# Did Paul hijack Christianity?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [February 25, 2010, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342 "2010-02-25T01:48:27Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 4
### Author:  [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/61 "2010-02-26T04:43:48Z")
> [@Oveja\_Slayer](#):
>
> Wasn’t aware it was a forgery. Cite?
>
> I don’t take it as the whole truth by any means, but it would seem there may be some connection to some assemblance of truth, corrupted. But yes that’s what I was referring to.
Well, it’s pretty much that nobody ever saw any of the manuscripts that Szekeley claimed to have translated, both the Vatican library and the Austrian library that he claimed to have found the documents in deny they exist, Szekeley didn’t mention his finding of a Hebrew fragment of the supposed gospel in the Monte Cassino library until after World War II, when the Monte Cassino monastery had been destroyed by Allied bombing.
Further, the documents were supposedly in Old Slavonic, Hebrew, and Aramaic, but there’s not any evidence, other than his own claims that he had ever studied any of those languages. He published the work twice, in 1937 and 1977, and the story he gives in the preface is different each time. In 1937, he says the Aramaic text is from the first century. In 1977, he says the Aramaic text is from the third century.
The 1937 book is called "The Gospel of Peace of Jesus Christ by the Disciple John. After the Dead Sea Scrolls were found, and the Essenes became popular, he changed the name to the Essene Gospel of Peace.
In addition, in 1928, he founded the International Biogenic Society, which held as its principles that we’re all the children of the earth mother, and that people should get frequent enemas and eat a vegetarian, raw food diet. Interestingly enough, in the Gospel of Peace, Jesus says that his followers are children of the earth mother, and that you’ll only go to heaven if you get frequent enemas and eat a vegetarian, raw food diet.
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### Author:  [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 5:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/62 "2010-02-26T05:11:27Z")
Gnosticism is incompatible with the principles of Christianity laid down in the New Testament. Paul arguably advanced the path to salvation through grace alone. Christianity was unusual for a religion in that it required not just adherence to behavioral dictates, but required belief that God loves you, and you love God. It also advised behavior: turn the other cheek, love thine enemy, etc. These provided salvation, and not second class salvation. Everybody knew it and it was to be told to everyone. Gnosticism, by its definition, is about secret knowledge leading to various special benefits not available to people without the secret knowledge. It is like the Open Source movement compared to copyrighted and encrypted source code.
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### Author:  [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/63 "2010-02-26T05:14:39Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> I have long suspected that the early Christians had to contend with a still-flourishing sect of Johannites who could claim: “Everybody knows John baptized Jesus, so how could Jesus, not John, be the Messiah?” And that, as deliberate counter-propaganda, the writers of the Gospels put in the passage where John says to Jesus, “I have need to be baptized of you, and you come to me?”; and, “He [John] was not the light but came to bear witness to the light”; etc.
>
> Now, if what you are saying is true, I see there might have been an additional reason for those passages: That the early Christians were trying to distance themselves from Gnostic doctrine.
>
> But, none of this bears on the core question: **Did** the early Christian Church have a body of esoteric doctrine, known to the inner circle, and not published in the Bible nor preached to the laity? Is there any reason to think so?
There were a number of Gnostic gospels, including the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas, found about 100 years ago, which survives today. I believe the recently discovered Gospel of Judas is Gnostic. They are available in books stores. Mary and Peter have also had attribution of apocryphal works that did not make it into the canon.
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### Author:  [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/64 "2010-02-26T05:34:22Z")
> [@The\_Second\_Stone](#):
>
> Gnosticism is incompatible with the principles of Christianity laid down in the New Testament. Paul arguably advanced the path to salvation through grace alone. Christianity was unusual for a religion in that it required not just adherence to behavioral dictates, but required belief that God loves you, and you love God. It also advised behavior: turn the other cheek, love thine enemy, etc. These provided salvation, and not second class salvation. Everybody knew it and it was to be told to everyone. Gnosticism, by its definition, is about secret knowledge leading to various special benefits not available to people without the secret knowledge. It is like the Open Source movement compared to copyrighted and encrypted source code.
I think you’ll find that the church still kept a pretty strict lock on deciding what a person had to do to be saved, for the next thousand and some odd years.
But say that someone who’s only ever talked to a level 1 member of Scientology went off to another country and started his own church. He’ll have never heard of Xenu or any of the other knowledge that’s kept to the higher levels. As he expounds upon what he does know, adding in tidbits of material to flesh it out, he ends up coming up with something that becomes largely incompatible with Scientology and yet he still calls his version Scientology. Does this prove that the original Scientology is unrelated to his religion?
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### Author:  [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/65 "2010-02-26T05:35:26Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#):
>
> Paul stayed with [Ananias](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ananias_of_Damascus) for some time previous to his conversion, as well as having acted as a lawyer prosecuting Christians before he became one himself.
>
> But that he might not have actually known all that much about the religion is quite the point. Why else would he need to claim that Jesus directly mind-melded with him (after the resurrection) and that everything he knew supercedes anything else Jesus might have said before?
Interesting. Where did he claim everything he knew supersedes anything else?
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### Author:  [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/66 "2010-02-26T07:31:45Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#):
>
> Interesting. Where did he claim everything he knew supersedes anything else?
Everyone else was Jesus’ student. Paul received all of Jesus’ teachings by [direct revelation](http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Gal.%201&version=TNIV).
Essentially, this means that where everyone else might have mistaken Jesus’ meaning, Paul could not because his understanding was innate and magical, not limited to the pitfalls of oral communication.
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### Author:  [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 8:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/67 "2010-02-26T08:32:42Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#):
>
> Interesting. Where did he claim everything he knew supersedes anything else?
Let me give a better answer than I did in my previous post.
Let’s say that there’s a guy named Alfred. His dad died 2 years ago.
I walk up to Alfred and I tell him that his dad is talking to me from beyond the grave. Alfred now needs to decide whether I’m the world’s biggest asshole, or I’m actually receiving direct communication from his deceased father. If he doesn’t punch my lights out, then he’s accepting that I know more about what his dad thinks than he does, so long as I don’t say anything that he can directly disprove.
In the case Paul, he doesn’t claim that Jesus taught him about his life, just his teachings. No one has any recourse to test that his knowledge of Jesus is divinely inspired, so long as he can make a convincing argument that anywhere he diverges from everyone else’s understanding of Jesus’ teachings is their misunderstanding. Being a lawyer, and having done at least some study of Christian teaching, I suspect that he could do that. And the instant they accept him, instead of punching his lights out or stoning him to death, they’re agreeing that he received divine revelation and knows more accurately what Jesus wanted than they do. There is no middle-path when it comes to accepting magical communication. It either is 100% or it isn’t.
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### Author:  [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/68 "2010-02-26T12:51:06Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#):
>
> Let me give a better answer than I did in my previous post.
>
> Let’s say that there’s a guy named Alfred. His dad died 2 years ago.
>
> I walk up to Alfred and I tell him that his dad is talking to me from beyond the grave. Alfred now needs to decide whether I’m the world’s biggest asshole, or I’m actually receiving direct communication from his deceased father. If he doesn’t punch my lights out, then he’s accepting that I know more about what his dad thinks than he does, so long as I don’t say anything that he can directly disprove.
>
> In the case Paul, he doesn’t claim that Jesus taught him about his life, just his teachings. No one has any recourse to test that his knowledge of Jesus is divinely inspired, so long as he can make a convincing argument that anywhere he diverges from everyone else’s understanding of Jesus’ teachings is their misunderstanding. Being a lawyer, and having done at least some study of Christian teaching, I suspect that he could do that. And the instant they accept him, instead of punching his lights out or stoning him to death, they’re agreeing that he received divine revelation and knows more accurately what Jesus wanted than they do. There is no middle-path when it comes to accepting magical communication. It either is 100% or it isn’t.
In other words it’s just your opinion. I thought perhaps you had a bible passage I had overlooked.
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### Author:  [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/69 "2010-02-26T12:52:42Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#):
>
> Everyone else was Jesus’ student. Paul received all of Jesus’ teachings by [direct revelation](http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Gal.%201&version=TNIV).
>
> Essentially, this means that where everyone else might have mistaken Jesus’ meaning, Paul could not because his understanding was innate and magical, not limited to the pitfalls of oral communication.
No it doesn’t mean that essentially or otherwise.
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### Author:  [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/70 "2010-02-26T13:05:35Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#):
>
> In other words it’s just your opinion. I thought perhaps you had a bible passage I had overlooked.
Yes, I don’t see any practical way for someone who is carrying divine knowledge to not outrank those who only received it second hand. If you understand my point and my reasoning, then it’s up to you from there. If you see some practical way to get around this standing then, well, good on ya.
Personally, I don’t see any way to get around it even as a hypothetical. That would mark it down as something more than opinion but, hey, anything can be handwaved away, hypothetical workarounds being non-existent or not.
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### Author:  [@Frank\_apisa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank_apisa)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/71 "2010-02-26T13:36:27Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> One could also read that as by implication condemning homosexuality, which is clearly against Old Testament law.
That was my point!
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### Author:  [@Frank\_apisa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank_apisa)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/72 "2010-02-26T13:39:33Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> Weelll . . . I’m tempted to say that without Paul “Christianity” would have endured only as a sect within Judaism, the way it started out; but, remember, it was not Paul who started accepting Gentile converts. **Peter** started that. Paul only pushed harder for it, insisting that Gentile Christians need not be circumcized, keep kosher, etc. Whether that development – certainly prerequisite to Christianity becoming a widespread religion in the Roman Empire and, later, the world – would have happened without Paul is imponderable.
Where did the “Peter started that” come from?
I’m not doubting it…just wondering about it.
I have always thought Paul started the mission among the gentiles…but if Peter actually did, I’d like to know about it.
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### Author:  [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/73 "2010-02-26T13:57:25Z")
> [@Frank\_apisa](#):
>
> Where did the “Peter started that” come from?
>
> I’m not doubting it…just wondering about it.
>
> I have always thought Paul started the mission among the gentiles…but if Peter actually did, I’d like to know about it.
Acts 10
Paul just cranked it to 11.
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### Author:  [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/74 "2010-02-26T14:15:27Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#):
>
> Yes, I don’t see any practical way for someone who is carrying divine knowledge to not outrank those who only received it second hand. If you understand my point and my reasoning, then it’s up to you from there. If you see some practical way to get around this standing then, well, good on ya.
>
> Personally, I don’t see any way to get around it even as a hypothetical. That would mark it down as something more than opinion but, hey, anything can be handwaved away, hypothetical workarounds being non-existent or not.
Go back and read Acts again and you’ll see why this doesn’t work.
If you had anything in the way of a passage that indicated Paul thought he outranked the other apostles then I’d be interested.
Scripturally speaking your assumption that Paul’s knowledge was from a divine source and the other apostles wasn’t is a glaring error. Not only did most of them receive their instructions directly from Jesus, who they considered …what?..divine,both before the crucifixion and after he rose from the dead, Jesus also promised them the coming of the Holy Spirit which happens pretty dramatically in Acts. I’d say that qualifies as divine as well.
I’m not handwaving it away. I’m dismissing it because even a somewhat superficial knowledge of the scriptures such as mine shows it to be incorrect. That’s why I was interested in the possibility of some passage I wasn’t familiar with, which you evidently don’t have.
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### Author:  [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/75 "2010-02-26T14:34:43Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#):
>
> The word, “hijack” implies that previous to Paul Christianity existed in a singular, homogenous form. While we don’t have enough hard, historical data to be able to determine exactly what Jesus taught or believed about himself, or how his disciples and the rest of his immediate followers vewed him, we do know that there were several different movements and sects of Christianity active in the first two centuries. Pauline Christinity won out and became the version that was eventually established as “orthodox,” but it wasn’t really any more a “hijack” than any of the other ones. Paul does have the benefit of being early and close to the original movement, but even he says he had differences with the Jerusalem movement, though it’s not clear what all of them were.
>
> Paul seems to have had a lot to do with establishing orthodox Christianity’s soteriology and Christology, and he changed it from a closed Jewish movement to a universal one. How much he differed from the original movement in its view of Jesus (or from Jesus’ view of himself) is unknown.
Finally, a voice of reason. Diogenes, even though we come at Christianity from different PoVs and disagree on the interpretation of the facts, I appreciate your detailed knowledge and historical detatchment in these threads.
> [@Sage\_Rat](#):
>
> Yes, I don’t see any practical way for someone who is carrying divine knowledge to not outrank those who only received it second hand. If you understand my point and my reasoning, then it’s up to you from there. If you see some practical way to get around this standing then, well, good on ya.
How can you say the other disciples received it second hand? They received their teaching straight from Jesus - just like Paul claimed to. Paul even refers to him self as “one abnormally born; for I am the least of the apostles.” (I Corinthians 15).
> [@Frank\_apisa](#):
>
> Where did the “Peter started that” come from?
>
> I’m not doubting it…just wondering about it.
>
> I have always thought Paul started the mission among the gentiles…but if Peter actually did, I’d like to know about it.
To expand on FriarTed’s answer, in Acts 10 Peter has that dream where he sees a sheet being lowered down from heaven filled with unclean animals, and God orders him to eat. Peter refuses, because the food is unclean. God tell him, “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.”
Immediately after the dream, Peter is approached by men sent from a Roman Centurian named Cornelius, a devout Roman who says the Spirit of God told him to summon Peter. Peter goes to his home and says “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts men from every nation who fear him and do what is right.” And he baptizes Cornelius and his family. [Acts 10](http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Acts%2010&version=NIV).
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### Author:  [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/76 "2010-02-26T15:31:24Z")
> [@Skammer](#):
>
> How can you say the other disciples received it second hand? They received their teaching straight from Jesus - just like Paul claimed to.
You know how they say a picture is worth a thousand words? Pretend that you had to describe a photograph down to every single blade of grass, just by speech. It’s not even remotely possible. It necessarily will be a simplified and quite likely be misinterpreted by your listeners to some extent. But if you do have a photograph, and hand it over to one guy, he’ll just blow away everyone else who only got the verbal description.
Jesus might have _told_ the Apostles what they needed to know, but only Paul had Jesus’ teachings implanted directly into his head. There is no room for misinterpretation when the knowledge has been perfectly copied in whole. Paul wasn’t taught. He was programmed. Jesus went down, shuffled around the bits in his brain exactly how he wanted them, and set him loose. If you’re to say that Jesus fiddled with everyone else’s brain as well, then why did he have to teach them for months or years, instead of just doing it instantaneously like he did with Paul? If _everyone_ had a perfect understanding, why did they have to meet and debate Jesus’ intent after the fact? If none of them had perfect understanding, then why did Jesus instantaneously provide _incorrect_ divine revelation directly into Paul’s brain?
> [@](#):
>
> Paul even refers to him self as “one abnormally born; for I am the least of the apostles.” (I Corinthians 15).
Humility: It’s a virtue.
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### Author:  [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/77 "2010-02-26T15:43:01Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#):
>
> Jesus might have _told_ the Apostles what they needed to know, but only Paul had Jesus’ teachings implanted directly into his head. There is no room for misinterpretation when the knowledge has been perfectly copied in whole. Paul wasn’t taught. He was programmed. Jesus went down, shuffled around the bits in his brain exactly how he wanted them, and set him loose.
There’s nothing in Acts or in Paul’s writing that indicates this is how Paul acquired his knowledge of Jesus. He was familiar with the church in Jerusalem as a prosecutor (and persecutor), and after his conversion he spent time in Damascus with the disciples there. In his letter to the Galations, he says he then went to Arabia for three years before beginning his mission to the Gentiles. So it took three years to for Jesus to “implant.. directly into his head”? You’re inventing that theory with no evidence.
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### Author:  [@Sapo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sapo)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/78 "2010-02-26T16:02:22Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#):
>
> You know how they say a picture is worth a thousand words? Pretend that you had to describe a photograph down to every single blade of grass, just by speech. It’s not even remotely possible. It necessarily will be a simplified and quite likely be misinterpreted by your listeners to some extent. But if you do have a photograph, and hand it over to one guy, he’ll just blow away everyone else who only got the verbal description.
>
> Jesus might have _told_ the Apostles what they needed to know, but only Paul had Jesus’ teachings implanted directly into his head. There is no room for misinterpretation when the knowledge has been perfectly copied in whole. Paul wasn’t taught. He was programmed. Jesus went down, shuffled around the bits in his brain exactly how he wanted them, and set him loose. If you’re to say that Jesus fiddled with everyone else’s brain as well, then why did he have to teach them for months or years, instead of just doing it instantaneously like he did with Paul? If _everyone_ had a perfect understanding, why did they have to meet and debate Jesus’ intent after the fact? If none of them had perfect understanding, then why did Jesus instantaneously provide _incorrect_ divine revelation directly into Paul’s brain?
> Humility: It’s a virtue.
Who says he didn’t just get the audio tape when he was plugged in? You are reading too much into it.
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### Author:  [@Frank\_apisa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank_apisa)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/79 "2010-02-26T16:07:44Z")
> [@Skammer](#):
>
> There’s nothing in Acts or in Paul’s writing that indicates this is how Paul acquired his knowledge of Jesus.
Actually, in Galatians, Paul does mention that he got his knowledge not through men…but directly form Jesus. And it does seem he is suggesting it came as a revelation…directly and quickly.
The fact that he went to Arabia for three years does not mean that the revelation took that long to be completed…but rather that as a result of the revelation…he went to do the work of converting gentiles. He even seems to be suggesting that there was no need for him to seek out the apostles and people who had actually known Jesus…because his knowledge was complete without doing so.
ASIDE: Paul got things done…and he was “into himself.”
It is my experience that one of the requirements of being someone who “gets things done”…is “to be into one’s self.”
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### Author:  [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)
#### Post date: [February 26, 2010, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-paul-hijack-christianity/530342/80 "2010-02-26T16:14:10Z")
> [@Skammer](#):
>
> How can you say the other disciples received it second hand? They received their teaching straight from Jesus - just like Paul claimed to. Paul even refers to him self as “one abnormally born; for I am the least of the apostles.” (I Corinthians 15).
He also, earlier in the same letter, far from seeing his mission as superior, defensive, and trying to prove that he’s as good as the Jerusalem community of Jesus’s original disciples:
> [@](#):
>
> Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not the result of my work in the Lord? Even though I may not be an apostle to others, surely I am to you! For you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.
>
> This is my defense to those who sit in judgment on me. Don’t we have the right to food and drink? Don’t we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord’s brothers and Cephas? Or is it only I and Barnabas who must work for a living?
And even earlier in the same letter, argues that there isn’t any division in Jesus’s message, and that none of groups of the apostles have superior knowledge of Jesus’s teachings.
> [@](#):
>
> I appeal to you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought. My brothers, some from Chloe’s household have informed me that there are quarrels among you. What I mean is this: One of you says, “I follow Paul”; another, “I follow Apollos”; another, “I follow Cephas”; still another, “I follow Christ.”
>
> Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Were you baptized into the name of Paul? I am thankful that I did not baptize any of you except Crispus and Gaius, so no one can say that you were baptized into my name. (Yes, I also baptized the household of Stephanas; beyond that, I don’t remember if I baptized anyone else.) For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel—not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power. . . .
>
> For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not mere men?
>
> What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe—as the Lord has assigned to each his task. I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow
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