Week 11- What Does it Mean to Call Paul a “Freelance Religious Expert”?

The ancient traditions would tell stories about Paul not to know what Paul was really like but because by remembering Paul in certain ways they could present Paul to their own day and convey the message that they thought needed to be heard by their listeners or readers

These re-present-ations have fooled people into believing these traditions are a reflection of Paul

Example: The book of Acts, or even Acts of Paul and Thecla, is taken as historically accurate narrative

What matters is how a person lives after joining the church

The life of faith was not, as it was in the days of Paul, a life of urgent expectation of the imminent return of Christ in judgement

30 years post Paul writing his surviving letters in the 50s C.E., a member of one of his churches wrote an account of the history of early christianity from the days of Jesus up through Paul’s time. This book eventually came to be included in the New Testament as the Acts of the Apostles, and the name of the author is traditionally known as Luke, author as well of our third gospel.

The Pastoral Epistles are particularly concerned with false teachers who have invaded their communities

It is hard to know what these heretics taught but what is interesting is that at one point the author warns against “the profane chatter and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge”

Gnosis: Greek word for knowledge

Christians Gnostics stressed the importance of knowledge for salvation.

They insisted that the world we live in was not created by the one tru God but was a cosmic disaster created by a lesser deity.

This was the god of the Old Testament. The Jewish god thought he was the only God