Are You Paul or are you Saul? (page 32)

TD

By the way, the most RABID anti Jewish accounts are found in Matthew, a book written from and for the Jewish community, who by the time it was written had ejected the christians from the synagogues.

One of the most striking examples to me is the following exchange:

One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?" "The most important one," answered Jesus, "is this: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these." "Well said, teacher," the man replied. "You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices." When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions. (12:28-34 NIV)

One teacher is impressed with the wisdom of Jesus' teaching. He asks a respectful question; he likes Jesus' answer, compliments Jesus and offers his own observation. Jesus likes the observation and compliments him too.

Now Matthew's redaction:

Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?" Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments." (22:34-40 NIV)

In the Mathean account, a group of Pharisees get together. Their motive in questioning Jesus is entirely different and is reflected in the open hostility of the question:

"ephrwthsen eis ex autwn nomikoV peirazwn... "

The mutual respect is absent and the compliments Jesus and the Pharisee pay each other in the Marcan account are gone. Matthew's account is different in both subjective and objective detail

Spike Tassel

Spike Tassel (Post 83): Saul the Pharisee wouldn't have paid attention as to what Mark was writing about or Matthew's thoughts. That particular Saul would have gathered whomever he could, whether it was Mark in front of him or Matthew, and arrested him according to the authority he had been granted by the high priest, etc. Paul the Apostle would have been very interested in both Mark and Matthew as brothers in his new-found faith, especially as he gained experience with them in the ministry.

Pistoff

"Paul the Apostle would have been very interested in both Mark and Matthew as brothers in his new-found faith, especially as he gained experience with them in the ministry."

And so why did Paul not mention the miracles, if he was interested in Mark and Matthew; if he thought they were correct, it seems to me he would have added their testimony to his own. This tells me that he either did not give them any weight, or he had never heard of them, very unlikely if they were circulating around the "world" of the Levant.

orangefatcat

Paul was a very special to Chirst Jesus. He was a Gentile and and next to Luke probably the most educated of all the apostles and seeing how Christ died for all of us that meant Paul would become the Apostle of the non Jewish Nations. Can you imagine the wars or back biting that broke out in the different congregations where there was Jew and Gentiles and how the Jews were rejecting the Gentiles because they weren't circumcised. To the Jews this was unclean and they demanded that these Gentiles be circumcised. It became a serious problem.

Paul directed them to understand that it was what was in the heart that was more important then circumcision. Yes he told the Jews that the issue was not circumcision of the foreskin but of the heart. Having a clean heart towards the Lord Jesus Christ spreading his teachings and baptizing people in the name of the Father and the son and the holy spirit or ghost.

Every letter Paul wrote he glorified Christ Jesus, and he edified the congregations in that same love of Christ.

There were times when Paul had to reprimand the Christians for their attitudes and their allowing wrong doing in the congregation and they were severly reprimanded for that and the party's involved were to be removed from the congregation. To maintain purity.

Look at all the missionary trips Paul took as proof of His devotion to Christ and his deep Love. The trials and difficulties he endured were well written for us in the scriptures. His imprisonments and other persecutions are well spoken of in the Bible.

If a man didn't love Christ then why would he even bother doing what he did walking hundreds of miles in his lifetime in order to bring the good news to the people where ever he was. How he was ship wrecked. How he never wanted to be a burden to any congregation and so he assisted his friends in tent making.

Yes he was a highly educated man and was a Pharisee and was well versed in the Laws of the Isrealites and the Mosaic Law. He spoke with conviction. He spoke to the philosphers and the stoics. He reasoned with them, he appealed to there senses and reasoned with them, and they were amazed they couldn't find fault with his logic from his logic and that logic is what Christ taught him. And they were speechless as they were considered as highly educated as Paul.

Our Lord Jesus blessed Paul in all his works and he is a blessed martyr in heaven. And there is not anyone who can convince me other wise that this man wasn't an apostle of our Lord Jesus Christ. You see it boils down to this

F A I T H !!!!

Orangefatcat

Spike Tassel

Spike Tassel (Post 89) re Pistoff (Post 1636): According to the Holy Scriptures, Paul the Apostle definitely did work in the ministry with John Mark, and perhaps with Matthew Levi also. I believe that Saul/Paul, John/Mark, and Matthew/Levi may all have been writing down their thoughts during an overlapping period of many years, and that each of their works reflects what the holy spirit laid upon them to write, a sample of which became bound up in the Bibles before us. In similar fashion, I am on JWN these days interacting with various posters. It is the latest aspect of my long writing career, if I may put it that way, since it goes back to when I first learned to read and write. Now, what I write on JWN as "Spike Tassel" is what JWN readers can know me for. Others will know me for my work in other venues, using other comments, on other topics, in other styles, occasionally referring to other languages, even as I have written under other names for myself. As I said, these days, I am on JWN interacting with various posters. Some I refer to by name, some I don't. Some posters have comments that reflect experience that is important to me, but which I do not have the time/ interest/ etc. to comment on. Sometimes it is deliberate, sometimes it is just the way the spirit is working with me. I suggest that the Apostle Paul is not different from me in this respect. Each of them — Paul, Mark, and Matthew, and the rest of the inspired writers of the Bible — worshipped Jehovah. I see know need for Paul to be any different from his exemplar Jesus, whose commentators also did not find it necessary to acknowledge each and every divine messenger before him. Each one's contribution to the Holy Writ is valuable, both in his own right, and collectively as a shout of praise to Jehovah, the giver of every good gift and every perfect present. The unity of thought despite over 1600 years (from when Moses first set "pen to paper" to when John's Revelation and Letters were finally complete) attests to Jehovah God being the One Divine Author of whatever is not spurious.

Spike Tassel

Spike Tassel (Post 90): well said, orangefatcat (Post 3568), well said.

C. T. Russell

See reniaa!

This is what I'm talking about!. Start your own posts vs. busting up someone else's. Some people don't have the time to post, but they get sad when their comment turns into a reniaa post. You have plenty of space to start a topic and turn it into 16 pages!

There is plenty of room.

C. T.

Spike Tassel

Spike Tassel (Post 91): I'm sure that if the Apostle Paul could work with each of us in the ministry, he probably would, even our own C. T. Russell and reniaa. Saul the Pharisee, on the other hand, probably would have just rounded the both of you up and had you dealt with according to the authorization he was operating under before he "met" Jesus. LOL. May brotherly love continue, even here amongst us all.

LockedChaos

Sorry Reniaa............................

I'm like Murray

Just a guy waiting for his coffee

and pie while dreaming of the

brown haired girl English girl sitting

at the bar, engaged in endless chatter,

and with me wondering what she would

look like in the buff............................

<blink, blink>

Awake now

What was I saying????

TD

Paul was a very special to Chirst Jesus. He was a Gentile

"....circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews"

Are You Paul or are you Saul?

Share this