Was the Apostle Paul the Rutherford of his day?

by nugget 24 Replies latest watchtower bible

  • PSacramento
    PSacramento

    I think that many things that had to do with the Apostolic Fathers were "credited" to Paul.

    Lets not forget what was the core of Paul's teachings:

    Love above all, faith in our Lord and Saviour, all are God's children, salvation based on faith in our Lord jesus and not workd done for recompense.

    He even reminde people that he was nothing, that the apostles and disciples were nothing compared to Jesus and to receiving Jesus vai the HS.

    He said how people were "not baptized under Paul or whoever" but under Our Lord Jesus.

    Paul spoke in accordance with his audience and aimed at specififc events even.

    With Paul, context was crucial.

    We also need to remember that many things written that were acredited to Paul may not have been his writing at all, the case for some of the harsh thinsg said in 1Timothy against women for example, Paul mentions women in high regard, even as leaders in the church and mentions some by name in his other letters.

  • WalkTall
    WalkTall

    When I first began researching the Bible on my own, it was initially because of the way women were viewed. I couldn't in my heart ever believe that God preferred one gender over another. It just didn't make any sense. So I had a real grudge against Paul. But learning about how much of what is attributed to Paul was most likely written by others, and that there were also later scribal additions to what he did write, has calmed me down in my frustration of his writings. Unfortunately, however, most religions, including the WTS, take every word of his letters as coming from God, and have used them to denigrate women, homosexuals, etc. and to set up rule based religions. At the meetings and conventions I would say about 90% of scriptures used come from Paul's letters and the OT, about 10% from Jesus own words in the Gospels, and from James and Peter. The WT faith would simply not be sustainable on Jesus' teachings.

  • palmtree67
    palmtree67

    I agree with Wobble that Paul's writings need to be taken in context.

    Perhaps the budding Christiain congregation needed BOTH personalities : Jesus' loving and kind manner and Paul's organizational and leadership skills.

  • PSacramento
    PSacramento

    walktall,

    The WT is very selective in what they use fromPaul's wiritngs, the avoid al his mentioning of "justification by faith", his accepteance of "special days", his repetitive use of "the cross" and boasting of Jesus's death on the cross, the avoid his "rebellion" VS the WT view of a "governing body" and they twist his words in Romans where Paul makes it clear that christians are to call on the name of JESUS for salvation.

  • TD
    TD

    The combination of benign idealist followed by ruthless pragmatist is a common one in religious and political movements alike.

  • frankiespeakin
    frankiespeakin

    As a JW we were indoctrinated to believe that the Bible is a collection of 66 books with different writers that took 1600 years to complete, we were indoctrinated to believe that they all are in harmony with each other and basically they are the word of God with a smidgen of personality from the original writers mixed in.

    Not very different from the rest of the Fundamentalist Christians who may have different interpretations of scripture,, but like the JWs still hold to the "many writers but only one author",, or as the WT tries to have us believe "many secretaries taking down dictation from just one boss". But on examining things more closely and less biased what do we really find? We find this explanation or supposition does not ring true.

    Instead we find different books contradict one another even in the gospels the different accounts of what Jesus said and did is plain to see provided that one is not too heavily laden with indoctrinated bias. And it becomes more and more obvious in the letters of Paul, and the rest of the NT writings,, that the Jesus of these different writers reflects a lot of the personal attitudes of these writers. This is all together reasonable once we drop the idea that the Bible is a collection of inspired books that reflects the mind of just One author.

    The appearance of internal harmony no doubt was helped along by the meetings of church fathers in the 4Th century as to what books should be in the bible. They excluded many books that just did not fit their particular theology. But even though that is the case they were not able to erase all contradictions, and variations of differing Jesus-es.

  • jonathan dough
    jonathan dough
    Not very different from the rest of the Fundamentalist Christians who may have different interpretations of scripture,

    Frankie, you always speak in vague generalities. Ever notice that?

    http://144000.110mb.com/144000/index.html#I

  • PSacramento
    PSacramento

    frankie,

    The writers of the NT and the various epistles that are "canon" were are varied people with varied education and some didn't even do their own writing.

    Some think that the Gospel according to Mark was simple a collection of writings that Mark, a disciple of Peter ( perhaps even his true Son) put together from what Peter would tell him.

    Not all of Paul's letters were written by him, and most were written for a specific audience and Paul believed that you shoudl "talk to a greek like a greek and to a roman like a roman and to a hebrew like a hebrew".

    There was John the apostle and John the elder, and they both wroter in theor own way, what they thought to be the most important things they felt about their faith.

    Add to that the NON-canon writings that still infulenced many preople, including the apostles and the generation after them and you can see that the variety of writing is to be expected.

  • frankiespeakin
  • frankiespeakin
    frankiespeakin

    Jonath,

    The reason for my generalities on what fundamentalist Christians believe was for the sake of brevity, of course there are many variations but I think according to wiki I was really close:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamentalist_Christianity

    Fundamentalist Christianity, also known as Christian fundamentalism or fundamentalist evangelicalism, is a movement that arose mainly within British and AmericanProtestantism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries among conservativeevangelicalChristians, who, in a reaction to liberal theology, actively affirmed a fundamental set of Christian beliefs: the inerrancy of the Bible, Sola Scriptura, the virgin birth of Christ, the doctrine of substitutionary atonement, the bodily resurrection of Jesus, and the imminent personal return of Jesus Christ. Some who hold these beliefs reject the label of "fundamentalism", seeing it as a pejorative term for historic Christian doctrine, [ 1 ] while to others it has become a banner of pride. Such Christians prefer to use the term fundamental as opposed to fundamentalist (e.g., Independent Fundamental Baptist, Independent Fundamental Baptist Association of Michigan, and Independent Fundamental Churches of America). [ 2 ]

Share this

Google+
Pinterest
Reddit