What was "the church of God"?

[Charles Wilson]

I get the impression that all the apostles believed that Jesus "died for our sins" in 1 Cor. 15:3-11:

For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures... Whether, then, it was I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.

nah, that's a redactor trying to be paul

GakuseiDon and perseusomega9 -

More, please!

[GakuseiDon]

GD --

I feel that you are onto something but I'm not sure what it is. Perhaps a common Redactor of the Paulines? There is a common thread in this but it may be for those smarter than Yours Truly.

1 Corinthians 1: 17 (RSV):

[17] For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.

Here is a similar verse discussing the "...cross be[ing] emptied of its power".

Interesting. "Preaching of the cross" is "foolishness" to those who perish, even if preached with words of wisdom:

Co 1:17 For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.
18 For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.

But preaching the cross doesn't get you persecuted. It's preaching against circumcision that does.

Anyway, I think Paul tells us more about the church of God in Christ in 1 Cor 12, and the church includes people who receive the "word of wisdom":

1 Cor 12:
7 But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all:
8 for to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge through the same Spirit,
9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings by *the same Spirit,
10 to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another discerning of spirits, to another different kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues.
11 But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually as He wills.
...
27 Now you are the body of Christ, and members individually.
28 And God has appointed these in the church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, varieties of tongues.
29 Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Are all workers of miracles?
30 Do all have gifts of healings? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?
31 But earnestly desire the *best gifts.

I was actually impressed by Earl Doherty's idea in "Jesus: Neither God Nor Man" that there was a community of Galilean itinerant teachers who went around performing healings, making prophecies about the end times, etc. Doherty called this the "Q community", since he believed (or rather speculated -- nothing wrong with speculation!) that the Q document was inspired by this community, and "Jesus" was a made-up figure who came to represent that community's actions and beliefs. For me, Jesus might well have been a member of that community, and as he gained prominence within it, the knowledge of the Q community faded into the background.

Certainly Jesus had nearly all the attributes that Paul lists: wisdom through the Spirit, gifts of healings, the working of miracles, prophecy, discerning of spirits. Whether that meant Mark was working from Paul, or both were working from a common source, I don't know. To my mind, Jesus was part of the church of God, and like other members performed apparent miracles, etc.; he became prominent at some point, probably through visions after his crucifixion; Paul converted to that church after his own vision, and the church continued to produce apparent miracles and healings.

At some point, the travelling miracle show came to a halt. When and why I don't know. Though the cynic in me thinks that it was a money-spinner in its early days, and once it stopped earning money, that side of Christianity dropped away.

[davidmartin]

have you ever come across Peter Popoff?
he's the goofiest charlatan of them all and folks like that don't invent their wheezes, they exploit existing ones once their materialist senses are aroused. its far more likely there was a core behind all later loot gathering that exploited it that these crooks and shirt lifters would ever be able to create for themselves. Thus, the search for the untainted core is profitable.

[Charles Wilson]

True story:

Decades ago, I was"Roaming through the dial" on the AM band late at night when the end of a "Peter Popoff" episode came in loud and clear *. Popoff was finishing a "prayer", asking God to provide for his "Ministry" through the people's donations. In the background, an assistant could be heard,"I can see those people writing out one hundred dollar checks..."

Glory, Glory and Glory...Pass the plate and where's the "/sarc" switch?

CW

* All you youngsters out there in the Ether prolly don't know about "Clear Channel" Stations and the like. Back in the Daze (through late 1960s and beyond), American stations were limited to 50,000 watts. There were various Day Stations which would go off the air at sunset. These stations were clustered around various assigned frequencies on the AM Band and when the station went off the air for the rest of the day, the interference and noise around that frequency was mostly eliminated. This allowed certain 50,000 watt stations to have their signal "carry" across the states.

WLS out of Chicago was one of those Clear Channel Stations. The Worldwide Church of God would buy time for "The World Tomorrow" Broadcast at 11:00 or 11:30 PM and the program would usually drift in for reception in Florida.

Simultaneously, certain stations in Mexico and elsewhere were not limited to 50,000 watts. These stations would pack 250,000 watts into their signal and their Culturally Imperialistic brand of Salsa Music overwhelmed anything around that frequency. You could fry chickens on your dinner plate if you stood in the right place under the Broadcast towers. There was a station, PJB, out of Bonaire, that did the same thing. They would directionalize their signal for maximum carry into the States. Popoff and other Evangelical types would buy time on these stations. It takes a lot of "Hund'ed dollah chetts" to pay for this signal. The organization of these Radio Churches of God was not haphazard.

Itinerant Preachers indeed!

[Edit Note: Popoff may have used other stations than PJB. There was an older gentleman who used PJB and I hope I'm not mis-remembering here. Popoff was bad enough without tying Mega-Power stations around his neck...]

[Irish1975]

GD --

I feel that you are onto something but I'm not sure what it is. Perhaps a common Redactor of the Paulines? There is a common thread in this but it may be for those smarter than Yours Truly.

1 Corinthians 1: 17 (RSV):

[17] For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.

Here is a similar verse discussing the "...cross be[ing] emptied of its power".

Interesting. "Preaching of the cross" is "foolishness" to those who perish, even if preached with words of wisdom:

Co 1:17 For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.
18 For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.

But preaching the cross doesn't get you persecuted. It's preaching against circumcision that does.

Anyway, I think Paul tells us more about the church of God in Christ in 1 Cor 12

Thanks for the interesting comments. It does seem likely that Paul’s account of “the manifestations of the Spirit” in 1 Cor 12 reflects something that his church of God had in common with the Judaean churches of God. Receiving the spirit is everything. That’s why I think the first part of 1 Thess 2:14 is so important, because once you set aside the interpolation, there is that very significant idea of Paul founding the gentile churches of God after the pattern of the Judaean churches of God. I think this does imply that he’s thinking about worship practices, spiritual gifts, prophecying, and all the rest.

Now if, as GakuseiDon suggests, Jesus was a member of the church of God, does that imply that Paul would have known him? Perhaps when he was a persecutor?

even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer (2 Cor 5:16)

I tend to see Paul’s Christ as an alter ego, which he is able to manifest in worship contexts when he “preaches Christ crucified.” Stevan Davies’s book has lots of good info about the anthropology of altered mental states and the assumption of alter egos in spirit-led religious movements.

Indeed, there is something weirdly physical for Paul about his identification with Jesus:

From now on let no one cause trouble for me, for I bear on my body the brand-marks of Jesus (6:17)

How this relates to circumcision, another physical expression of devotion, which also invovles pain, is something to speculate about. But whatever the underlying practices that we can never know in detail, there must have been an experiential basis for Paul’s theology of Jesus Christ. It cannot be pure mythology about sky demons, as Carrier would have us think.

[Ben C. Smith]

Anyway, I think Paul tells us more about the church of God in Christ in 1 Cor 12, and the church includes people who receive the "word of wisdom":

1 Cor 12:
7 But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all:
8 for to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge through the same Spirit,
9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings by *the same Spirit,
10 to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another discerning of spirits, to another different kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues.
11 But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually as He wills.
...
27 Now you are the body of Christ, and members individually.
28 And God has appointed these in the church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, varieties of tongues.
29 Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Are all workers of miracles?
30 Do all have gifts of healings? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?
31 But earnestly desire the *best gifts.

I have speculated — given that wisdom and knowledge are usually considered pretty much the same thing, but on the Pauline list of gifts that you quote above appear to be different things — that "words of wisdom" were literally words spoken in the name of the personified Lady Wisdom (based on that trope being present both in Judaism and in Christianity), and that "words of knowledge" were insights into how the relationships of various cosmic entities are structured (based on how the word gnosis is often used in the literature).

Certainly Jesus had nearly all the attributes that Paul lists: wisdom through the Spirit, gifts of healings, the working of miracles, prophecy, discerning of spirits. Whether that meant Mark was working from Paul, or both were working from a common source, I don't know.

Less speculative, IMHO, is my overall sense of what was going on with all of these spiritual gifts. The "time had come," as it were; the last generation of humankind, spoken of in 1 Enoch and at Qumran and in the Pseudepigrapha, had finally been born: or so an interlocking set of movements believed and announced. This meant that the pattern of Eldad and Medad and the promise to the prophet Joel were in full swing. I personally think that the author of Mark knew at least some of the Pauline epistles, but in this case it hardly matters; this is more like a modern charismatic or Pentecostal Christian knowing about "seed faith." Nobody even has to know that the concept originated with Oral Roberts; rather, the notion is part of the fabric of the movement by this time. The lists of the gifts in the early Christian writings are never identical, and that is because they are describing real life, confusing, and often chaotic phenomena which overlap and can be difficult to classify. Modern charismatic Christians know instinctively what "kinds of things" are on the divine list of charismatic gifts, even without memorizing any of the NT verses listing them; occasionally a gift will even be added to the list, such as when the so called Toronto Blessing gave the church the (truly awkward and cringey, in my view) gift of "holy laughter."

YMMV.

[Ben C. Smith]

Indeed, there is something weirdly physical for Paul about his identification with Jesus:

From now on let no one cause trouble for me, for I bear on my body the brand-marks of Jesus (6:17)

Good observation. I have been collecting instances of early Christians and Jews "channeling" spirits or deities, and related phenomena, and this one had escaped my notice.

[Secret Alias]

Also the statement about Paul being the one publicly crucified before your eyes.

[Charles Wilson]

And:

"In hoc signo vinces"

From the ever Politicized Wiki-P:

"The historian bishop Eusebius of Caesaria states that Constantine was marching with his army (Eusebius does not specify the actual location of the event, but it is clearly not in the camp at Rome), when he looked up to the sun and saw a cross of light above it, and with it the Greek words "(ἐν) τούτῳ νίκα" ("In this, conquer"), a phrase often rendered into Latin as in hoc signo vinces ("in this sign, you will conquer").

"At first, Constantine did not know the meaning of the apparition, but on the following night, he had a dream in which Christ explained to him that he should use the sign of the cross against his enemies. Eusebius then continues to describe the Labarum,[5] the military standard used by Constantine in his later wars against Licinius, showing the Chi-Rho sign. The accounts by Lactantius and Eusebius, though not entirely consistent, have been connected to the Battle of the Milvian Bridge (312 AD), having merged into a popular notion of Constantine seeing the Chi-Rho sign on the evening before the battle..."

Hmmm... "Did you say 'Eusebius'?..."

[GakuseiDon]

I have speculated — given that wisdom and knowledge are usually considered pretty much the same thing, but on the Pauline list of gifts that you quote above appear to be different things — that "words of wisdom" were literally words spoken in the name of the personified Lady Wisdom (based on that trope being present both in Judaism and in Christianity), and that "words of knowledge" were insights into how the relationships of various cosmic entities are structured (based on how the word gnosis is often used in the literature).

Thank Ben. I checked out that thread. I had seen Paul distinguishing between "words of wisdom" and "words of knowledge" and was wondering about the difference. Your thread was interesting, as always!