Paul denies Jesus lived
recently
Many have noted how the writings of the apostle Paul, the first Christian
writings, give no indication that Jesus's life and death happened recently.
Others think that there are hints that Jesus was believed to be an obscure
figure who lived centuries before. The whole feel of his work has a Jesus
plothole, why is there no hint that people proclaiming themselves fanatics for
Jesus willing to die for him were hungering for the life story?
Where is the truth?
NO FIRST CENTURY CHRIST
The writings of Paul, the first Christian writer deny the view expressed in the
gospels that Jesus lived roughly from about 4BC to 33 or whatever AD and don’t
even say he lived and died on earth - he could have died in some arcane and
magical world. He says that Jesus died and rose from the dead on the third day
and then he appeared. But he could have risen the third day centuries before and
started only to appear in the early thirties AD.
Theodore Parker noticed from the New Testament that Paul’s Jesus was a mythological figure (page 234, Theodore Parker’s Discourses).
Paul does state some things about Jesus’ life but he
never puts Jesus in any time or place or says that what he knows about Jesus
came from historical data. It might have been worked out from Old Testament
prophecies or have been disclosed to somebody in visions. There is no evidence
against the view from Paul himself that the only revelation Paul got was a sense
that God was telling him to interpret the alleged messianic prophecies of
scripture as having been fulfilled by an unknown man and that this was the cause
of his conversion and he thought the man appeared to him later (page 15, Jesus -
One Hundred Years Before Christ). No hint is given that the vision had anything
to do with his conversion or that it was even as important as scripture.
The Epistles of Paul just say that Jesus was born of woman, lived under the law
of Moses, was betrayed, said, “This is my body given for you”, over bread,
testified to the faith before Pontius Pilate - did Pilate have a vision of Jesus
(Paganism used techniques to induce “visions”) or did he see the real Jesus or
did he just hear what Jesus supposedly said through some prophet? (Note: the
letter that records this, the first epistle to Timothy, is regarded as a late
forgery by most scholars), died on a cross, rose to life and appeared in his
time. Paul’s Jesus could have been born of this woman on another world. The Law
of Moses was believed to be a Law that was always in force – because it was
really God’s Law - but which was only revealed at the time of Moses so Jesus
could have been born under the Law before Moses was even born.
Romans 9:5 says that the Jews are descended from the patriarchs and that Christ
came from their flesh and blood which seems to contradict the view that Jesus
never lived on earth. But God could have taken an embryo to Heaven so that the
Christ would be Jewish or made sperm into a body for Jesus in Heaven just like
he made Eve from Adam’s rib. Perhaps despite being risen for countless
centuries, the risen Jesus had his bodily nature changed after the Israelites
came to be so that he was genetically a descendant. Or perhaps because when Paul
decreed that Onesimus and Philemon were blood brothers though they were not this
is a reflection of that idea. Perhaps Jesus was only a legal descendant but not
an actual one.
In the Bible, the angels are natural material beings like men and who have
bodies but who possess unusual powers.
Paul’s stress on faith would be incompatible with the traditional Christian idea
of a Jesus who did lots of miracles on earth for Paul wanted a faith nourished
by the word of God and not by miracles. He viewed faith as a great blessing and
the means of salvation so though he considered visions tolerable too many
miracles would be a problem and would block faith.
Romans 15:8 tells us that Christ became a servant to the circumcised, referring
to the Jews, to show that God was truthful so that the promises made to the
patriarchs centuries before would be confirmed. The promises didn’t mention a
saviour who would die for sins and rise again. They promised material blessings
for Israel and peace with a David ruling it as its just king on earth. Unless
you want to believe that Paul thought that Jesus did all this for Israel in some
unrecorded time perhaps at least a century before his time you can see that
Jesus did not fulfil any of these promises. The alternative is to hold that Paul
is a liar or that Romans 15:8 tells us nothing about when Jesus lived for he
could have been this servant, that proved these points, after his resurrection
or even before his birth as a man. All of the three would indicate that Paul
cannot be taken as evidence for the existence of Jesus. In the same chapter Paul
called on the Romans to be tolerant with each other after the example of Jesus
Christ. But the Gospel Jesus was very intolerant of the Jewish leaders and of
hypocrites. He was tolerant of stubborn sinners but the intolerance is what
shines through most.
Many think that Paul wrote that when he admitted to having persecuted the Church
(Philippians 3:6) that the Church must have existed before him so he was not the
inventor of Jesus or the first Christian. He only admits to his bloodthirsty
past the once. He immediately added that he was above reproach when it came to
justice as the Law of Moses understood it. He then says that he perceived all
this as rubbish when the light of Christ shone upon him. The Church could have
been just the chosen body that was conscious of garbled new revelation coming
through and Paul was chosen as their prophet and seer. He could have been the
one that shaped these revelations that became solidified into a new god, a
resurrected Jesus Christ. He could still have been the creator of Jesus.
Paul said that Jesus died and rose according to the scriptures. The scripture he
had in mind was probably Isaiah 53 which speaks of a man suffering for others as
an offering for sin – one of Paul’s major themes about Jesus - and then he gets
his reward. It is the best candidate though it is bad enough. Romans 10:16
proves that it is the one.
The suffering man is spoken of in the past tense in Isaiah as if it had all happened long ago. Christians say the prophets often predicted future events in the language of the past. Isaiah never did that even if others did so that is improbable. They would have made it obvious that they could not mean the past if they did. Also, the passage could be about the past so it should be taken to mean the past. 53:1 asks who has believed this message about the servant meaning nobody did. We gather then that that generation knew who or what it was about and did not believe it. It was too vague and obscure in itself to be really unbelievable to those who accepted prophets unless it was not vague and obscure to them indicating they knew what and who it referred to.
Paul’s use of the text may indicate that he believed that
Jesus lived long ago. Paul said that Jesus was a mystery to the ages past but
that could refer to the gospel of the resurrection which was only revealed in
the latter days by the apparition of Christ. The past tense in Isaiah shifts to
the future tense when speaking of the rehabilitation and vindication of the
servant indicating that the tenses should be taken literally.
Paul told the Thessalonians that they and he believed that Jesus died and rose
again (1 Thessalonians 4:14). You don’t say you believe that John F Kennedy
died. You would only say that if you had just the word of a few witnesses for it
that he died or if you knew people who thought they had seen his ghost that said
he had died on a cross. If Jesus had died in the first century Paul would have
written you know that Jesus died and believe that he rose again and not lumped
the death and resurrection under belief. The context in which Paul said this was
about that there was hope if loved ones die. Yet the hope he gives is one of
belief not proof so there was no proof for proof would serve his consoling
purpose better.
The mission fields that Paul worked in would have required him to be able to
tell the people about Jesus’ life and there were mystical heretics around who
would have liked there to have been Christians who knew nothing much about the
Jesus of history. Pagans comprised the bulk of the converts and pagans were
heavily into stories about gods and they would not have changed the religious
habits of a lifetime. If Jesus had had a story, Paul would have focused on it
more. It would be different if Paul admitted that nobody knew anything about
Jesus. A Jesus who could be known through visions would have been a big
attraction to pagans. A Jesus with stories about him like the gods of the pagans
would have been much better.
Paul complained about how hard it was to keep people true to the faith and yet
he did not give them the whole verified Jesus story. He wrote to the
Thessalonians that they must hold fast to the faith and prove all things in it
(1 Thessalonians 5:21). This proof contained nothing then about the life of
Jesus. Whatever had to be proven had to be proven by the Old Testament and
without the life of Jesus. We see this when Paul complains about his fear that
their faith was not firm despite his efforts which betrays a non-intellectual
historical basis for that faith (chapter 3). In 2 Thessalonians the concern is
that the people will be tricked by forged or altered letters from the apostles
that contradict the apostolic doctrine of the second coming and what will
happen. This could not happen if they were familiar with the Jesus of history,
if that Jesus is the one of the gospels, for the second coming was one of Jesus’
main themes and Jesus went on about it so much that it is clear that he may have
thought of rising from the dead and the second coming happening then or that the
second coming was not far behind.
Paul centred the Church not on the foundation of Jesus and his history but on
Jesus as seen through the apostles and especially himself. This overwhelming
dependence on the apostles proves that Jesus was at most a vision that they had
and that the gospel history never happened.
Ephesians 4:8 says that Jesus took captives with him when he ascended into the
heavens from earth. This proves that the author thought that Jesus must have
ascended centuries before because nobody could say he did it some years ago. The
saints are not captives. Paul says that Jesus does not drag people kicking and
screaming into his friendship. The captives are his enemies who he takes up out
of the world but not necessarily to Heaven.
Romans 16:25,26 speaks of the mystery of redemption which was recently unveiled
and kept in secret for long ages but is now disclosed through the prophets and
scriptures of the Old Testament. The mystery of redemption is very broad and
covers the death and resurrection of Christ and the call to the world to be
saved through this redemption. Paul is saying that the converts are seeing these
doctrines in the Old Testament and the apostles never claimed authority for
themselves but always used the Old Testament to support their claims so
everything depended on the predictions of the Old Testament. Even Paul himself
and the Early Church didn’t believe that their mission was based on the miracles
and life of Christ or any gospels. In fact the only thing that counted was the
Old Testament prophecies. If it didn’t predict the resurrection of Jesus then it
never happened even if the whole of Palestine saw Jesus rise!
Paul said that the children of Israel hundreds of years before when Moses was
alive drank from the spiritual rock that was Christ and that God was not pleased
with any of them (1 Corinthians 10:4). He said that they were lost so he does
not mean that they were spiritually sustained by grace but that Christ was there
to teach them. Paul was frightened of people twisting his words (2 Thessalonians
2:2) so he wrote what he meant. And especially when he was writing to the Church
in Corinth which had many people who believed Jesus was not a material being and
that the resurrection was a symbol and not an event. Paul believed that Jesus
only appeared to people for a good spiritual reason so he was not talking about
apparitions. Jesus lived on earth as a man in the time of Moses. The fact that
the deeds of Jesus are not mentioned in the books of Moses was of little
consequence to him. The early Church believed the prophet Moses predicted who
would be like him was Jesus. Paul knew that when Moses predicted the coming of a
prophet like himself that this prophecy was too vague and therefore useless
unless you assume that this prophet was alive then which narrows it down a good
bit. All the early Christians believed this prophet was Jesus so Paul would have
thought Jesus was alive in Moses’ day.
Why does Paul when enumerating the gifts of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 12)
which are to prophesy, preach well, do miracles include the gift of faith? He
says this gift is given to some in the Church.
Faith is necessary for membership in the Church and for being a Christian. But
what is this faith that is given to some of these? How is it different?
Now this faith is different from the faith you have to have when you join the
Church. It is not normal Christian faith. It is something more advanced.
Now both kinds of faith are based on evidence and are a gift from God – his
guidance makes you see that it is true. Let’s call the ordinary faith of
Christians normal faith. Let’s call the other charismatic faith. It is a charism
– a gift that the Spirit doesn’t give for everybody just like he doesn’t give
all the gift of prophecy.
So what is different about them? There is only one possible answer.
The normal faith of the Christians was based on the apostles’ testimony and on
the feeling that God was telling you in your heart that it was true but not on
anything concretely evidential. But God was choosing some to receive and or
provide proper evidence for the faith of and the existence of Jesus which was
charismatic faith. That would only happen if there were no people who saw Jesus
do miracles or who knew people who had experienced Jesus’ miracles. It would
only happen if there were no people who saw the death of Jesus happen. So God
provided evidence for the chosen in the Church by giving them visions of what
supposedly actually happened.
Paul counselled the Church members to work out their salvation by fear and
trembling – Jesus never encouraged fear and often told his followers not to be
afraid. When Paul wants the trembling it shows he wanted them to be very afraid.
When the first Christian writer urges something that the gospels say Jesus
didn’t want then it follows that the gospels are lying. Maybe they are not, but
we have to follow the rules of evidence which require us to pay most heed to the
earliest testimony. And that testimony is Paul’s.
Some say that Paul quoted the historical Jesus in his epistles. 1 Corinthians
9:14 superficially matches Matthew 10:10. 1 Corinthians 10:27 superficially
matches Luke 10:7. Romans 13:7 superficially matches Mark 12:13-17; 1
Thessalonians 5:2-5 superficially matches Luke 12:39-40. All of the parallels
can be explained without suggesting that they were quotes from the gospel
version of Jesus. The gospels came after the epistles and so they probably took
some inspiration from the epistles. Some parallels can also be explained as
coincidence or are down to expressions like thief in the night which might have
been current in the Church and were incorporated into the gospel version of the
words of Jesus. The author of Luke was reputed to be a disciple of Paul. None of
the verses are presented as quotations so they should not be taken to be
quotations. The first selection has Jesus saying something we all say, without
intending to quote him or anybody – there are certain things that tend to be
expressed in the same words by coincidence – Jesus saying that the worker
deserves his wages and Paul puts it like this, that those who preach the gospel
should live by the gospel which is too different to be a possible quotation.
In a culture that was full of mythical gods that everybody made up stories about, it would be odd if Jesus were real and Paul would not make him evidence-based to "solidify" him against nebulous gods! He clearly held there was no real evidence so that was not an option. The implications are staggering.