The short gMark earlier than the Pauline Epistles.

[hakeem]

The short gMark predates all stories of Jesus in the NT including all the so-called Pauline Epistles.

Quite a few scholars have argued for Mark using Paul as a source for his Gospel. Here is one example https://www.amazon.com/Mark-Canonizer-P ... 1601910207

I did not ask for the names or books of people who believe the author of the short gMark used the so-called Pauline letters--I am asking you to show me the evidence.

As I said before, no-one can show a single verse in the short gMark that was taken from any Epistle under the name of Paul.

We know how the short gMark would most likely look if the author was aware of and used the so-called Pauline Epistles.

We have the Synoptics.

The Synoptics are perfect examples of what to expect when the authors used sources for their Gospels.

The Markan Jesus story contradicts the Pauline Jesus and teaching.

The Markan Jesus preached nothing about universal salvation because of his crucifixion and resurrection. In fact the Markan Jesus's gospel did not require his death or being raised from the dead.

There would be no salvation to those who betrayed, rejected or caused the death of Jesus in the short gMark.

The short gMark is about the supposed fulfilment of prophecy in the books of the prophets--the Jews would reject the Son of God so their city and Temple would be destroyed.

Mark 6

11 And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear you, when ye depart thence, shake off the dust under your feet for a testimony against them. Verily I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrha in the day of judgment, than for that city.

Mark 14:21

The Son of man indeed goeth, as it is written of him: but woe to that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! good were it for that man if he had never been born.

Mark 13:2

And Jesus answering said unto him, Seest thou these great buildings? there shall not be left one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.

The short gMark was invented as an explanation for the Fall of the Jewish Temple not to start a new religion.

[hakeem]

The so-called Pauline letters were invented after the writing called Revelation .

In writings attributed to Justin Martyr there is no mention of Paul and the Epistles however there is mention of a character called John who had a revelation.

Dialogue with Trypho LXXXI

And further, there was a certain man with us, whose name was John, one of the apostles of Christ, who prophesied, by a revelation that was made to him, that those who believed in our Christ would dwell a thousand years in Jerusalem; and that thereafter the general, and, in short, the eternal resurrection and judgment of all men would likewise take place.

Revelation 20:6

Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years.

It is very important to understand that in the writing called the Muratorian Canon the revelation of John preceded the so-called Pauline Epistles.

It is implied John wrote his revelation to seven Churches before the supposed Paul

The Muratorian Canon

....as the blessed Apostle Paul, following the rule of his predecessor John, writes to no more than seven churches by name, in this order: the first to the Corinthians, the second to the Ephesians, the third to the Philippians, the fourth to the Colossians, the fifth to the Galatians, the sixth to the Thessalonians, the seventh to the Romans.

It must also be noted that version of the second coming in the so-called Pauline Epistles was unknown by Justin.

The supposed Pauline writers followed the rule of their predecessor and wrote to seven Churches.

[Jax]

The so-called Pauline letters were invented after the writing called Revelation .

I won't discount this as there is really no way to actually date Revelation (just wild conjecture as far as I can tell) as it has no references to earlier NT material to help place it. See this forum page for more information viewtopic.php?f=3&t=3459&start=210

In writings attributed to Justin Martyr there is no mention of Paul and the Epistles however there is mention of a character called John who had a revelation.

I think that you will find however that quite a few scholars feel that Justin Martyr at least alluded to the Pauline letters in his writings.

[hakeem]

I think that you will find however that quite a few scholars feel that Justin Martyr at least alluded to the Pauline letters in his writings.

Again, I am not asking for the quantity of Scholars who believe the so-called Pauline letters were early instead I ask for the evidence for an historical Paul and that he actually wrote Epistles to Churches in the time of Claudius and/or Nero.

There is no such evidence and there never was.

Paul and the Epistles are very late fabrications---invented after "True Discourse" attributed to Celsus.

Acts of the Apostles is a non-historical writing and one of the main invented characters is Paul.

In order to make Paul a believer his conversion was manufactured and then the so-called Epistles to Churches were made up.

The Christian cult must have started after the Fall of the Jewish Temple c 70 CE and after at least Antiquities of the Jews attributed to Josephus.

Antiquities of the Jews 10.11.7 .

In the very same manner Daniel also wrote concerning the Roman government, and that our country should be made desolate by them. All these things did this man leave in writing, as God had showed them to him, insomuch that such as read his prophecies, and see how they have been fulfilled, would wonder at the honor wherewith God honored Daniel...

There is no trace of any Christian cult in the 1st century and no known contemporary writer wrote about Jesus and Paul.

[pavurcn]

Paul and the Epistles are very late fabrications---invented after "True Discourse" attributed to Celsus.

And the evidence for this is...the (implausible) possibility of one interpretation of the writings and witnesses we have? The fact that it can be imagined to have happened this way?

Where is the evidence of the conspiracy happening? Who are the rogue inventors of the religious geniuses that swayed 2000 years of history? Where did they meet? What were their tactics? Not a shred of evidence for this, is there?

Gratuitous assertions of fabrication can be reasonably rejected.

[hakeem]

Paul and the Epistles are very late fabrications---invented after "True Discourse" attributed to Celsus.

And the evidence for this is...the (implausible) possibility of one interpretation of the writings and witnesses we have? The fact that it can be imagined to have happened this way?

Where is the evidence of the conspiracy happening? Who are the rogue inventors of the religious geniuses that swayed 2000 years of history? Where did they meet? What were their tactics? Not a shred of evidence for this, is there?

Gratuitous assertions of fabrication can be reasonably rejected.

You cannot show me that Paul and the Epistles are mentioned in the Dead Sea Scrolls, the writings attributed to Philo, Josephus, Pliny the Elder, Tacitus, Suetonius, Plutarch, Pliny the Younger, Aristides, Justin Martyr, Tatian, Celsus, Municius Felix, Theophilus of Antioch, Athenagoras of Athens, Arnobius, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, James, 1 Peter, Jude and the Epistle to the Hebrews.

Paul and the Epistles were manufactured.

[StephenGoranson]

I have suggested (and I'm not the first) that Revelation of John has some anti-Pauline aspects (if so, Rev. was after Paul), but hakeem, you seem to have made up your mind. If interested:
Goranson, Stephen. “Essene Polemic in the Apocalypse of John.” In Legal Texts and Legal Issues: Proceedings of the Second Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies, Cambridge, 1995: Published in Honour of Joseph M. Baumgarten, edited by Moshe Bernstein, Florentino García Martínez, and John Kampen, 453–60. Leiden: Brill, 1997.
And related:
------. “The Exclusion of Ephraim in Rev. 7:4–8 and Essene Polemic Against Pharisees.” Dead Sea Discoveries 2, no. 1 (1995): 80–85
and “The Text of Revelation 22:14” in: New Testament Studies 43 (1997): 154-157.

[pavurcn]

You cannot show me that Paul and the Epistles are mentioned in the Dead Sea Scrolls, the writings attributed to Philo, Josephus, Pliny the Elder, Tacitus, Suetonius, Plutarch, Pliny the Younger, Aristides, Justin Martyr, Tatian, Celsus, Municius Felix, Theophilus of Antioch, Athenagoras of Athens, Arnobius, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, James, 1 Peter, Jude and the Epistle to the Hebrews.

Paul and the Epistles were manufactured.

1. Why would you expect Paul's letters to be universally known and given scriptural or high status so soon? The emphasis was on Jesus Christ and the Word, not on Paul. Paul's letters were not collected, circulated, and given their great importance till a later date, after the original eyewitnesses died off and the communities were growing and there was need for some authoritative guidance...Just as we should expect. Ignatius of Antioch (d. 106 / 107) already reveres Paul.

2. Why would someone like Pliny the Elder be referring to something that probably had not yet been collected yet, much less widely circulated?

3. There are many books known to have existed at that time that were not cited by the writers you mention. Non-mention is not equivalent to non-existence.

There is still no evidence of fabrication. The traditional picture is a fully coherent one.

[John2]

hakeem wrote:

You cannot show me that Paul and the Epistles are mentioned in the Dead Sea Scrolls, the writings attributed to Philo, Josephus, Pliny the Elder, Tacitus, Suetonius, Plutarch, Pliny the Younger, Aristides, Justin Martyr, Tatian, Celsus, Municius Felix, Theophilus of Antioch, Athenagoras of Athens, Arnobius, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, James, 1 Peter, Jude and the Epistle to the Hebrews.

I think Paul may be referred to in the Dead Sea Scrolls, Josephus and the Letter of James (which I think is genuine and pre-70 CE).

Regarding James, I think Paul is the "foolish person" being referred to in 2:20-24 and the boasting "tongue" discussed in chapter 3 (in the context of being a proper teacher):

You foolish person, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless? Was not our father Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. And the scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,” and he was called God’s friend. You see that a person is considered righteous by what they do and not by faith alone.

Not many of you should become teachers, my fellow believers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly. We all stumble in many ways. Anyone who is never at fault in what they say is perfect, able to keep their whole body in check ... the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts.

Compare the above with Paul's discussion of Jewish Christians in Gal. 2 and 3 and 2 Cor. 11:

We who are Jews by birth and not sinful Gentiles know that a person is not justified by the works of 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 the works of the law, because by the works of the law no one will be justified.

You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? ... Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? After beginning by means of the Spirit, are you now trying to finish by means of the flesh? Have you experienced so much in vain—if it really was in vain? So again I ask, does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you by the works of the law, or by your believing what you heard? So also Abraham “believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”

I hope you will put up with me in a little foolishness. Yes, please put up with me! ... I do not think I am in the least inferior to those “super-apostles” ... As surely as the truth of Christ is in me, nobody in the regions of Achaia will stop this boasting of mine ... And I will keep on doing what I am doing in order to cut the ground from under those who want an opportunity to be considered equal with us in the things they boast about. For such people are false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as apostles of Christ ... I repeat: Let no one take me for a fool. But if you do, then tolerate me just as you would a fool, so that I may do a little boasting. In this self-confident boasting I am not talking as the Lord would, but as a fool. Since many are boasting in the way the world does, I too will boast ... Whatever anyone else dares to boast about—I am speaking as a fool—I also dare to boast about. Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they Abraham’s descendants? So am I. Are they servants of Christ? (I am out of my mind to talk like this.) I am more.

As far as the Dead Sea Scrolls and Josephus go, I think that the Liar mentioned in the pesharim and Damascus Document and the Saulos mentioned in Josephus are at least similar to Paul (as Eisenman argues). And I think 1 Peter is genuine and pre-70 CE and shows some influence from Paul (cf. 1 Pet. 2:13-17 with Rom. 13:1-7).

Regarding Paul and the DSS, Vanderkam and Flint note that:

The phrase works of the law apparently occurs nowhere else in ancient writings other than once in MMT (C 26-27) and eight times in Paul's letters (in the Greek form erga nomou: Rom. 3:20, 28; Gal. 2:16 [3 times], 3:2, 5, 10).

https://books.google.com/books?id=SBMXn ... MT&f=false

And Dunn sees the type of separation discussed in the Community Rule and MMT as being relevant to the Antioch incident in Galatians:

That parallel [between MMT and Galatians] is indicated not only by the phrase 'works of the law', but by two other points of contact between MMT and Galatians ... The writers of MMT remind the addressees that 'we have separated ourselves from the multitude of the people [and from all their impurity]' ... The letter itself is obviously intended at least in some measure to provide an explanation of why they had thus 'separated' themselves. The verb used is precisely equivalent to the verb used by Paul to describe the action of Peter, followed by the other Jewish believers, who 'separated himself' ... from the Gentile believers in Antioch, having previously eaten with them (Gal. 2:12-13). The point is that the attitude behind both 'separations' is the same ... in each case the primary concern on the part of the 'separatists' was their own purity: they 'separated' because they feared the defilement which would be contracted by associating with those who did not maintain the same degree of purity. In short, the motivation and theological rationale were the same in MMT and Antioch: that it was necessary for Torah-true, covenant-loyal Jews to separate themselves from impurity, whether the impurity of apostate Jews or the impurity of Gentiles. That is what Paul objected to.

The parallel extends to the idea of righteousness as dependent on observing such regulations: 'This will be "reckoned to you for righteousness" in doing what is upright and good before him' ... with the same echo of Gen. 15.6 which was central to Paul's reasoning on the subject (Gal. 3.6; Rom. 4.3-12). Clearly the letter writer(s) believed that those who followed Qumran's halakhoth would be 'reckoned righteous'; that is, they would be 'reckoned righteous by reference to their ma'ase hatorah', or, in the term used by Paul, they would be 'justified ex ergon nomou'. In both cases, that is to say, what was seen to be at stake by the separatists was their own righteousness/justification; their own righteousness/justification would somehow be imperiled by association with those who did not so understand and practice the Torah, that is, by the impurity of these others. And, once again, it is precisely that attitude and praxis to which Paul objects ...

What has proved so interesting about 4QMMT at this point is that it has used the very same phrase, 'the works of the law', in the very same way as does Paul in characterizing the attitude of Peter, and with the very same implication that such 'works of the law' were deemed by the observant to be necessary bulwarks to sustain and preserve their self-definition, their identity.

https://books.google.com/books?id=ZJDKs ... on&f=false

There are other similarities between Paul and the DSS, to such an extent that I don't rule out the possibility that the Liar could be Paul. The same goes for Paul and the Saulos in Josephus. Saulos doesn't have to be Paul, and I don't care if he is or isn't, but he sounds like him at least (and more certainly fits the timeline than the DSS).

[John2]

Regarding the similarities between Saulos and Paul, both (at least arguably, in Paul's case) were related to the Herodians.

War 2.17.4:

So the men of power perceiving that the sedition was too hard for them to subdue, and that the danger which would arise from the Romans would come upon them first of all, endeavored to save themselves, and sent ambassadors ... among whom the most eminent were Saul, and Antipas, and Costobarus, who were of the king's kindred; and they desired of them both that they would come with an army to the city, and cut off the seditious before it should be too hard to be subdued.

Rom. 16:10-11:

Greet those who belong to the household of Aristobulus. Greet my kinsman Herodion. Greet those in the Lord who belong to the family of Narcissus.

Watson notes that this Aristobulus is "often identified" with the Herodians and that the one who was married to Salome had a son named Herod during Paul's time.

https://books.google.com/books?id=4PfFg ... me&f=false

And den Hollander notes that it is argued that this son "is also the 'Herodion' within the household of Aristobulus to whom Paul directs greetings in Rom. 16:10-11."

https://books.google.com/books?id=TPjYA ... me&f=false

Bird talks about Aristobulus and Herodion and their possible connection to the Herodian dynasty here (though he sees Herodion as a Herodian slave rather than as Aristobulus's son).

https://books.google.com/books?id=pU0VC ... ul&f=false

Regarding the identity of Herodion and whether he was Paul's relative or countryman, Holland writes, "The greeting gives little away about Herodion. Indeed, the virtual silence supports the view that he was a blood relative as there seems to be little point in Paul isolating one of his many countrymen in Rome in order to send such a brief greeting."

https://books.google.com/books?id=ZblMA ... er&f=false

And both Saulos and Paul were associated with Nero and Achaia and were anti-sedition.

War 2.17.4:

So the men of power perceiving that the sedition was too hard for them to subdue, and that the danger which would arise from the Romans would come upon them first of all, endeavored to save themselves, and sent ambassadors, some to Florus, the chief of which was Simon the son of Ananias; and others to Agrippa, among whom the most eminent were Saul, and Antipas, and Costobarus, who were of the king's kindred; and they desired of them both that they [Florus and Agrippa] would come with an army to the city, and cut off the seditious before it should be too hard to be subdued.

War 2.20.1:

Costobarus, therefore, and Saul, who were brethren, together with Philip, the son of Jacimus, who was the commander of king Agrippa's forces, ran away from the city, and went to Cestius. But then how Antipas, who had been besieged with them in the king's palace, but would not fly away with them, was afterward slain by the seditious, we shall relate hereafter. However, Cestius sent Saul and his friends, at their own desire, to Achaia, to Nero, to inform him of the great distress they were in, and to lay the blame of their kindling the war upon Florus, as hoping to alleviate his own danger, by provoking his indignation against Florus.

Php. 4:22:

All the saints greet you, especially those of Caesar’s household.

Rom. 13:1-5:

Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves ... Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also as a matter of conscience.

Rom. 15:26:

For Macedonia and Achaia were pleased to make a contribution for the poor among the Lord's people in Jerusalem.

1 Cor. 16:15:

You know that the household of Stephanas were the first converts in Achaia, and they have devoted themselves to the service of the Lord's people.

2 Cor. 1:1:

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, to the church of God in Corinth, together with all his holy people throughout Achaia.

1 Thes. 1:7-8:

... you have become an example to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. For not only did the message of the Lord ring out from you to Macedonia and Achaia, but your faith in God has gone out to every place, so that we have no need to say anything further.

And both Saulos and Paul were violent.

Ant. 20.9.4 (after the James passage in 20.9.1):

Costobarus also, and Saulus, did themselves get together a multitude of wicked wretches, and this because they were of the royal family; and so they obtained favor among them, because of their kindred to Agrippa; but still they used violence with the people, and were very ready to plunder those that were weaker than themselves. And from that time it principally came to pass that our city was greatly disordered, and that all things grew worse and worse among us.

Gal. 1:13:

For you have heard of my previous way of life in Judaism, how intensely I persecuted the church of God and tried to destroy it.