Ibn Anwar
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Did Paul really meet Jesus?
Posted by Ibn Anwar on April 6, 2008
The Problem of Paul
by Sami Zaatari
In today’s court of law any information given by a person that is contradictory, and is also illogical, then this information is thrown out of the court and the speaker who gave the information is discredited and cannot be taken as a reliable person at all. We find this precisely to be the case with Paul, when Paul talks about his supposed meeting with Jesus, he contradicts himself and is also illogical. So we shall just quote the passages that bring into question the credibility of Paul supposedly meeting Jesus, and once we see the contradictory statements it will be safe to say that whole episode cannot be taken seriously, neither can the entire book of Acts and neither can Paul. So we now proceed to the verses:
The first mention of Paul meeting Jesus on the road to Damascus is mentioned in Acts 9: 1-7:
1 And Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went unto the high priest, 2 And desired of him letters to Damascus to the synagogues, that if he found any of this way, whether they were men or women, he might bring them bound unto Jerusalem. 3 And as he journeyed, he came near Damascus: and suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven: 4 And he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? 5 And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks. 6 And he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do. 7 And the men which journeyed with him stood speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing no man
So few things to note, Paul is on a journey, he then sees a light and hears a voice, this voice is supposedly Jesus. Paul then asks Jesus what do you want me to do? The response by Jesus is for Paul to go to the city and it will be made known to him over there. Now lets read what Acts 26: 12-18:
12 Whereupon as I went to Damascus with authority and commission from the chief priests, 13 At midday, O king, I saw in the way a light from heaven, above the brightness of the sun, shining round about me and them which journeyed with me. 14 And when we were all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice speaking unto me, and saying in the Hebrew tongue, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks. 15 And I said, Who art thou, Lord? And he said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest. 16 But rise, and stand upon thy feet: for I have appeared unto thee for this purpose, to make thee a minister and a witness both of these things which thou hast seen, and of those things in the which I will appear unto thee; 17 Delivering thee from the people, and from the Gentiles, unto whom now I send thee, 18 To open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me
So note the difference, in the first account all Jesus tells him is go to the city to find out what you must do, in this account in Acts 22 we see Jesus already telling Paul what he must do! So which one is it? Will Paul know what his purpose is in the city? Or did he already know?
In fact in the account version of Acts 22: 5-10, there is no mention of Jesus telling Paul all this information:
. 5 As also the high priest doth bear me witness, and all the estate of the elders: from whom also I received letters unto the brethren, and went to Damascus, to bring them which were there bound unto Jerusalem, for to be punished. 6 And it came to pass, that, as I made my journey, and was come nigh unto Damascus about noon, suddenly there shone from heaven a great light round about me. 7 And I fell unto the ground, and heard a voice saying unto me, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? 8 And I answered, Who art thou, Lord? And he said unto me, I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutest. 9 And they that were with me saw indeed the light, and were afraid; but they heard not the voice of him that spake to me. 10 And I said, What shall I do, LORD? And the Lord said unto me, Arise, and go into Damascus; and there it shall be told thee of all things which are appointed for thee to do
This account agrees with the version of Acts 9, Acts 26 is the only different one in this case; Acts 26 contradicts Acts 9 and 22.
It is very easy to notice the contradiction, in Acts 9 and 22, Jesus tells Paul that he will know what to do in the city, in Acts 26 Jesus already tells Paul what he will do and mentions nothing about going to a city to find out. So which one is it? We already have enough proof to discredit the entire account of Paul meeting Jesus, however so there is more.
Acts 9: 1-7:
1 And Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went unto the high priest, 2 And desired of him letters to Damascus to the synagogues, that if he found any of this way, whether they were men or women, he might bring them bound unto Jerusalem. 3 And as he journeyed, he came near Damascus: and suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven: 4 And he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? 5 And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks. 6 And he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do. 7 And the men which journeyed with him stood speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing no man
So as we can see, Acts verse 7 says that the men who accompanied Paul heard a voice, but saw no man, they saw nobody. Now let us compare this with Acts 22 5-9:
. 5 As also the high priest doth bear me witness, and all the estate of the elders: from whom also I received letters unto the brethren, and went to Damascus, to bring them which were there bound unto Jerusalem, for to be punished. 6 And it came to pass, that, as I made my journey, and was come nigh unto Damascus about noon, suddenly there shone from heaven a great light round about me. 7 And I fell unto the ground, and heard a voice saying unto me, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? 8 And I answered, Who art thou, Lord? And he said unto me, I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutest. 9 And they that were with me saw indeed the light, and were afraid; but they heard not the voice of him that spake to me.
So now as you can see, in Acts 22 Paul says the men saw a light, but heard no voice! In Acts 9 Paul says the men so no man, but heard a voice!!!! The obvious contradiction is there for all to see, there is no denying it. So this piece of information also throws doubt into the entire episode, it shows that this story is not credible at all. We already have 2 contradictions, it is safe to say that if we were in court this information would be thrown out and Paul would be exposed as a liar for all the jury to see.
So based on this information we can also say that the entire book of Acts is now in doubt, and is also unreliable, we can also say the entire character of Paul is in doubt and is unreliable, as we clearly see he cannot stay consistent at all. It does not end there; there is still another contradiction left and a logical fallacy, first the contradiction:
Acts 26: 12-14:
12 Whereupon as I went to Damascus with authority and commission from the chief priests, 13 At midday, O king, I saw in the way a light from heaven, above the brightness of the sun, shining round about me and them which journeyed with me. 14 And when we were all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice speaking unto me, and saying in the Hebrew tongue, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.
So as you can see, the verse says that Paul and the men with all fell down, easy to see and understand. Let us read what Acts 9 and 22 have to say.
Acts 9: 5-7 :
5 And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks. 6 And he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do. 7 And the men which journeyed with him stood speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing no man
So as you can all see, Acts 9 shows the men did not fall to the ground, but stood speechless, they were shocked that they stood still. No one fell down hence we have another contradiction. So which one was it? Did the men with Paul all fall down? Or did they stay standing? It seems Paul cannot give a straight answer! It doesn’t end there, let us read Acts 22.
Acts 22:5-7:
. 5 As also the high priest doth bear me witness, and all the estate of the elders: from whom also I received letters unto the brethren, and went to Damascus, to bring them which were there bound unto Jerusalem, for to be punished. 6 And it came to pass, that, as I made my journey, and was come nigh unto Damascus about noon, suddenly there shone from heaven a great light round about me. 7 And I fell unto the ground, and heard a voice saying unto me, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?
So we now see Paul saying that he fell! Not everyone, but him alone, so now Paul again contradicts himself. So which one is it? Acts 22 and 9 agree that only Paul fell, Acts 26 says that they all fell, which one is it? The answer is none of them are correct, it is all a big lie, a hoax made up by Paul. He most likely paid those men with him to act like he saw something. You want proof? Sure I will show you the proof.
You see, when a liar has a plan, he always fails, they always forget something small, and Paul forgot something small here, this leads to the logical fallacy, this logical fallacy does show that it could be said that Paul made the whole thing up and paid those men with him to lie about it and act like it did happen, anyway here is the proof:
Acts 9: 1-9:
1 And Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went unto the high priest, 2 And desired of him letters to Damascus to the synagogues, that if he found any of this way, whether they were men or women, he might bring them bound unto Jerusalem. 3 And as he journeyed, he came near Damascus: and suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven: 4 And he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? 5 And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks. 6 And he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do. 7 And the men which journeyed with him stood speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing no man. 8 And Saul arose from the earth; and when his eyes were opened, he saw no man: but they led him by the hand, and brought him into Damascus. 9 And he was three days without sight, and neither did eat nor drink.
So as we can see, the supposed light that Paul saw blinded him for three days, this is supposedly to show how strong this light was and how great and glorious it was that Paul went blind.
Here is the logical fallacy:
Acts 22: 5-11:
5 As also the high priest doth bear me witness, and all the estate of the elders: from whom also I received letters unto the brethren, and went to Damascus, to bring them which were there bound unto Jerusalem, for to be punished. 6 And it came to pass, that, as I made my journey, and was come nigh unto Damascus about noon, suddenly there shone from heaven a great light round about me. 7 And I fell unto the ground, and heard a voice saying unto me, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? 8 And I answered, Who art thou, Lord? And he said unto me, I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutest. 9 And they that were with me saw indeed the light, and were afraid; but they heard not the voice of him that spake to me. 10 And I said, What shall I do, LORD? And the Lord said unto me, Arise, and go into Damascus; and there it shall be told thee of all things which are appointed for thee to do. 11 And when I could not see for the glory of that light, being led by the hand of them that were with me, I came into Damascus
The logical fallacy is for all to see, Paul looks at the light and gets blind, yet the men with him also saw the light and did not get blind! Why is that? Why was Paul the only one who got blind? Why not everyone else, they saw the same light, so hence if Paul got blind so should have the men with him. This is Paul’s blunder, he forgot it wouldn’t make sense that he gets blind by looking at the light, while the other men don’t get blind. This is all a hoax, Paul faked it all with the help of the men with him, Paul wanted to make it seem like he met Jesus, he made a blunder when he said he got blind because other men DIDNT get blind and they also saw the light. Paul couldn’t even remember the story he fabricated which is why he kept on contradicting himself. So three contradictions and a logical fallacy, Paul lied, Acts is unreliable, the Bible is corrupt, the Quran said so, the Quran is true, come to Islam!
Appendix
Ways Paul could have avoided this big mess:
1- Write down his fabricated story so he could have remembered it.
2- Should have made the story a bit simpler, shorter so he could easily memorize it.
3- He should have not made the part up about him being blind.
4- He should have made another person act like he was blind to make it seem that Paul was not acting since he was the only blind one, if you had two blind men then it would be a bit more believable.
Those 4 things would have easily have gotten Paul of the hook, but liars always expose themselves. Paul is false, Allah is true.
Allah knows best!
Kite said
This is my first my comment i have postd but ive been comming to your website for long time and ive really like it.
keep up the good work
Ibn Anwar said
Thank you Kite..we hope to see more feedback from you.
Holly said
wow this is so true when you look at the whole story WOW, I really believe the word BLIND is for us because every service is towards Paul who sounds like a POPE I have cried seeing and following this lie for many years. Thank you for your site,, I have been searching online for info to add to my newsletter and it has truly been a blessing to see the TRUTH.
Bless U
Ibn Anwar said
Assalamu’alaikum,
Congratulations sister! masha’Allah. May Allah give you more guidance and light and showyou the path to truth. Ameen.
E.T. said
Acts was supposedly written by Luke who attempted to document the stories for our benefit. Luke travelled with Paul. I’m sure he didn’t take written documentation and/or record when Paul spoke. It is understandable that he would not get the stories precisely right when trying to recall them in exact detail to what Paul told him.
How many times have you heard a story from a friend, that if you have to write it down afterwards you wouldn’t get every detail correct? Luke was human.
I believe many of the gospels had several authors and not all have been indentified. This is somewhat evident by the same story being recited several times within the same chapter. The repeated overkill of some of the stories rings this truth.
Paul in his own writing says he saw the lord. 1 Corinthians 15:8
Jim Doemer said
“Acts was supposedly written by Luke who attempted to document the stories for our benefit. Luke travelled with Paul. I’m sure he didn’t take written documentation and/or record when Paul spoke. It is understandable that he would not get the stories precisely right when trying to recall them in exact detail to what Paul told him. ”
Christians often tell us that the Bible is God inspired. If so, then how could such error slip through the cracks? If it is “understandable that he would not get the stories exactly right”, then what about the rest of the Gospel, much of which were not penned for decades after Christ’s death?
Ibn Anwar said
Greetings,
Thank you for your thoughts E.T. Did Paul really meet Luke? That question is briefly explored here http://unveiling-christianity.com/2009/04/15/did-luke-meet-paul/
alvin said
if u would like me to comment, this is it.
your article is a logical fallacy. i do not want to insult this piece of writing which is already contradicting itself, please email me to understand from me, what i really need to share. And i find that if you have not gotten ur facts right, it is unfair to discredit any historical source. hope you will learn to write with tact.
Ibn Anwar said
lol….don’t waste ur time Alvin or anyone elses…if you have thoughts that you want to share please post it here so that others do not get “misled” by sami zataari’s “logical fallacy” lol.
Zayed Ahmed said
hey alvin…you know what…last year when i was in my home country i was walking on a footpath at midnight…i was all alone and then i met the holy spirit…CAN YOU BELEIVE IT!!…i got inspiried by the HOLY SPIRIT…and since then i started writing a book…and beleive or not it is god breathed…do u know what is the name of the book>>>>21st century revelation
I BET THE READER OF MY COMMENT MIGHT BE LAUGHING BY NOW BUT THIS IS THE TRUTH THAT CHRISTIANS DO HAVE BLIND BELEIF
Haman said
hey mrrrrrrr zzayed…woe to u muslims…u have no respect for other faiths…u people are so ill mannered…u cannot even speak properly…thats why i saw the webmaster of this site speaking to me as if he is about to shoot me…its okay…its not your fault?i know where the main problem is coming from
Ibn Anwar said
You may claim to be an atheist, but you certainly sound a lot like a CHristian hiding behind the guise of an atheist. You would critice Muslims for their manners, but when Christians are ill-mannered like Sam the Sham Shamoun it’s not that you just do not care, but you even tried defending him lol. When I answered you it sounded like I was going to shoot you? Oh really? Maybe it’s you who’s trying to shoot yourself? These are nothing more than smokescreens. Anyone can go to the article on Muslim hate aka haman to see how he has been totally refuted.
Polycarp said
This is a common ploy among those who go on the offensive with the Bible. They point to varying accounts saying,”this indeed throws the story out, as there is conflicting reports of how the story is told, thus it did not happen!” This however is not how history is determined my dear friend… Take the stories of the Punic Wars, the Romans tell their side and Carthage tells their side. Both accounts contradict each other, yet no one disputes the Punic Wars occured. This is extremely common in historical accounts; especially ancient historical accounts where the historians seemed to be more blatent about their biases. I can also give you another account of this happening, in fact today this occured. An aquaintance of mine had a sort of humorus thing happened to him today, so he began to tell others. I heard him tell the story two different times to various people with slightly varying details, as Pauls slightly varied…however the event still happened despite these varying details, as I myself witnessed it. So by your logic, this event could not of happened because it does indeed contradict itself in some of the details. As a historian, I can attest that history does not disregard events because “secondary details” conflict. The “primary details” being Paul’s vision of Jesus, the secondary, the details surrounding that vision, i.e. the exact number of people he was with or who they were, the exact characteristics of the vision, word for word what Jesus would have said to him, or in this case, when Jesus gave him the details of his mission to the gentiles. Even the highly critical New Testament scholar Gerd Ludemann believes this vision to be something that really happened to Paul, as evident in the change of Paul’s beliefs ( he just takes a slightly different approach to it).
Ibn Anwar said
Assalamu’alaikum and Greetings,
The conflicting reports without a doubt lead to any reasonable and critical person to conclude that they are not reliable and very doubtful. If one cannot established what really happened, then how can someone be so certain that it did happen in the first place? Such conflicting reports would be thrown out of any civilised court of law. I’m sure you know this. I have discussed the passage with my history professors, who I will assume have better credentials than you and they have concluded as many others have that the story was faked. No you have summarily cited conflicting historical accounts on a single event by two different parties and say that the history behind those conflicting details do not render it ahistorical. Well, first of all it is a FALSE ANALOGY. Why? Because the narratives about paul’s meeting on the road to damascus are all found in Acts which was written by a SINGLE author, though anonymous. And this single author who is supposed to be Luke and a companion of Jesus as tradition goes(though critical scholarship rejects this) how could he have not gotten the story right? Was he stupid? What mental deficiency or ailment did he suffer that he can’t even narrate a simple story consisting of no more than 10 lines accurately? My 10 year old cousin can do a better job and the author of the book is supposed to be INSPIRED by the Holy Spirit even! Some inspiration that was! The history about Carthage and the Romans do not render the fact that they did fight in the Punic Wars untrue because there is something called multiple-attestation. In addition, the conflicting reports was probably because of the biasness that each side had. This is no different from how Caesar painted the Celts. It was not a very pleasant portrayal. Historians generally do not regard everything Caesar said to be true even though it was written because there is hardly any corroborative evidence and the archeological facts seem to conflict with what he claimed. Likewise, here is one ANONYMOUS person who reported on an event, but did not even get the story straight! Further more, this supposed vision is not mentioned anywhere by Paul himself. Paul supposedly experienced it, but, he never wrote about it! Instead somebody else did and he didn’t even narrate it coherently! It is difficult to comprehend how a reasonable person can still say that the event did really take place after reading the article and my explanation here. Who cares about Gerd Ludemann? William Ramsay who was an atheist and converted to Christianity(a favourite of evangelists) was so sure of himself and said everything in Luke’s historical..today he is the laughing stock of modern scholarship. http://unveiling-christianity.com/2009/07/15/historical-inaccuracy-of-luke/
Polycarp said
First, off, who cares about Gerd Ludemann?! Are you at all familiar with New Testament studies or is this a copy and paste game from “the biblesfalse.com.” Gerd Ludemann is a leading expert on New Testament history, probably has more experience in Greek and New Testament histocial writing techniques and methods then your history professors combined, and is an athiest, which means he doesn’t share in any sort of Christian bias. Second, this is a sort of pick and choose your authorities here my friend, “who cares about Gerd Ludemann?” Well who cares abot Marcus Borg, N.T. Wright, Bart Ehrman, Bruce Metzger, John Dominic Crossan, Larry Hurtado, and the list can go on and on. You throw one professor out with no good reasoning behind it, while accepting those who’ve you’ve read/copied and pasted… we call that cafeteria criticism. I’m pretty sure I gave a good reason as to why I do not accept somethings the Jesus Seminar scholars say (incidently Gerd Ludemann is one). Secondly, who cares about your history professors? What are their backgrounds, both religious and scholarly? What sort of biases do they hold? Have they put the verse in context, have they even studied the Bible, have they even studied Greek styled of historical documenting? The list could go on and on as to why I don’t have to take their opinions…simply put, they probably are not authoritative in this sort of subject field. I wouldn’t ask a Modern Western History expert on his evidence for believing Xerxes was King of Persia and the historical methodology used to prove that. At least not unless he gave me something tangible for me to believe that he has experience in that field. Various credentials mean a hill of beans unless they’re actually related to the subject, which is why your choice of words in this line of argumentation is borderline genetic fallacy, and most certainly a strawman. I once debated a philosophy professor who had more credentials then me, however his arguments in some of the things we were dealing with were lacking, simply because his credentials were not in that field. Third, you really haven’t given any good reasons to not accept this testament. What you’ve done is spouted opinions, worded in such a way that it could make perfect sense, especially to those who lack knowledge in how this process works. Just like the Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris’ of the world…those who cling to their arguments have very little background in philosophy, and those arguments only stump the theist who lacks basic philosophical knowledge . History works on probability based on a set of criteria established and not the logic of philosophical arguments. Fourth, if all four Gospels told the tale exactly the same, their testamonies could be thrown out in a court of civilized law as well, due to the witnesses “collaborating evidence.” Fifth, if you notice Luke wasn’t recording the same event being told over and over again. What he was recording was different situations that Paul’s story ended up being told. For instance, the account in Acts 9 is telling the initial event, while the other two instances, in Acts 22 and 26, are being told by Paul on trial. Acts 9 is clearly lacking Jesus’ mission statement to Paul, even after he arrives at Ananias’ house. However, we get the details from Ananias’ end, so this could be revealing to the historian that Luke probably got this information from someone other then Paul, like in an interview with Ananias. How Luke obtained the information for writting Luke and Acts is revealed at the beginning of Luke, he asked eyewitnesses. So this is more then a single account, it is Luke essentially making a report of what he gathered from the eyewitnesses and what they experienced. Sixth, I think its a good analogy I gave dealing with the “logic” you used, simply because people have situations happen to them all the time where they remember only the core facts, change the secondary details or the order of the story, and yet the story will remain true. So hopefully if you recap a discussion we have you don’t leave out any details, mix any details up, change the order of the details, or pretty much change anything from the actual story itself, or I’m goin to have to call “objection, conflicting reports!”
. Seventh, Luke is not held to be a follower of Jesus by tradition, but Paul’s personal doctor. If you have something saying companion of Jesus, I’d be delighted to see this. In a couple of weeks when I’m back to my civilization with access to my study, I can give very good reasons to take Paul’s statement as truth, that he really believed he saw Jesus speaking to him. Just curious, where do you get your sources?
Godbless you
Ibn Anwar said
What you have written is full of red-herrings. I did not reject Gerd Ludemann just because I felt like rejecting him. I reject what he concluded based on what I discussed in my previous response on your fallacies that you mostly have not responded to. You totally ignored my points on Luke 1 and 2 together with Raymond Brown and the other numerous scholars that I cited to back my contentions. If you are truly a historian i.e. an academician, by God you are quite a shoddy one. It’s very clear to me that you cannot discern meaning from my writings even though they’re straight forward and uses quite elementary words and expressions. You said that you’re pretty sure you gave good reasons for rejecting the conclusion of the Jesus Seminar on the verse..reasons which I have rebutted time and again. In the above response of yours you have totally ignored my latest response and I suppose your saying that ‘i’m pretty sure i gave good reasons’ totally concludes the whole affair. I think not. I’ve explained the analogy you gave regarding the Punic wars and i don’t see any cogent refutations by you on it. You say that in a court of law if several witnesses give exact testimonies of an even theirs will be rejected? What are you talking about? In a court of law conflicting witness accounts will result inevitably in reasonable doubt which is cause enough to acquit the case. The witness accounts will be counted as unreliable. You accused me of fallacies(which i have not really committed), yet you have committed a fallacy yourself again and again by resorting to Ludemann as if he is the pope that one must adhere to. You have not quoted his words or the reasonings behind his conclusions. You have merely cited him and now you’re stating his credentials. This is appealing to authority which is a clear logical fallacy. I on the other hand have not just quoted scholars, but went on further to explain their positions. You have conveniently ignored the example of the piercing story in John and what Raymond Brown has said about it. You have also conveniently ignored the point that I made about the author of Luke commiting a clear error in Luke 2 and the lie of Luke 1. I have argued that this causes any reasonable person to doubt the reports that he gives in his writings, especially if they conflict between each other. And it is the same author! Did the anonymous author of Luke get his information from Paul? I have already written an article on this and linked it in my previous response. Here’s the link again http://unveiling-christianity.com/2009/04/15/did-luke-meet-paul/
Oh btw, that was a slip from me about Luke being Jesus’ companion. I was supposed to have said Paul. The above link discusses the issue.
Polycarp said
I’m going to have to hold on responding to this and your other blog counter responses until I get home. I have very little sources available to me other then the internet and a few snippets here and there. So in about 2 weeks or so I’ll be cookin up a response for you. Until then, God Bless
Ibn Anwar said
take as much time as u need…compose a whole doctoral thesis if you have to.
Polycarp said
Maybe I will!
Ibn Anwar said
Ανυπομονώ για αυτή
Ibn Anwar said
μην ξεχάσετε να διαβάσετε το άρθρο μου http://unveiling-christianity.com/2009/04/15/did-luke-meet-paul/
Polycar said
Assalamu’alaikum,
Well I made it home, and so I look forward to continuing our dialogue as time permits on both ends. I’m going to start from scratch with regards to this post, since it has been about two weeks or so since we’ve dialogued about Paul’s visionary experiences listed in Acts. Now that I’m back home, I can actually give you quotes from sources and an actual dialogue that is idiosyncratic, rather than jotted down thoughts and ideas from memory.
The Oxford Guide to the Bible describes Paul’s Christian conversion as something that was not a disenthralling from Judaism, since he was clearly dedicated to a biblical faith (Galatians 1:14; Philippians 3:4b-6). Instead it was the “conversion experience that changed his life and played a major part in the development of his theology…he discovered that Jesus was no longer dead, but alive”(Metzger pg.578). Gerd Ludemann in “The Resurrection of Christ,” reinforces the idea that Paul had zealousness towards the law, as “evident…by his condemnation of their [Christians] proclamation of a crucified Messiah and… their [Christians] de facto disregard of the Torah”(Ludemann pg. 167). This of course raises the question again, what caused Paul to convert from his deeply rooted Jewish beliefs? Answering this question, Bart Erhman states in his book, “Peter Paul and Mary Magdalene,” that “there is little doubt, historically, about what converted Paul. He had a vision of Jesus raised from the dead” (Ehrman pg.111). Gerd Ludemann reverberates this by never denying Paul had a visionary experience of the risen Lord; rather, Gerd Ludemann likens it to a personal hallucination of the risen Christ. This idea can be seen in his debate with William Lane Craig, which is available in book form (Jesus’ Resurrection Fact or Figment?). He expounds on this notion a little more in his book “The Resurrection of Christ,” where he puts Paul’s vision in the same category as the Old Testament Prophets and affirms the hallucination theory by stating, “rather I adopt a psychological viewpoint in proposing the Paul experienced something that many people from his culture did…”(Ludemann pg.48). Continuing on, John Dominic Crossan and Marcus Borg in their book, “The First Paul,” describe Paul’s transformation of church persecutor to saint, as a “dramatic experience” Paul had with the risen Christ. They also point to the scholar, Peter Berger’s findings that, “Saul becomes Paul in a moment of religious ecstasy” (Borg pg.18).This of course is a reference to Paul’s visionary experience in Acts. The only explanation for Paul’s conversion is a dramatic experience such as this. As no credible scholar will deny that Paul was a pious Jewish Pharisee who was extremely devoted to the Torah and detested the new Jewish sect, Christianity. So whether the visionary experience was in fact a physical event or a hallucination, there is no denying that Paul experienced something arcane on the road to Damascus. If you continue to read the paragraph in Bart Ehrman’s book, “Peter Paul and Mary Magdalene,”you will find that he does not dismiss the visions themselves as not happening because of the differences in the narratives, like Sami Zataari does or as your history professors do. Rather he notes, “There are differences among these three accounts, making it difficult to know what, exactly, the author of Acts wants us to think happened. But the basic story line is similar” (Ehrman pg. 111). Borg and Crossan both echo Ehrman’s words that the primary details of the story are the same; Paul saw a light, he heard a voice and addressed it as Lord, the voice identified itself as Jesus, and the experience transformed him (Borg pg.22). This of course is what I have iterated once before, the differences in the secondary details do not necessarily throw something out. Granted, if you’re looking at it from a historical perspective, you may have to accept that some details did not occur or perhaps not in that order. This does not dismiss the event as not happening though. Bart Ehrman, in an email discussion I had with him, essentially agrees with what I just stated. The eyewitnesses maybe valuable as to what happened, but the eyewitnesses may not have recorded/remembered the events correctly and thus may not be accepted as getting it down to perfection. I fully accept that all three accounts may not be 100% historically accurate, as is the case in many of antiquities historical writings. However, the point is the main points do not sway, nor do they differ. At the very least, yours and Mr. Zataari’s conclusions are incorrect on this matter.
I do want to touch upon a point you brought up in regards to the beliefs of Marcus Borg. If you read his book “Reading the Bible Again for the First Time,” he sort of outlines his views on how to take the Bible. A Wikipedia article sort of summarizes this if you want to get the most basic idea of his view. But he takes a “metaphorical historical” view of the Bible, and on page 46 of this book; he gives a list of ideas that he considers to be symbolic in the relationship of God and man. If you notice, the events he labels as metaphoric, both in the New and Old Testaments, are all stories that would involve miracles. He further defines his criteria of knowing if something is metaphoric by what he calls, “limits of the spectacular.” In other words, if the event goes beyond what we think is possible, it falls into this category. With that being said Marcus Borg is one of the more “conservative” members of the Jesus Seminar, still more “liberal” then what I consider myself to be, which is seen on page 47 of his book, where he does paint a more open view towards miracles. He further states, that because no one else has performed miracles or these miracles, such as the virgin birth, multiplying loaves of bread, or turning water into wine, he cannot fully accept that Jesus did these miraculous actions, labeling these actions as “metaphorical narratives.” So despite that he is more “open” to miracles, he still goes into the text presupposing they did not occur. My view is similar to that of Dr. William Lane Craig’s which is, natural explanations should be what we turn to first, but if there are no natural explanations that can explain the “miracle” event without the explanation becoming ad hoc or outrageous, we may have to turn to a supernatural explanation. Even though it sounds like Marcus Borg’s belief, it isn’t. Borg doesn’t accept miracles from the get go, and won’t unless it can be historically certain the supernatural events occurred before.
1. Borg, Marcus J. Reading the Bible Again For the First Time Taking the Bible Seriously But Not Literally. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2002. Print.
2. Borg, Marcus J., and John D. Crossan. The First Paul: Reclaiming the Radical Visionary Behind the Church’s Conservative Icon. New York: Harper collins, 2009. Print.
3. Ehrman, Bart D. Peter, Paul, and Mary Magdalene the followers of Jesus in history and legend. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2006. Print.
4. Jesus’ resurrection fact or figment? : A Debate between William Lane Craig & Gerd Lüdemann. Downers Grove, Ill: InterVarsity, 2000. Print
5. Ludemann, Gerd. The Resurrection Of Christ A Historical Inquiry. New York: Prometheus Books, 2004. Print.
6. Metzger, Bruce M., and Michael D. Coogan, eds. “Paul.” Oxford Guide to the Bible. New York: Oxford UP, 1993. 578. Print.
Ibn Anwar said
My response may be read here http://unveiling-christianity.com/2009/09/06/unveiling-polycarp/