand is raised in the traditional Byzantine teaching gesture of fingers separated into two (for two natures in Christ) and three (for three Persons in the Trinity). What is extraordinary, however, is that his left hand holds 10 clearly distinguishable scrolls -- not a single scroll or book but 10 scrolls in a cluster.
Why 10 scrolls when Christianity's New Testament attributes 13 letters to the apostle Paul: letters to communities such as the Romans, Corinthians (twice), Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians (twice) and to individuals such as Timothy (twice), Titus and Philemon.
There is, however, a massive consensus in modern scholarship that those three letters to Timothy and Titus were written in Paul's name but long after his death. It would seen, then, that around 1265 a Byzantine artist at Sopoćani already accepted that viewpoint -- hence, only 10 scrolls for 10 letters.
There is also a strong (but not massive) consensus among much of modern scholarship that a further three of those 10 letters were not written by Paul. In other words, we have seven letters certainly from the historical Paul (Romans, 1-2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, Philemon), three others probably not from him (Ephesians, Colossians, 2 Thessalonians) and a final three certainly not from him (1-2 Timothy, Titus). Those are all, of course, historical conclusions and not dogmatic presumptions. Well and good, but, even if correct, so what? And why should anyone care?
It is not just that we have factual and fictional letters of "Paul" or that those 13 letters are mixed between a Paul and a Pseudo-Paul. It is not just that, after Paul's death, followers imagined him in new situations and had him respond to new problems -- as if in a seamless if fictional continuity from past into present and future.
The problem is that those post-Pauline or Pseudo-Pauline letters are primarily counter-Pauline and anti-Pauline. What happens across those three sets of letters is that the radical Paul of the authentic seven letters (Romans, 1-2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, Philemon) is slowly but steadily morphed into the conservative Paul of the probably inauthentic threesome (Ephesians Colossians, 2 Thessalonians) and finally into the reactionary Paul of those certainly inauthentic ones (1-2 Timothy, Titus).
In other words, the radical Paul is being deradicalized, sanitized and Romanized. His radical views on, for example, slavery and patriarchy, are being retrofitted into Roman cultural expectations and Roman social presuppositions. Watch, then, how it works in terms of slavery (I leave patriarchy for my next blog in this series on Paul):
The radical and historical Paul sent back the now-converted slave Onesimus to his owner and told him that a Christian could not own a Christian for how could Christians be equal and unequal to one another at the same time? He reminds him "to do your duty," to free Onesimus, and to consider him "no longer as a slave but more than a slave, a beloved brother -- especially to me but how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord" (Philemon 1:8,16).
Next, the later, conservative counter-Paul takes Christian owners with Christian slaves absolutely for granted, addresses both classes and reminds each of its mutual obligations. "Slaves obey ... fearing the Lord" and "Masters treat your slaves justly ... you also have a Master in heaven" (Colossians 3:22-4:1 & Ephesians 6:5-9). Christian-on-Christian slavery is back but now in kinder, gentler mode!
Finally, the still later and reactionary anti-Paul never mentions mutual duties, addresses only the master, and says to "tell slaves to be submissive to their masters and ... to be an ornament to the doctrine of God our Savior" (Titus 2:9-10).
What is at stake in that sad progression from Paul to anti-Paul? Why is it of importance that -- at least with regard to slavery -- radical Christian liberty is being changed back into normal Roman slavery. It means this: Jewish Christianity is becoming Roman Christianity. And this: Constantine here we come!
Paul the Apostle - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Pauline epistles - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Paul's Mission And Letters | From Jesus To Christ - The First ...
Sopoćani - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Monastery Sopoćani – UNESCO World Heritage Site | Travel Serbia
..."Some men are not to marry. For the are neither given nor taken in marriage.
Some men are borne of there Mothers womb...Other men are borne of other men,
While other men are borne of the Kingdom. Thus after fulfilling the Will of the Father,
move on to thrive, a little bit below the Angels..."[NKJV-1611 Thomas/Nelson Trans]
1. Paul did not personally know Jesus,
2. Paul was guided by the same Holy Spirit that came over Jesus, and as they are in need of direction or counseling, they pray and meditate for an answer, which may come from a dream, vision or thought form
3. The "differences" between the early and later Paul writings, deal in "physical" areas under Paul's discretion on what is the best way to organize his groups (church), which means sometimes the "teacher" has to "discipline" the "students"
4. Those "disciplinary rules" have nothing to do with the "spiritual" message; that in due time, the holy Spirit would come to work on them, should they be willing
5. If folks would like the assistance of mentors considered further along in their spiritual walk in life, orders and rules are a prerequisite (parochial school anyone? what difference does it make to ones spiritual growth, or to God, whether you wear a uniform or hairstyle)
6. The holy character traits of peace and quiet (as well as many others) comes about over a life long struggle with self-: control, sacrifice and suffering
7. Church rules comes from the physical side, a human being; Paul, the Holy Spirit comes from God on the spiritual side, they are separate,
8. Just because someone goes to the organization (church) does not mean they have the HS
9. Just because someone does not go, does not mean they can't get the HS
What you are saying is nothing new to people who bother to research these things. In fact I might suspect that this article is Pseudo-Crossan to be rather technical about it from my point of view.
Why is it that clerics like Bishop Morris in Australia, the Cardinal in Portugal or the retired Egan in NY run statements by us very, very briefly like there are few theological barriers to such matters as female ordination or celibacy just before they retire?
No guts. No glory. Just a comfy pension check for a job not well done for pushing the same old dead dogma along with a broom for another generation or two. The people of God do not matter anymore to you all in charge of the theology thingy. They have been written out of every modern equation - political, economic and now religious sad to say.
People – here and NOW - is Jesus! Not some weakening heart and spirit presently found in obsolete language, dogma, ancient history. The word is living. The word is not a book or a supposed Pauline blog article published in that book.
Really?
I think it unlikely that in 1265, almost a millennium after St. Augustine's council of Carthage in 397, either an artist or an abbey would go against Paul's having 13 epistles. Though I am undecided on the authenticity of the Pauline corpus, I think that the artist and those who commissioned him would have had no such doubts.
A similarity might be found in Shakespeare's works, where some scholars believe some works were not written by Shakespeare, but someone writing for him. Irregardless, the stories and plays are still enjoyable.
It seemed God commissioned Paul to set up a "religion" based on Jesus, its both a help and a hurt, it was Paul's baby
2 Corinthians 11:28 "Besides everything else, I face daily the pressure of my concern for all the churches."
1 Thessalonians 3:1-5 "So when we could stand it no longer, I sent Timothy to you to strengthen and encourage you in your faith. I was afraid that the tempter might have tempted you and our efforts might have been useless."
Titus 1:5 "The reason I left you in Crete was that you might straighten out what was left unfinished and appoint elders in every town, as I directed you."
when a person is going all out and stressed, they tend to become more controlling and contentious (Acts 15:36-41)
Paul grew more harsh, the people he formed into his church organization are new comers, unskilled in the faith and not far along in their spiritual journey, his job is to organize, not do the work of the Holy Spirit, so mistakes are happening and Paul has to go around solving problems, what seems to be called "anti-Paul" was references to keeping the carnals from becoming destructive in his church organization, that was basically what the physical law was meant to do (Galatians 3) "the law and rules were put in place till faith or the HS came and changed their hearts and character"
Another point would be the differences in Paul's statements. Someone brought up the Ronald Reagan defense...(Shudder) But if we are talking about the literal inerrant word of God then there would be no defense.
Neo-Orthodox would not throw out the baby with the bath water. It would look for certain threads that do exist and recognized these as divinely inspired while these other elements are take as statements made specifically to that community and is not made for universal appeal.
I am not sure of the technical terms you use, the bible has a "spiritual" message and a "physical" message, God wants people to go the spiritual route, the physical helped keep people out of jail
there have been many overcomers, and they have vast differences on the physical side, some were important rulers like Daniel, David and Joseph, but many have been dirt poor nobodies
there has been many personal changes in overcomers positions, such as Moses acted as a Judge with people coming to him, he changed because it was getting too difficult as the community got larger, and instituted Priests and Levites (civil servants), this reminds me that the US Constitution set the number of representatives at 1 rep for each 30,000, Art 1 Sec 2 they started to run out of space, so instead of building a larger place they limited the seats and let the number go up it is now somewhere in the range of 1 rep for each 300,000 people, changes happen based on time and cultural circumstances
there were judges, yet because of public pressure, Samuel was forced to change and make Saul King
the apostles who were Jews started out following the physical side till the day came for their spiritual transformation, they believed that salvation or the Holy Spirit was only "for the Jews" later, Peter and the others discovered that Gentiles who never went the physical route, can be saved and get the HS