@BandOnTheRun
While your commentary may be true that doesnt hide the facts i have presented. Lets not forget that scholars like Ehrman etc contend that only half of the Epistles attributed to him are actually by him. By him, i mean the other letters are obviously written by a different person. They use completely differently styles of language, different vocabularies and so on.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authorship_of_the_Pauline_epistles
Seven letters are generally classified as “undisputed”, expressing contemporary scholarly near consensus that they are the work of Paul: Romans, 1 & 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, and Philemon. Six additional letters bearing Paul's name lack academic consensus: Ephesians, Colossians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 & 2 Timothy, and Titus. The first three, called the "Deutero-Pauline Epistles," have no consensus on whether or not they are authentic letters of Paul. The latter three, the "Pastoral Epistles", are widely regarded to be pseudepigraphical works, though certain scholars do consider Paul to be the author. [2] There are two examples of pseudonymous letters written in Paul’s name apart from the alleged New Testament epistles: These are the Epistle to the Laodiceans and 3 Corinthians. Since the early centuries of the church, there has been debate concerning the authorship of the anonymous Epistle to the Hebrews, and modern scholars reject Pauline authorship. [3] The Pauline epistles are the fourteen books in the New Testament traditionally attributed to Paul the Apostle, although many dispute the anonymous Epistle to the Hebrews as being a Pauline epistle. [1]
I think the best way to support my argument is to continue with more evidence. The more you dig the more you realise there are too many conincedences.
JOSEPHUS AND PAUL
http://vridar.wordpress.com/2007/04/25/the-shipwrecks-of-josephus-and-paul-part-3/
Robert Gnuse listed 12 coincidences of content between the two. His article is “Vita Apologetica: The Lives of Josephus and Paul in Apologetic Historiography” [JSP 13.2 (2002) 151-169]. The main difference is that Josephus is travelling to Rome on behalf of god-fearing priests who have been unjustly accused and forced to plead their case before Caesar.
- A Roman procurator, Felix, is involved in both accounts (cf Acts 24.1-27)
- Jewish religious leaders are involved in both accounts (priests in Vita and Paul in Acts)
- Felix causes Jewish religious leaders to be imprisoned (cf Acts 24.1-27)
- Felix’s actions result in prisoners going to Rome (cf Acts 25.10-11)
- The Jewish religious leaders are unjustly accused (cf Acts 24-26)
- Journey to Rome is by ship (cf Acts 27.1-44)
- The sea journey to Rome seeks to effect justice at the imperial level to undo injustice done at the provincial level (cf Acts 24-27)
- The ship not only sinks (cf Acts 27.41-44)
- But chooses to sink in the Adriatic Sea (cf Acts 27.27)
- The heroes, Josephus or Paul, act with courage and provide leadership (cf Acts 27.31-38)
- All passengers survive (presumably in Josephus’s account) (cf Acts 27.44)
- Both heroes pass through Puteoli (cf Acts 28.13-14)
APOLLONIUS AND PAUL
The article below is a bit long but with some bible knowledge of Pauls own journies its easy to go thru the page and see the very same or similar events in Appollonius life. All im going to say is the Roman Catholic Church simply said Paul believes in our same religion, we are the establishment. We can see the very same cities that Paul visited and wrote letters too below. If you want to verify all of them read the entire page.
http://www.livius.org/ap-ark/apollonius/apollonius_life.html
Book four
Most of Book 4 is concerned with Apollonius' visits to the Greek cities in Ionia and the mainland. He provides their citizens with advice, admonition and assistance. In Ephesus ( 4.1 - 4 ) he condemns the idle amusement to which the Ephesians are addicted, urges them to adopt a sense of community, and warns them of the outbreak of a plague epidemic. In Smyrna ( 4.5 - 9 ) the Ionian league comes under attack because a number of Roman names occur in one of its decrees. Apollonius also discusses how civic life should function with the people of Smyrna. When the plague breaks out in Ephesus, Apollonius miraculously travels there, exposes an old beggar as the plague demon, and eggs the Ephesians on to stone him ( 4.10 ). A statue is erected for Apollonius near the theater.
He then proceeds to Pergamon, where he visits the shrine of Asclepius, and to Troy , where he spends the night on the mound of Achilles ( 4.11 ). He boards a ship bound for Greece, visiting the grave of Palamedes on the Aeolian coast ( 4.13 ) and the shrine of Orpheus on Lesbos ( 4.14 ) on the way. During the rest of the voyage, at Damis' request, he describes his nocturnal meeting with the ghost of Achilles ( 4.15f ). After arriving in Athens ( 4.17 ), Apollonius wants to be initiated into the Eleusinian mysteries. At first the hierophant refuses to admit a charlatan to the mysteries. A match for the occasion, Apollonius gives the name of the hierophant who will initiate him on a subsequent occasion ( 4.18 ).
Another interesting fact is that Apollonius is thought to be following or recreating the journies of Orpheus.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orpheus
Death
According to a Late Antique summary of Aeschylus's lost play Bassarids, Orpheus at the end of his life disdained the worship of all gods save the sun, whom he called by the name of his former lover Apollo. One early morning he went to the oracle ofDionysus at Mount Pangaion [43] to salute his god at dawn, but was ripped to pieces by Thracian Maenads for not honoring his previous patron (Dionysus) and buried in Pieria. [14] Here his death is analogous with the death of Pentheus. Pausaniaswrites that Orpheus was buried in Dion and that he met his death there. [44] He writes that the river Helicon sank underground when the women that killed Orpheus tried to wash off their blood-stained hands in its waters. [45]
COMPANIONS ETC
So Orphus worshipped the Sun or Apollo. Apollonius, Paul, Apollo are all of course very similar. If we start looking at some of the companions of Orpheus and Apollo we start to see the same names in Pauls work. Other names include Luke, Apollo etc.
SUMMARY
We can see that the Gospels say little about organising a church, while the later and often fake Paul letters are responses from a central authority to establish some heirarchy within the Church. Lets not forget that the RCC itself uses the scripture about giving the keys to Peter to say Rome is the center of the Church. Another interesting fact about the early church is that the second or fourth pope is from the same family as Vespasian, im talking about Pope Clement. Start taking a look at som,e of the early church figures and you will also notice their names in the writings of Paul.
I always find the holy saint of the RCC as good clues as they often respect the original god. We can see this in Jesus big days, XMAS and Easter. They are about the Sun, which is of course Jesus.
