Paul: The Founder of Christianity

New Testament scholar Gerd Lüdemann continues his exploration of the life and teachings of Paul in this groundbreaking monograph, which synthesizes the research of his four previous books on Christianity's leading apostle. As the subtitle of the present work makes clear, Lüdemann comes to the conclusion that Paul should be considered not only Christianity's most influential proselytizer but in truth deserves the title of founder of the religion that ostensibly originated with Jesus of Nazareth. Though other scholars have previously made the point that Paul's interpretation of the Christian message actually obscured the original teachings of Jesus, Lüdemann goes further. His painstaking historical research shows that Paul created the major tenets of the Christianity we know today and that his theology - an original synthesis of Hebrew and Greek belief systems - differs significantly from what we now know the historical Jesus to have preached. This book is an essential study of the life of the Apostle Paul for anyone who is truly interested in working out the knotty problems that are present in the conflict between the epistles and Acts. It is well argued and clearly written. Warning: this is not a book for those who just want to remain comfortably in their warm, fuzzy beliefs because, gentle though he is in approaching the difficulties, Ludemann does not go weak-kneed when the obvious emerges from the logical steps that the study follows. Of particular interest is Prof. Ludemann's discussion of the psychology of the apostle as inferred from his writings and actions. I have occasionally thought that Paul was a full bore schizophrenic with all the attendant visions and voices, but opposed to this was his often exhibited practicality and ability to manage his life-goals quite efficiently. It's a conundrum, for sure, and Ludemann adds considerably (and convincingly) to the range of speculations. Still, there is a lot to be said for William James' "Varieties of Religious Experience" view in respect of Paul (which doesn't exclude what Ludemann has proposed). Historian, Donald Akenson, in his "Saint Saul: A Skeleton Key to the Historical Jesus, also attempts a reasonable psychological analysis though with slightly more positive results than Ludemann concluded. In the end, Paul doesn't fit neatly into psychological categories; but then, does anybody? I mention this because this book is well worth reading just for this perspective. I do think Ludemann gave a bit too much credit to Acts as a possible historical source; it seems obvious, after Pervo's and Tyson's work, that Acts is purely and simply a literary creation with an agenda peppered with historical names and events ripped off from Josephus and Paul's letters to give it verisimilitude. And, as a close study of Acts will show, these historical bits are often in the wrong place at the wrong time thus revealing the anti-historical nature of the work; very shaky to use ANY of this, in my opinion. It also seems obvious from reading the New Testament documents in chronological order with reasonably accurate contexts as revealed in recent scholarship, that there really was no "Jesus of Nazareth" as the gospels created/presented him. Sure, there was probably a Jewish religious Robin Hood type with his band of merry revolutionaries (Josephus is rife with them, take your pick) who died and was then claimed to have "resurrected" in a spiritual sense (see Israel Knohl's "The Gabriel Revelation"), and Paul utilized his story as a vehicle for his world-changing plan to unite all men under one god (with added features of course), but there was no great Jewish teacher who was crucified and rose from the dead: it was all a theological creation of Paul's. And that seems to be the bottom line. After Paul, the gospels were written as pure fiction utilizing Paul's ideas, and later still, Acts. There was no "Christianity" in Jerusalem, there was only a gang of revolutionaries who utilized their dead teacher/leader (who was going to return with God and whup up on the Romans) as a recruiting symbol: "The Resurrected Messiah WANTS YOU! So he can come on the blood of martyrs to destroy the Romans and evict them from our real estate!" What's more, the most likely characters from Josephus weren't even crucified (though some related bit-players were). Paul probably got the idea for a crucified/ascended "god-type" being from the mystery play reenactments of the funeral of Julius Caesar where the dead (and much beloved by the people) dictator's wax effigy was mounted on a cross-like trophaeum. (See Francisco Carotta for details on this.) The last supper probably came from the reports of the last supper of Caesar where it was said that the topic of conversation was "how would you like to die?" and Caesar said "quickly." And most certainly, the most famous betrayal of all time was that of Brutus vis a vis Caesar. Interesting that Dante puts both Brutus and Judas in the lowest circle of Hell together. The whole ascension/deification business probably was due to Caesar's comet and certainly everyone knew that comets tend to "return" and often were accompanied by disasters which were deemed to be the hand of God acting against one or another nation, group, king, whatever: thus, apocalypticism. Well, enough of speculation; Ludemann has added a very valuable work to the exploration of why our world is the way it is today: based on a religion created by a psychologically stressed Greco-Roman Jew living in a fairly dreadful time in history when people needed something to believe in. From the most positive take on it, Paul tried to give it to them, tried to teach them to get along and love one another. The negative perspective is that he created another "our god is the ONLY real one" religion and set Christianity and Judaism at each other's throats for a very long time. Well, Paul did try... and Ludemann sorts out a lot of tangled threads about his world-changing effort comprehensibly and cleverly. Well worth reading; highly recommended.