What More Could I Have Said About Paul? The New Perspective, Acts, and Mythicism

Prof. McGrath, I appreciate this follow up. Still wondering why we need to be cautious about Luke's portrayal of Paul, if not to question the source of Luke's portrayal.

T. C., please call me James.Let me try the short answer and see what happens: Because we need to be cautious with all our sources!

@Bernard – I'm not going to dispute that. Was Luke indeed a traveling companion of Paul? When was Acts really written, before or after Paul's undisputed letters? I think these are legitimate questions.@James – fair enough.

Perhaps I should add that, even among the most skeptical historians, in general what is done is to prioritize Paul's own writings o er Acts, not ignore it entirely. Paul's own letters give us too little biographical information to enable us to write a life of Paul on their basis.Sound familiar? These letters don't give us enough information to write a chronological life of their author, and yet mythicists claim that Jesus must be a purely mythical figure because we can't write a life of Jesus on the basis of them.

Paul, I haven't read it, and since my research at present doesn't focus on Paul, I am not likely to anytime soon. I have several historical Jesus books to review, including Casey's recent one, in case that provides any consolation. Some other hefty volumes will get reviewed here in the not-too-distant future.

Bernard, Recent trends in Luke-Acts studies point to a much later terminus ad quem, c. mid-second century. See Tyson, Pervo, etc…. Have you addressed these trends on your website?

1) How do you know? It is quite hard to show an author had no knowledge of a work simply because he doesn't use it. He might not have had need for it.2) John's terminus ad quem is also late; our earliest manuscript evidence is 125-150 CE and no additional attestation earlier than this exists. There is also a possibility that there existed a proto-gLuke which we no longer have, and what that document contained we cannot begin to speculate upon. Also, Matthew's Gospel would have been extant around the same time, so it is possible similarities exist based upon this. 3) We don't have Papias' writings, only Eusebius' quotes and references in Iraenaus. The epistle of Barnabas is late (possibly) since we only have attestation after the terminus ad quem currently assigned to Luke (late second century) and the earliest manuscript we have is 4th century, and Ignatian's letters might also be relatively late (cf. http://richardcarrier.blogspot.com/2008/09/ignatian-vexation.html). Do you take this into account?

@ Tom,1) "Luke" used 'Wars' then why would she not use 'Antiquities' if she had it? Oh yes, 'Antiquities' would have been most useful, for instance in determining who was the high priest during Felix's tenure. "Luke" deducted from 'Wars' it was a 'Ananas'. But 'Antiquities' specifies it was Jonathan, then Ismael. And there is more. I cover the topic in http://historical-jesus.info/appa.html2) I am in the opinion ancient writings should not be dated as late as possible but according to internal and external evidence, even, as can be expected, if none of the two is overwhelming. Internal evidence: For gJohn, the "beloved disciple" (13:23; 19:26, 21:7) who was thought (or pretended) to be an eyewitness of Jesus, could not have died around 150! Even 120 would be pushing it. Furthermore Irenaeus, (who did not assume a 'John' the "beloved disciple" was John the fisherman), wrote that (alleged) disciple's life span reached Trajan's reign only. As far as external evidence, there is not much, I agree, but Papias (c.a. 120) quoted a saying of Jesus which appears in gJohn (14:2). Aristides and more so Basilides (around 130) also seem aware of gJohn. More details in http://historical-jesus.info/gospels.html.I do not deal with "possibility". It is always possible to imagine something in your favor, but what does that prove?And a mass of additions which occurred during the making of gJohn are from elements in gLuke which do not exist in gMatthew. See my mini book on the making of gJohn here: http://historical-jesus.info/jnintro.html.3) Papias's writings were available during Eusebius and Irenaeus' times. Both authors quoted different passages from Papias' works. Papias is not an invention.The epistle of Barnabas can be fairly securely dated around 97 according to the internal evidence. See my page on the gospels dating, already given.Note: "terminus ad quem" means the writing could not have been composed after. It does say it what written then. Why aren't you looking also at the earliest possible dating for those texts?Bernard

@ Tom,1) If "Luke" had 'Wars', and used it, why would she not use 'Antiquities' if she had it? And 'Antiquities' would have been most useful for her: for example she deducted from 'Wars' the high priest during Felix's rule in Judea was an 'Ananas'. But 'Antiquities" specifies it was first Jonathan and then Ismael. And there are more of those clues: see http://historical-jesus.info/appa.html.2) terminus ad quem is about the latest possible date for an original text to be written. What about the earliest possible date? And I think that the range for dating of a text should be estimated through the combination of available internal and external evidence, even if any one of the two is strong.Internal evidence for gJohn:The "beloved disciple" (13:23,19:26,21:20) who was thought (or pretended) to be a disciple of Jesus could not have died around 150; even 120 is stretching it. And Irenaeus wrote the same disciple, a 'John', died during Trajan's reign.External evidence: Papias (around 120) quoted something said by Jesus which appears in gJohn 14:2. Also Aristides and more so Basilides (around 130) likely knew about gJohn. For more details, see http://historical-jesus.info/gospels.html.As far as the massive additions during a phase of the making of gJohn, all are inspired by material coming from gLuke which do no appear in gMatthew. See my mini book on it: http://historical-jesus.info/jnintro.html3) Irenaeus quoted Papias in his 'against Heresies'. Eusebius also quoted Papias (but different passages). How do you know Eusebius quoted Papias through Irenaeus' works?The epistle of Barnabas can be fairly securely dated at around 97 through the internal evidence:See again http://historical-jesus.info/gospels.html.Bernard

Good show Bernard.

if we only had Luke's account of Paul being lowered over a city wall to safety, we'd treat it as a fantastic bit of hagiographical fiction. But Paul himself confirms that such an event happened (2 Corinthians 11:33), while providing enough different details so as to make it unlikely that Luke is simply deriving information from Paul's letters. And so Luke can be shown to preserve a grain of historical reminiscence even in a story about which we'd naturally be skeptical.Why on earth would you consider it "unlikely that Luke is simply deriving information from Paul's letters," and assume that this story is at all historical? Which seems more probable: (1) the event happened, Paul truthfully wrote about it, Luke read Paul's version and also learned about it from a truthful independent source, and Luke wrote about it with additional details or changes learned from that source, or (2) the event did not happen, Paul falsely wrote about it, Luke read Paul's version, and Luke wrote about it with additional details or changes that he either learned from non-truthful independent sources or invented?I honestly can't see the slightest reason for an objective third party to assume that option 1 is any more probable than option 2. Would you like to provide any?

Every sentence in that paragraph seems problematic.the story seems not to have been known to Luke via Paul's letters.The very fact that the story appears in Acts, along with the fact that we aren't aware of any sources for the story other than Paul, suggests that it is most probable that Luke (or the author of Acts, at any rate) knew the story via Paul's letters.There is no reason that I can think of that Luke would have changed names and details in a manner that created problems for readers. There's no plausible motive. First, it's not clear how changes would have "created problems for readers," especially since I doubt the average reader at the time (or even now) compared Paul to Acts looking for inconsistencies. Second, there are dozens of plausible motives for making such changes — for example, to make the story more entertaining, edifying, interesting, or plausible. Or even because Luke had read the story in Paul, didn't have a copy in front of him, and decided to recreate it based on his (hazy) memory.And so it is certainly within the realm of the possible that the event didn't happen, Paul told the story widely that it did, and Luke heard a version of it that differed from Paul's own telling in 2 Corinthians.No argument here, actually. It is "within the realm of the possible."But literary dependence is far less likely, since Luke's differences do not show signs of being conscious alterations to serve some purpose, but simply differences that reflect the typical effects of memory. But it's reaching to say literary dependence is "far less likely." (Than what?) Even if "Luke's differences do not show signs of being conscious alterations" (for example, because they don't serve any theologicial purpose), is there any reason to assume it is more likely that (1) Luke got the story from a truthful third party — or any third party — than that (2) Luke recreated a half-remembered story he previously read in Paul?

Evan, perhaps we should start with how you can know what I wrote, which is by reading it. And then when you refer back to it, please don't misrepresent it.As for the hypothetical scenario that I mentioned, you are free to use any story that any public figure at any point in history has told about themselves repeatedly. For an accurate comparison we'd need to remove television and recording technology from the mix, of course.EvanG, you are of course correct that it is for all intents and purposes impossible to distinguish awareness of oral tradition from awareness of a written source read on one earlier occasion and recalled by memory. It seems reasonable to consider Luke's approach to his source material (e.g. Mark and Q) and suggest that, if he had had access to Paul's letters, he probably would have used them in a similar manner. And it isn't clear why, if Paul's letters had been collected and circulated by this stage, Luke would not have been able to consult them when writing Acts.But as with so many things in ancient history, this is a matter of weighing probabilities, rather than of anything that can be called "certain".

I wrote "And so it is certainly within the realm of the possible that the event didn't happen, Paul told the story widely that it did, and Luke heard a version of it that differed from Paul's own telling in 2 Corinthians." Then you asked me how I "know" that Paul "told a story widely." And so I am puzzled by why you asked me how I "know" something that I merely mentioned as being "within the realm of the possible."

Just to clarify, I don't have any particular reason to doubt Paul's own account. It is always possible that things that authors tell us are made up, and so historians are always faced with this same dilemma.Paul's letters seem to have been collected prior to the composition of 2 Peter. The author of 2 Peter knew of a collection of Paul's letters (apparently being treated as Scripture), and also shows knowledge of the Synoptic Gospels (but nothing specific to Luke). On the basis of its relationship to other works, 2 Peter could date from around any time from the late first century to around the mid second. But even towards the late part of that spectrum, if Paul's letters are not only collected but regarded as Scripture in some circles by around 150 CE, then it would be rather implausible to date their collection and circulation in that form among Christians to less than a few decades prior.As for the date of the Gospel of Luke, I'm inclined to agree with Raymond Brown's assessment of the most plausible range as being roughly 80-100 CE.

So it's not clear from what you say above what your time frames are. Do you believe the author of Acts had access to a collection of Paul's letters or not? If so, then what letters do you assume were in such a collection, given that you seem to acknowledge that there were canonical forgeries written after this time.

@ Tom,1) It is clear, according to the introductions of the gospel & Acts that “Luke” pretended to write history. She certainly wanted her two works to be seen as history. And it would not be the first time that, under the pretext of writing history, an author adds on his/her own agenda (but every gospel author added so much of it that the gospels/Acts cannot be considered as only history, rather as mostly propaganda or/and pious lies!). I agree that, on the gospel, there is very little of Lukan material which is reliable. However, for Acts, by comparing with Paul's letters, I have reasons to think a significant part of Acts is truthful: some common items shows some concordance, other betrays “Luke” need to embellish, other displays contradictions. But the embellishments and contradictions can be demonstrated to be caused by the author's several agendas, such as, among others, to establish continuity between Jesus & Paul (through Peter), to have Paul more Jewish as he appears in his letters and more attentive to (and accepted by) the Church of Jerusalem than he was really (there are more agenda items, some seen through Lukan parables. I have a page on that). Of course, one need to study the whole thing closely, instead of looking at all kind of pretexts in order to declare the whole thing as trash.I explained the confusion about the census and the lack of relationship of “Luke” with “Antiquities” on my website. I demonstrated that quite a few items in Acts which are historical errors can be explained very well by “Luke” browsing 'Wars' and not knowing 'Antiquities'. I cannot understand your insistence that “Luke” could have 'Antiquities' but felt no need to use it. That goes against human nature.Bernard, to be continued

@ Tom, part 3First, I do not acknowledge your terminus ad quem when it is based on the most unequivocal evidence, and does not take in account earlier (but weaker) still legitimate evidence: terminus ad quem based on irrefutable evidence (such as Irenaeus' works) is in my view rather academic. The same goes for irrefutable evidence for terminus ad quo. For example, what do you have against gMark not written in the 60's? I dedicated a lot of time for the dating of important Christian works. Here is the start of it: http://historical-jesus.info/gospels.html. Sometimes texts can be dated within one year, a few years, a few decades and anything in between. Yes the evidence may be weak in some cases, but it is existing. I am looking for the most likely time these works were published, with concerns about finding evidence for their sequencing (and everything has to fit!). Some mythicists put most, if not all, early Christian texts in the 2nd century, but that creates a lot more problems than it solves, with an almost unlimited number of ill-evidenced so-called solutions, with many unexplained items and with seemingly clear-cut evidence against.I think we have enough evidence for presbyter John's existence, (through Revelation and gJohn, and Papias (who claimed to have known him)). It all fits. What data are you taking about? Do you think Irenaeus and Eusebius invented Papias' works and Papias himself? One can always find reasons to doubt anything, more so when the evidence is not very strong. Anyway my argument there, for dating gJohn, was about the longevity of the “beloved disciple”, who is portrayed as an eyewitness of Jesus, and who died at the end of gJohn (disturbing many who thought he would not die (before the Kingdom advent)). I justified around 100 because of that, rather than 120 or 150. I only needed gJohn for that.As for Barnabas, you said the evidence is not strong: does that mean you admit the evidence exists? Then why should it be discarded?Bernard