Christianity Without Paul:
A New Christian Paradigm
An essay written by The Most Reverend Doctor Christian-Thomas
Archbishop-Primate of The Church of Philadelphia
If one were to ask any given person who professes to be a Christian, even a Gnostic Christian, the same answer would be given: “that is not possible.” Without Paul’s Christology, there can be no Christianity, no gnosis. What is Christianity if we take away Jesus’ salvific sacrifice on the cross? What is Christianity if Paul is repudiated and denied the august (self-proclaimed) title of “Apostle to the Gentiles”? Where would Christianity be if Paul had not been the first Christian theologian whose soaring literary and exegetical genius defined what came to be “The One Holy Catholic Church”?
It seems pointless to challenge romantic, cherished notions about Paul with nominal Christians, at least when one questions his role in the formation of the Christian confession. People who claim to understand scripture have been programmed to accept the words of Paul as almost equally authoritative to those of Jesus The Christ. And yet, no one seems to perceive the inherent contradictions between Pauline Christianity and the Yeshuan revelation. The words of “Christ” that pepper the Tarsiot’s writings are quite different in tone as compared with the original sayings of Yeshua, both canonical as well as apocryphal and extra-canonical.
It is the biblical scholars and archaeologists of the past two centuries who studied the bible and ancillary writings outside of the context of a church-dominated homogenized theology. These were the first courageous thinkers to demonstrate that scripture, while apparently divinely inspired, shows very clear evidence of having been edited. As more ancient writings were discovered, many of which were the prototypes of the accepted gospels, epistles, etc., it could be proven that there were numerous passages omitted and substitute readings inserted. Those responsible for this are called redactors who substituted words more in keeping with the church as it evolved as a secularized and political entity. Both of the canonical testaments show clear evidence of mutilation by well-meaning but unenlightened scribes who lived far after the time of the professed authors of same.
Although the many contemporary seminarians know that this is unequivocally factual, nevertheless, once ordained and in a ministry, they still teach the members of their flocks the same falsehoods about biblical inerrancy and the pre-eminent Christology enunciated by Paul. My consecrator and friend, the most Rev. Thomas Hickey, spoke of this as “pious fraud.” And fraud it is indeed. It can be demonstrated that Paul himself and his tireless attempts to save the world via his message served as the defining catalyst that prompted the gradual transformation of Jesus’ original liberating teachings of the way of light into a status quo-serving religious monolithic system of social control.
In some ways, this is most ironic, since, as we know, the original apostles really did not like Sha’ul Tarsiot and most assuredly did not anoint him with the self-same apostolikos that they had received from the person of Christ. I use the name “Sha’ul Tarsiot” to indicate that his choice of the moniker of “Paul,” meaning “little one” was self-proclaimed as a means to establish his apostolic legitimacy. If the reader recalls, Jesus reportedly said that his future disciples should expect and accept a “little one who comes in my name.” However, it should be noted that Sha’ul was not included among the twelve apostles delineated by the “Book of Revelation”. (I might add that Jesus also warned in Matthew 24 about false prophets preaching false christs )
No. The Tarsiot did have many difficulties before and after his death among not only the majority non-Pauline Christian communities but also with the early Church Fathers themselves. Because of the strangely inconsistent Gnostic character of some of his writings – which stand in marked constradistinction to most of his other writings – he was called “The Father of all heresies.” Were there two or more Pauls, one might ask?
It has been demonstrated rather convincingly that virtually all of the authors of the books of the old and new testaments were written by later scribes, who used the names of revered persons pseudepigraphically. This was a very common practice in the ancient world. It is now believed that Paul actually wrote only two of the letters ascribed to him. The writers of the gospels, be they canonical or apocryphal, were probably not the persons whose names are attached to these sacred writings.
Arguably, in the creation of the Christian Faith, we can affirm that there were main characters: Jesus the Christ and Shaul Tarsiot. Exactly what is the relationship between the two? Did they share some sort of relationship that is unknown to the general public? It is widely known that the Tarsiot relentlessly persecuted the original Christians. But, other than his self-proclaimed vision of the risen Christ on the road to Damascus (which he interpreted to mean that he had been called to a special ministry), there has not been until very recently any clues as to the actual nature of Sha’ul’s relationship with Jesus before the latter’s judicial murder. It is certain that Jesus never accepted Sha”ul as a disciple, apostle, etc. What exactly was the common base that the two shared before Jesus initiated his messianic teaching ministry?
The period that is called “the Intertestamental Period,” roughly from 100 b.c.e. to 100 a.c.e., inspired peoples continued to pen powerful holy writings. Indeed, there is a plethora of apocryphal, pseudepigraphical and ancillary writings that messianic mystic Jews, early Judeo-Christians, and early Gnostic theologians read side by side with universally accepted scriptures. That period of time is quite similar to these latter-day millenial days in that so very, very many persons are coming forward, each with his/her idiosyncratic spin on holy writ who create their own “gospels,” which enjoy varying degrees of popularity with the many. No one challenges these modern writers; the same was more of less true during the Intertestamental centuries as well. What can we learn from these writings and the four accepted gospels that will shed considerable light on the interrelationship between Jesus and Sha’ul?
One of the most revolutionary, mystical sects of Judaism was called Essenism. There were many Essene communities, mostly located in the desert/wilderness throughout Judaea and adjoining countries. These Holy Men and women amassed a corpus of spiritual literature, community rules, and so forth. Yet, until the 1940’s, what little we know about these mysterious groups was provided by the Hellenized Jewish historian/philosopher Philo.
However, when a cache of deliberately hidden sacred texts located in the area known as the Wadi Qumran was unearthed and analyzed (1947-1956), a new world of understanding history was made available to scholars and theologians alike. It should be noted that the group of archaeologists and biblical scholars was hand-picked by representatives of the church of Rome and commissioned in such a way as to make their translations alien to exoteric Christianity and, therefore, no threat to the established order. These early scholars, all in one way or another connected to the Church of Rome, held an iron grip over their finds, allowing virtually no one outside of their clique to analyze them. The earliest translations that were issued were duly “sanitized” and, indeed, seemed quite irrelevant to the rise of Christianity. Their obvious Essene character was played down considerably, to the point that many contemporary scholars still doubt that Essenism had any seminal influence on the scrolls.
Beginning in the early 1990’s, a few very courageous and perhaps a bit reckless biblical scholars came forward and released copies of the Dead Sea Manuscripts that the earlier group had deliberately hidden from the world. While very fragmentary, the released texts, never before released, were very revolutionary and controversial. Subsequently, these courageous scholars released new translations of the entire corpus of the Dead Sea Scrolls. It is now very obvious that this Essene community, with its mysteries and proto-Gnostic leanings, was the religious community where Jesus was nurtured, instructed in the way of light, the second birth, and the way of immortal return to the luminous realms of God. Furthermore, the selfsame community evolved into the earliest Christian assembly. We know this because fragments of New Testament writings were found in the midst of the Holy Scrolls.
It seems quite likely that Jesus, from a tender age until his adolescence, dwelt with his earthly parents in an Essene community in Egypt. These Egyptian Essenes were known as the Therapeutae, as they were healers of a spiritual and metaphysical nature. They were completely separatist, and, since none of their writings have been discovered thus far, aside from the fact that Philo described them as consummate mystics, we know very little about them. It can be arguably reasoned that the passages in the canonical gospels that described Joseph’s being warned by an Angel of God to flee into Egypt with the infant Jesus and his mother are factual. It is widely known that this earlier puppet king Herod had pronounced his infamous death sentence upon all of the male children, ages infant to two years, living in Bethlehem. Therefore, the flight into Egypt makes more sense in this context. This writer asserts that Jesus’ parents, who probably were Essenes themselves (many Essenes did reside in cities and villages also), sought refuge among the Egyptian Therapeuts until it was safe for the family to return to Judaea, after Herod had died.
Undoubtedly, Jesus and his family continued their association with local Essenes when they dwelt in “Nazareth”. By the way, it has been documented that there was no such village as Nazareth until the first century a.c.e. This “Nazareth” was built by unscrupulous entrepreneurs so as to bilk the many pilgrims who came to the holy land out of their money and goods! The reference to Nazareth in the canonical gospels was inserted in order to fulfill a prophecy that “He (The messiah) shall be called a Nazarene.” the term Nazarene is more correctly translated as Nazorean. It is well known that the Nazoreans were also Essenes. Both Nazarene and Nazorean derive from the near and middle eastern root morpheme “nasr” which means in Hebrew, Aramaic and Arabic “keyholders of a secret treasure or oral tradition” (as well as from the Hebrew “naas”= “snake”). Again, the Nazarene/Nazorean reference very strongly suggests that Jesus’ so-called missing years were spent by continued Essenic association, where he continued to grow and be instructed in the exigencies of his future office as Master Teacher (Tzaddik) and the anointed Mashik’hah, future King of Israel and Judaea.
As an aside, it should be noted that Jesus’ cousin (?) John the baptizer was also an Essene. Unlike Jesus, John Baptizer followed the more traditional encratic rules [an ascetic who wears hair shirts] of the Essene order. Because Jesus was destined to fulfill other offices – that of Master Teacher (Rabboni) of the Way as well as Messianic King of Israel and Judaea – he was obliged to put aside the ritual purity and separatist rules of the order and mingle with people of the world. His most important office was to spread the Holy WORD,+ (Logos) of God. The topic of God’s Holy living Word, which is completely different from any human word written (including any and all scripture) would require a thesis in itself, so I shall not address this issue further.
But there was another notorious member of the Wade Qumran Essenes: Shaul Tarsiot himself. Himself late of being a former student of the famous Jewish Master Rabbi Hillel, Shaul believed that his destiny was to be a master teacher himself or more remarkably, the spiritual head of an entire religious tradition. As the Essenes were known to be the most knowledgeable and mystical wisdom sect of Judaism, no doubt Shaul ingratiated himself to them. As a Hellenized Jew who was instructed in the Greek philosophical arts of argumentation and metaphysics, he probably believed that his Essene association could only legitimize him more as a spiritual leader.
The authors of the Dead Sea Scrolls saw his entrance into the order differently. Because of his Roman citizenship, they called him an “Herodias” (a later King Herod, so-called Jewish King who was a minion of the Roman oppressors). The Essenes were above all shrewd judges of human character and hidden agendas. They believed that he had been sent to spy on them and perhaps attempt to disrupt their assemblies. Of all of the Jewish sects, the Romans feared most of all the Essenes who cherished millennial concepts of the overthrow and destruction of the Roman Empire in a great spiritual war as well as the reestablishment of the Jewish people as the pre-eminent religious kingdom. What few people know that at around the time of Jesus, they were becoming radically proto-Gnostic. They began to make a differentiation between the good God and the lord, this latter seen as a subordinate deity. It was from amongst the Essenes that Jesus developed many of his Gnostic teachings which he revealed in his earthly ministry. And there can be no doubt that Shaul too was fascinated by these revolutionary ideas, as he plagiarized many of the Essene-Gnostic prayers and ideas and put them in his later writings (or some unnamed scribe did).
It is probable that Shaul came into contact with the Essene Jesus, whom the Essenes knew was the prophesied Messiah (anointed one – the Christ) and teacher of righteousness. Because of his own megalomaniacal fantasies about his being one of the elect, it is very likely, indeed indubitable, that he harboured evil thoughts of hatred towards and envy of Jesus. No doubt these negative thoughts and feelings continued to fester in him to the point of obsession. Certainly, until his “conversion” experience, this hatred of Jesus and all of his followers resulted in his attempts to destroy the earliest Christians. Be that as it may, for reasons that are unclear (apparently he flagrantly broke several key community rules regarding personal hygiene and ritual purity), Shaul was eventually excommunicated and banished from the Essene community at Qumran. This can only have fueled his hatred more, eventuating in the most hideous of acts and behaviors towards his former spiritual community and its membership, especially the sweet and beauteous Yeshua. His hostile exit from the community and his noxious deeds then and afterwards earned him the Essene epithet of “The Wicked Priest”.
In my spiritual consciousness, I am convinced that it was Shaul himself who planned and executed the plot to put Jesus to death, with Judas Iscariot playing only a subordinate role. Of course, in the redacted and edited versions of the canonical gospels that came down to us, Judas is portrayed as the most odious and hateful of betrayers. Is this in fact a true depiction? The recent recovery of a Gnostic gospel, “The Gospel of Judas,” prompts us to think otherwise. Judas. We see was preordained by God to play a very specific role in the life story of Jesus: namely, the task of releasing the beautiful luminous spirit of Jesus from its fleshly prison and returning his master to the realms of light. Jesus chose to die at the time it was preordained, because he wanted to go home. There was nothing more he could do. The world was, and remains to this day, too much for him to bear.
After the murder of Jesus, the secret teachings of the way of light and the Gnosis continued to be taught in oral form by his anointed apostles to Jew and gentile alike. The Jewish Christian community that Jesus initiated was taken over by James, Jesus’ biological brother, as was the custom of inheritance at that time. He and most of the Apostles felt that they should reach out to the Jewish people that had been scattered amongst the gentiles after their captivity by Babylon. The former peoples of the northern Jewish kingdom, namely Israel, enjoyed their freedom to the extent that they chose to live in the larger gentile world. These were known as “the lost tribes of Israel” who themselves may have continued their religious practices or converted to other non-Jewish religions. In the meantime, Shaul continued to persecute this community and may also have been instrumental in the martyrdom of James, at which time Peter took over nominal ad hoc leadership which he shared with Jesus’ mother Miriam.
It was somewhere at this time that Shaul experienced his famous “conversion experience” whilst on the road to Damascus, which was a code name for Wade Qumran. Did the luminous Jesus Christ actually appear to Shaul? Most exoteric Christians believe “Yes”. But there are alternative explanations. It is possible that an endarkened spirit, appearing in the guise of a blinding light, appeared to Saul, assuaging his guilt while at the same time planting the seeds of deceit in his mind about his being called as the “Apostle to the gentiles.” It is important to remember that Jesus Christ had already commissioned the disciples to be Apostles to the entire world. Would he have filled Shaul, the enemy of goodness and truth, with megalomaniacal thoughts of apostolic legitimacy? It should be noted that by this time, he had become quite mentally ill. Perhaps all that he experienced was a very vivid hallucination that sprang from his sense of shame and guilt regarding all of the loathesome acts which he had committed?
Whatever the case, it is a moot question, because Shaul certainly believed it, converted nominally to Christianity and dubbed himself Paul, the little one who was to come after Christ. [As Jesus seems to foretell in Matthew 18:5] He approached the Jerusalem community and begged the blessing of the Apostle Peter to pursue his conversion activities in the non-Jewish world. Despite what the “Acts of the Apostles” claim, which were written, as was the gospel of Luke, by a Hellenized disciple of Shaul, the actual true sequence of the historical activities of the Apostles was grossly misrepresented. The “Acts” describe Shaul’s courageous attempts to de-Judaeise the early Christian community and make it more palatable to the free-living, carnal gentiles. The animosity between the True Apostles and the false prophet Shaul was far more pronounced than the “Acts” would have us believe. Somehow it appears that Shaul/”Paul” was magically transformed from being at odds with the stubborn “Jewishness” of the Apostles into becoming the nominal “head” of the Christian church! His lifelong goal was finally achieved, mirabile dictu!
To reiterate, while Shaul was rushing rapidly (baptizing everyone and anyone he could) through Asia Minor and all the way to Rome, the Original True Apostles continued to reveal the way of gnosis to those deemed worthy of receiving it. The secret teachings were never written down. I cannot stress this point overmuch. I have read every single spiritual writing available, past and present. The secrets of the way have never been written down or even closely approximated by contemporary writers. In accordance with Divine Law, they cannot be written down, nor shall they ever be written down.
We might ask ourselves, why, therefore did written scripture pertaining to Jesus begin to circulate not long after his murder? The answer is quite simple. As the Apostles formed communities, the community leaders began to record the sayings of Jesus that were taught to them. Indeed, for each and every gospel, canonical or otherwise, there was a Christian community whose leaders read these words orally in the service of their congregants. The Secrets of the Way, I reiterate, never appeared in these texts, although the sayings of Jesus which were recited vaguely alluded to a semblance of the truth, so that those “who had ears could hear,” as it were. At the same time that the gospels began to appear in garbled written form, Sha’ul was quick to pen his many-splendoured exegesis of the holy gospel. There was no oral Pauline tradition. He simply wrote “scripture,” contrary to the established norms. It must be acknowledged that he was a brilliant writer, creating a number of writings that are both moving and beautiful – although in error. Inasmuch as he only wrote two epistles unequivocally, we can rightly ask who wrote the remaining ones? Some of these are profoundly Gnostic and beautiful whilst others were penned to deal with the day-to-day governance of the membership of the Pauline churches; i.e., instructions that were completely mundane and even offensive at times, counter to the true spirit of Christ.
Indeed, the source of all of these writings sprung from the fertile minds of both mystics and church leaders during the oft-cited Intertestamental period. All of the many gospels, epistles, revelations (Apocalypses), discourses, etc., etc. had their beginnings during that time. Much of this material had come to take a more Gnostic character after the destruction of the temple and dispersion of the Jewish people in 70 a.c.e. Many of the Bishops of that time, the inheritors of the Apostolikos from the original disciples (as well as the many “consecrated” by Sha’ul), found that there were so many writings that it would be necessary from the standpoint of organizational conformity to fix a canon of what came to be the New Testament.
Most of the Neo-Christian Bishops, those who had not received the mystery of the way of gnosis imparted by Jesus Christ soon became very suspicious of writings of a Gnostic bent. The Gnostics, who were the inheritors of the true gospel of Christ increasingly found themselves being attacked, ridiculed and dismissed as heretics of the worst kind by the neo-Christians. Because it was so easy to become a neo-Christian, given the childish and simplistic formula: “Believe in your minds that Jesus Christ died for your sins on the cross, (accept water baptism and His ‘atoning blood sacrifice to god’) and you will be saved.”
It is no wonder that the Pauline minority soon became the majority “Christians” by the beginning of the second century a.c.e. And this majority eventually formed the basis of each and every exoteric Church on the planet. We all recall that by this time, there remained so many divergent beliefs about who Jesus was, what is the nature of God, what is the origin of Evil, etc., the dominant churches convened an infamous series of “councils,” which served to further mainstream the religion and quell opposing voices. The “losers” at these councils ended up being banished, oppressed, and even martyred at the hands of their “Christian” brethren. The many Gnostic assemblies suffered the most during these dark centuries. And, as we know – the winners always get to write history.
But the defining event that was forever to debase the great traditions and teachings of Jesus the Christ was the emperor Constantine’s acceptance of the Pauline version of Christianity as the universal State religion of the Roman empire after his vision of a cross superimposed upon the sun during the heat of battle. This move eventuated in his convening the infamous council at Nicaea from whence arose the so-called “Apostles’ Creed” or “Nicene Creed”. The long and short of this declaration of faith was that all citizens and denizens of the roman empire were forcibly obliged to swear to it or be killed, effectively causing the followers of the Christian gnosis to go into exile, be killed, or go underground. What once was the dominant Essene-Gnostic Community of Light formed by Yeshua Mashik’hah became a marginalized and outlawed faith throughout the empire, although it seems that a number of the True original Christians migrated to obscure parts of Gaul (France) and Britannia (The British Isles), sometimes mingling with the local pagan traditions.
The fall of the Roman Empire was cataclysmic in that it signaled the beginning of what is rightly called the dark ages because the light of Christ was withdrawn by God from the Church Militant except in a very few rare cases. In this lightless world, the most horrific barbarity became the norm. Murderous war after war scarred the countryside. The clergy of the dominant churches, especially the Church of Rome, became worldly, thoroughly corrupt, and oppressors of the peasants and poor ones. Superstition replaced reason, and all humankind was far worse off than before the Ministry of Jesus. And all because of a false “apostle” whose unrighteous, megalomaniacal desire to be the head of Christianity resulted in his watering down of the Christian message, the so-called “Hard Sayings,” making it a spiritual pablum that everyman could espouse and accept, never to evolve to a higher level of functioning than a mere brute. The forces behind Sha’ul, the Artificer, archons, authorities – the fallen angels – were once more triumphant over God’s plan to redeem not only the fallen human family but even the fallen angels too, to bring all home to him in holy light.
But be of good cheer. The holy Light of God, who is Christ is again being shed upon the whole world because in these millennial times, advocates and expounders of the truth of Light, of Gnosis, of the mysterious second birth, have been sent by God into the human family to bring the beloved orphans of God back into full communion with him.
Amen. Halleluyah
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References
The Holy Bible (King James Version), public domain (2007, Trident References Publishing).
The Dead Sea Scrolls: A New Translation, Wise, Michael, Abbeg Jr., Martin & Cook, Edward (2005, Harper San Francisco).
The Pre-Nicene New Testament: Fifty-four Formative Texts, Price, Robert M. (2006, Signature Books).
The Dead Sea Scrolls Bible: The oldest known Bible translated for the first time into English, Abegg Jr., Martin, Flint, Robert & Ulrich, Eugene (1999, Harper San Francisco).
The Gnostic Bible, Barnstone, Willis & Meyer, Marvin (2006, New Seeds, Boston & London).
The Gnostic Scriptures: Ancient Wisdom for the New Age, Layton, Bentley (1995, Doubleday, New York).
The Other Bible, Barnstone, Willis (2005, Harper San Francisco).
The Gospel of the Gnostics, Greenlees, M.A., Duncan (2006, The Book Tree).
The Lost Sayings of Jesus, Smith, Andrew Phillip (2006, Skylight Paths Publishing).
The Beginnings of Christianity: Essene Mystery, Gnostic Revelation and the Christian Vision, Welburn, Andrew (2004, Floris Books).
The Lost Books of the Bible & the Hidden Books of Eden, H. Platt, Rutherford (2005, Apocryphile Press)
The Most Rev. Thomas J. Hickey, XP, in private conversation with the author.
I understand that Valentinus claimed Paul taught gnosticism in secret to select followers, including Theudas, Valentinus’s teacher. Is this tradition false?
An insoluble question persists regarding “Pauline Gnosticism”. While a number of passages in the Epistles of Shaul contain strongly worded Gnostic ideas, one cannot be certain whether or not “Paul” ever wrote them. Of all of these Epistles, only two can be directly attributed to Shaul. The others are clearly pseudepigraphical. Before the orthodox church established its Canon, it can be demonstrably proven that many editors, redactors and interpolators reworded and inserted new passages not originally present in the first drafts of the documents. So we are quite uncertain as to exactly which “Paul” was a gnostic teacher. There may have been one who bore the name of “Paul” who was a Gnostic Teacher but not the real Shaul whom the apostles unanimously agreed was a charlatan and con-man. In additon, the earliest Patristic writings condemned this “Paul” as “the Father of All Heresies.”
The selfsame processes of editing, redaction and interpolation were applied to the Gnostic literature as well. If we read “The Gospel of Philip,” a document associated with the Valentinian School, there are clear insertions of “Pauline sayings” that should lead us to conclude that, yes, “Paul” was a teacher of Theudas. Theudas, in turn, it is believed, was Valentinus’ Master. Whether or not this Pauline influence on Valentinus is true I cannot affirm or deny. As I said, all of the intertestamental literature, mainstream and gnostic, is arguably proven to have been repeatedly edited and reedited over the first two or three centuries after Yeshua’s martyrdom. It is possible that at the time of Valentinus, when “Paulianity” was becoming fashionable, a well-meaning disciple of Valentinus may have made these ascriptions to “Paul” as a way of legitimizing Valentinus’ profoundly Gnostic exegesis.
I can only conclude that “this tradition” is both false and true, but I maintain some reservations on my part.
Thank you for your comment.
Peace,
Tau Christian-Thomas
Greetings Christian-Thomas,
I very much enjoy your articles. However, as concerning this one article I must disagree.
I do agree with your basic point that one need not be a student of “Paul” to be a Gnostic or “Christian.”
On the other hand, I must say that I remain unconvinced that Paul was ever a villain, or that he was the mastermind of Catholic theology. I think that this is a plausible idea that has been repeated by many writers of various stripes. But the historical evidence, in ancient Catholic texts, shows that Paul was not a primary influence in the development of early Catholic doctrine. Paul did not spread the “Gospel” to the gentiles all by himself. As an example, the Roman Church was not founded by Paul.
Numerous reputable scholars have written on various aspects of this issue: FC Bauer, Adolph von Harnack, Albert Schweitzer, Wilhelm Bousset and James Dunn. All agree that there is a pattern in that Catholic doctrine is not based on Paul’s most fundamental ideas. (Justin Martyr wrote as if he never heard of Paul.) And then when the Catholic Fathers do make use of Paul, they most often twist him out of context in order to refute Gnostics who quoted Paul.
Moreover the historical evidence shows that Paul’s writings were originally popular among the “heretics” viz. Marcion and the Gnostics, whereas Catholic writers might mention his name but otherwise had a loose grasp of his doctrine.
Frankly I don’t think that any “orthodox” theologian really understands Paul or tries to address all the elements of the letters (excluding the Pastorals). Paul has been high-jacked and twisted by the “orthodox” church. But in reading the Pauline letters by themselves I don’t get the impression that Paul was a tyrant, or that the crucifixion was truly at the center of his doctrine. The early Gnostics such as Valentinus recognized this quality about Paul’s writings. Jesus was the exoteric doctrine and then there was the esoteric initiation (1 Cor. 2, cf. Heb. 6:1-2).
I think that the Paul you are writing against is the Paul of the Pastoral Letters and Catholic tradition–but this is not the Paul of history. Some parts of the Pauline letters have been edited or doctored by Catholic scribes, e.g. 1 Cor. 14:34 which says that women cannot speak in the church; wheres in 1 Cor. 11 Paul says that women can and should prophesy in the church, but only that they wear a head-covering. The former passage actually matches the Pastoral Letters which forbid women to speak in the church. The problem is that Paul cannot be shown to be down on women in every passage. In Romans 16:7 Paul mentions a certain woman named “Junia” who is of “note among the Apostles.” (Note to readers: Romans 16 is probably a fragment and not part of the original Romans letter.)
But again I understand and agree with your basic point that one need not be student of Paul to be a Gnostic/Christian. But I don’t agree that he was a villain or that he founded the Catholic Church. I believe it was the Catholic Church that high-jacked Paul and falsified his legacy.
I know you believe that there is an “insoluable problem” of knowing which elements of Paul’s letters are authentic. I think this problem applies to the Gospels and many other ancient texts as well. To be honest, we don’t even know for sure what Jesus really said as opposed to the words placed in his mouth by others.
Best regards,
Jim West
Dear Dr. West:
I first wanted to tell you how much I admire your research papers on the Aeon Byte web site. I love the site itself and am always gratified by how many intelligent commentators have been interviewed there.
I do understand the essential points of your spiritual bio on Paul. Your arguments are both compelling and persuasive. And I do agree with some of them. But there are concepts which I reaffirm that show a different Paul than the one whom you describe, the one embraced by mainstream Christians as well as many contemporary Gnostics.
The first point that I wish to raise is the accepted historicity of “Paul”/Shaul. Contemporary scriptural research suggests that this particular man is the true author of only two of the Pauline Epistles. All others are pseudephigraphical. You will agree that this method of writing, while unacceptable to us scholars today, was in common usage for as long as the Bible has existed. Furthermore, some recent research suggests that “Paul” was at least two individuals and perhaps more as his ideas rose to ascendancy in the nascent churches. Such being the case, I am wondering exactly to which “Paul” you are referring? I believe it is the “Gnostic Paul.” Perhaps I am wrong. Please advise.
I still hold to the historicity of Shaul’s being a mastermind behind the murder of Yeshua. I don’t believe that he (or the other Pauls) directly masterminded the formation of the Roman Church, as such, and I never claimed that he was the sole influence. That would make him almost a godlike prodigious mastermind indeed. But, from a very early date, when most ecclesiastics were not sure which writings to include in the Canon, the majority of the Pauline Epistles were the first ones to be accepted by a consensus of the burgeoning Christian communities as being canonical at about 90 A.C.E., and also by may of the non-Jewish HellenizedChristian-Gnostic assemblies (e.g., Marcion, Valentinus, etc). Since we know that Valentinus revered a “Paul” and felt very comfortable working within the establishing Church of Rome, some Pauline Letters were probably in use within this bastion of orthodoxy early on.
I do believe it to be quite plausible that what became Christian orthodoxy did in fact tamper with these writings. I think that we both can agree that every single document that became the canonical Bible has been tampered with, edited, redacted, interpolated before its final inclusion in the Canon by anonymous, well-meaning politically-minded editors throughout the long history of “the good book” up to and including the present. Look at all of these ridiculous new translations of the Bible! Shaul’s intimate awareness of the numerous Pagan religions/mystery schools which all paid homage to the many dying and revivifying gods made it easy for him to promote his (and his alone) false doctrine of Jesus Christ as the new Dying/Reborn saviour god whose blood sacrifice atoned for all of the sins of his followers forever. Such a childlike and immature soteriological formula would have made it easy for Shaul to win over the hearts and minds of the hellenized Roman Empire, both residents and citizens. It is commonly agreed that the preferred religion of the Romans, especially the savage, blood-crazy soldiers was an imported Mithraism. So close were the tenets of both Mithraism and the Pauline Confession of Faith that it was not relatively long before his false exegesis was universally accepted.
Shaul was demonstrably a big-time self-promoter and less of a genuine Christly apostle. The actual companions of Yeshua who became His Apostles strongly detested Shaul and held him to be, at best, a false prophet. “The Book of Acts” does some amazing legerdemain to make this evil and unwanted Shaul become the Greatest of all of Yeshua’s Apostles. Peter and James are strong in the beginning but gradually fade out as a triumphant “Paul” emerges at its end, just as he escapes from prison and disappears into history. Did the mainstream Church invent this myth, or was it one of Shaul’s disciples who did? It must be realized that, as a result of burgeoning mainstream Orthodoxy’s blind acceptance of Shaul and/or “Pauls” that the selfsame sacrifices and covenants with “jave” which Yeshua annulled by virtue of His Teachings and His Actions were restored to the nascent churches in the formulation of his doctrine of the final and perpetual Jesus Christ god/human blood sacrifice atonement soteriology at the core of his Christology. Consequently, is it not true that he set into motion a series of events that led to the formulation of Christian gentile orthodoxy where formerly pagan constitutents gladly embraced the notion of bloody sacrifices and dying/arising gods? Should he, therefore, not bear some onus of responsibility for what went wrong with Christianity? Who can say, since there were plural “Pauls” at that time, I guess.
The information about Shaul’s actually being much less of a saint have come about as more and more recent scholarship has emerged that challenges cherished and romantic myth-based notions of the love-filled charismatic Paul. Several recent scholars believe that both Shaul and Yeshua were at one time both members of the Ossaien Essene Order where some sort of schism occurred. Some say that Shaul the “Herodian” was a Roman plant (an operative) to report back the activities of this nascent highly revolutionary cult. Others say that Yeshua split from the Wadi Qumran sect, which abandoned its Essene non-violent pietism and did support both animal sacrifices and warfare. This Order of Scribes then vilified Jesus as The Wicked Priest because He annulled animal sacrifice, revealed a GOD that was contrary to their “jave” and claimed this His Coming fulfilled the (incomplete) Mosaic Law. To them, Yeshua was a traitorous schismatic who preached love, fellowship, freedom from the awful demiurge and the Way of Gnosis. To his former Order members, this was worthy of His death sentence which Shaul reportedly was instrumental in convincing the Romans to set in motion, to execute Yeshua as a dangerous seditionist. I am not unappreciative of the sources you cite; all are stellar. But these sources wrote at a time when a lot of material from the Dead Sea Scrolls was not fully understood in context with the Jerusalem Church. Consequently it does not inform these gentlemen’s theories well.
Is it not ironic that people find it easier to hold to an unquestioning and uncritical acceptance of Judas’ guilt in the murder of Yeshua than it is to believe that Shaul/”Paul” is anything less than the greatest of all Christian theologians, yea, surpassing, Yeshua Mashikah, who taught authentic Theognosis? Such romantic notions come primarily from the mainstream churches’ long-standing policy of brain-washing their members in order to maintain social control and physical continuity of their churches, teaching “smooth things” that are entirely out of context with the Yeshua of both history and myth, as well as promoting falsehoods, a false prophet and Paul’s very false Christ.
I think that in the final analysis both you and I shall never know for sure, given the many facts on which we both concur.
I thank you for your incisive comment and invite you to come to this Forum whenever you wish. And keep up the good work at Aeon Byte!
Peace,
Tau Christian-Thomas
Hi Christian-Thomas,
Thanks for writing back, and for the compliments regarding my articles and the Aeon Byte webpage. Miguel amazes me in the way he is able to get all those reputable people to do interviews. Last week he actually had Philip K. Dick’s widow, Tessa, on for a close and personal interview! I couldn’t believe it!
Anyway, you and I will probably never agree on Paul. I don’t see Paul as a villain the way you do. But I do admire the audacity of your presentation. I’ll admit that the article offended me a little at first and I reacted. But in hindsight I think you’re exploring possibilities here that should be explored. This is the kind of material that gets people to start thinking and asking questions.
I agree with you that it’s possible that there was two Pauls, Paul and Shaul. If so then my Paul is the Gnostic mystagogue and not the other guy.
As for the Pauline letters and authorship, I’m aware that there are varying consensus on which letters or elements thereof are authentic. Some say two letters as you say. Others say three or four, or seven, or fourteen, or none!
Personally I think Paul is present in the following letters: Galatians, Corinthians I & II, Romans, Philippians, Philemon and maybe I Thessalonians. Galatians and Philemon are nearly intact whereas the other letters are comprised of smaller letters along with some non-Pauline fragments. Ephesians and Colossians are forgeries which come from later writers who were Gnostic leaning in their conceptions of Paul. The Pastoral Letters are forgeries which originate from Catholic writers who try to portray Paul as an “orthodox” clergyman. II Thessalonians is a forgery that was written for the purpose of discrediting I Thess. This is my overall impression of the letters.
I also wanted to share something regarding sacrifices and the doctrine of sacrificial atonement. I agree with you that it is revolting that people would aspire to spirituality through blood sacrifices, whether literal or symbolic. Certainly in this day and age we should be able to progress beyond the symbols of cannibalism that so many Christians solemnly observe. This is one of the things that turned me away from mainstream Christianity–as I became old enough to think for myself. I asked myself, why are we sitting around pretending to drink someone’s blood? I’m not getting anything from this and I feel like freak. There must be something more here. But the elders assured me that this was it; but I knew there had to be something more and I moved on.
On the other hand, in its historic context, the Christian Eucharist actually did accomplish something positive in its place and time: It drew pagans away from literal sacrifices. This in itself represents a major change in human civilization and consciousness for the better. Sure there were ex-pagans sitting around drinking wine and eating bread, fantasizing that this was the flesh and blood of a man. But it changed civilization in that these people were no longer slaughtering and sacrificing animals (and people) everyday–with priests handling the entrails and drinking the blood. Mithraists were bathing in the gore of real animals; the followers of Paul, etc., weren’t.
Christianity, in whatever form it took, orthodox or heretical, was responsible for this change in human evolution. Paul was one of the people who helped bring this change about. Blood was no longer the currency in which grace was bought and sold–as it had been for thousands of years. And Jesus, if he really was an historical person, was the man who initially set this change into motion–and he revolutionized Western civilization. The fact that we no longer engage in blood sacrifices may be one of the more obvious aspects of Jesus’s legacy and the profound impression that he made in history.
Blood sacrifices were a deeply ingrained practice for thousands of years in all cultures. Something like that doesn’t just change for no reason.
So again, my point is that the Eucharist is not a bad thing in its proper place and time. It helped primitive people to take a step upward and break an old habit. So I don’t see the doctrine of sacrifical atonement in the negative light that you do. And I agree with the Valentinians that this was not actually the center of Paul’s doctrine. Paul’s doctrine of Jesus/crucified was an introductory doctrine, for beginners; whereas Paul also imparted a “mystery” which involved “gnosis.” As Paul taught in 1 Cor. 8. Those who have “gnosis” know that sacrifices are superstition. In 1 Cor. 2 Paul made a distinction between “Christ crucified” that he proclaimed to all, in contrast with the “hidden wisdom” that was “spoken in a mystery” among the “perfect.”
Orthodox Christians read Paul’s writings and they emphasize Paul’s doctrine of atonement. But this doesn’t mean that this emphasis is correct. Orthodox Christians place emphasis on some things and ignore other things in Paul that don’t fit their theology. They extract this atonement theology from Paul as if this was the absolute center of his message, when this wasn’t the case. To this day large sections of the Pauline letters are ignored by “orthodox” Christians because those sections are of no use to them.
Now you may not agree with what I have just written. But I’m sure that when the historical issues are set aside, we can agree that sacrificial atonement is not relevant to gnosis in the here and now. I’m also not opposed to the notion of a Christianity or Gnosis without Paul: because Paul is of the past and not the present. People tend to stumble over the past if they’re not really careful.
In the here and now I would actually recommend Krishnamurti over Paul. But that’s another subject.
Again I want to compliment you on your articles. Your article “All things are not as they seem” definitely resonates with me. The “Duality Thing” is excellent too. We can disagree and debate questions of history; but surely we have our share in the same Light.
You’re on the East Coast, I’m on the West Coast; and Miguel is somehwere in the Midwest. But we’re all doing our parts to spread our portions of the Gospel.
This will be my last comment here as I don’t want to clog your comment section further. And as this is your forum its only right that I let you have the last word. If you want to talk further you have my e-mail address.
Best regards,
Jim
Dear Jim:
Thanks for your reply. I agree that we may never come to a common ground of understanding regarding Shaul/Paul or the Eucharist. But I also agree with you that it should be the present and future in Gnostic thought where we turn our attention.
This comment is not going to be The Final Word, Jim. I don’t think that in Gnosticism anyone has the Final Word, simply because, as we both acknowledge, Gnosticism is evolving at a breathless pace and is not at all static. New Gnostics are here and now and the legacy that we all have shall be turned over to future ecclesiastics and philosophers.
I find it far more helpful to us as a whole to recognize that we all share a very real confluence of basic questions and concepts. It is in these times when we are being attacked and ridiculed and dismissed as crackpots or antichrists by a misunderstanding majority public that we need to stay focused upon our respective beatific visions.
Thank you for your e-mail. I shall be in touch with you in the future. And keep up the good work at Aeon Byte!.
Peace,
+Christian-Thomas
“Where would Christianity be if Paul had not been the first Christian theologian whose soaring literary and exegetical genius defined what came to be “The One Holy Catholic Church”?”
Since the majority of Christian Gnostics were thoroughly Pauline, and this can be easily checked by reading any Christian Gnostic text from Nag Hammadi in Layton’s “Gnostic Scriptures” with footnotes included, it is a pretty safe bet that Paul-less Christianity would have been less Gnostic and more Jewish, rather than less Catholic. Paul was widely known as the Apostle of the Heretics. Indeed, the groups that opposed Paul the most, the Ebionites and later the Judaizing authors of the pseudo-Clementines, were thoroughly Jewish Christian groups. It is a safe bet that without Paul, Christianity would have maintained a very Jewish flavor, including obedience to the OT law, obedience to OT God, and obedience to the Jewish temple. Unfortunately the Gnosticized Christianity envisioned by some modern people if only Paul were removed is an unsubstantiated fancy. A Paul-less Christianity is Jewish, not Gnostic. Paul was the Gnostics’ favorite apostle.
Dear Spark:
Thank you for your comments and observations. Inasmuch as I believe and have demonstrated repeatedly in the many responses to comments regarding this original post that the original Yeshua Movement and its membership, which I like to refer to as “Original Christianity/Thomasine Christian Gnosticism”, completely repudiated Shaul/”Pauls’” writings, theology and christology, what more can I say in his defense? Shaul was a self-promoter, plagiarist and con-man. There were at least two distinct personalities who used the moniker “Paul,” and maybe more. Of the body of writings attributed to “Paul,” only two can be conclusively said to be his workof Shaul. The rest are written by a number of anonymous exegetes who promoted their ideas by using “Paul’s” name. These “Pauls” tried and fairly well succeeded in being, to borrow Hoeller’s phrase in part, “An Apostle for Everybody”. Later Gnostics such as Marcion, a virulently antisemitic man, Valentinus and his followers, and – Who else???? – Most Gnostic Christians(?) incorporated elements of the Pauline corpus into their teachings, probably at about the same time that the burgeoning mainstream church began to accept them as well.
While I can see Platonic and Mystical Judaic ideas in Sethian Gnosticism, Thomasine Gnosticism, Ophitic Gnosticism, the earliest Matthean, Marcan and Johannine communities, the Ebionites, Christianized Hermetic Gnosticism, Manicheism, Mandaean Gnosticism, as well as Essenic/ Nazorean “Nazirutha” Gnosticism, I see no evidence of anything attributable to “Paul” other than contempt towards him as a false prophet. Yeshua is the chief revelator of the Full and unsullied Gospel of the Way of (Epi)Gnosis. So were all of His Apostles so informed. In the tradition that I speak from in my blog, we are akin in spirit as well as continuity to Nazorean Christian Gnosticism, the Yeshua Movement and we disseminate Those Teachings to those who can receive them.
The original Christian Gnostics were Jewish; no one can dispute that. However, the type of Judaism they practiced was radically different in cosmology and soteriology than the Judaism you speak of and seem to have some issues with. If I interpret you correctly, “Paul” was the “one” to set the record straight, to repudiate any and all Judaising infiltrations into his “true” Gospel of pseudo-Jesus. Yet, at the same time, his development of the doctrine of Jesus’ blood atonement had the effect of actually reinstituting the odious practice of animal and human sacrifice to Jave, a false god, by perpetuating the lie that Jesus’ death was a perpetual blood sacrifice atonement that “god, the father” mandated for the remission of humankind’s sins. Without confessing to this horrific christology, virtually all mainstream Christian churches would have no cohering principle to justify their worship and faith, which is more OT and pauline than it is of Christ.
I think that the truth of the matter, as is the case with Jesus, is that a false romantic cult of His personality, coupled with any equally endearing but false cult of “Pauls’” personalities, has so embedded itself in the Western tradition that it is now universally subliminal. Consequently, no amount of questioning the truth of the false doctrines associated with this cherished cult of personalities will be accepted or even tolerated by 95% of the population. This will always be a perpetual conflict among mainstream, Gnostic, and Original Christianities — the “Pauline Question”.
May GOD bring you to a Good End,
Tau Christian-Thomas
If you would please read all of my blog posts as well as all comments, you shall see that, in our expression of the (Epi)Gnosis, we are validly Christian Gnostics, heirs to the Whole Body of Sacred Teachings that Yeshua revealed to His Apostles, which did not come down to the many pauline-informed churches, both orthodox-tending as well as gnostic christian tending. Certainly the many classical gnostic christian churches and mystery schools may have inherited a greater but still partial revelation of the Esoteric Paradosis of Yeshua than did orthodoxy. Yet we are Gnostic Christians and the Teachings of Christ are sufficient for us with no need of Paul whatsoever.
I didn’t mean to be snarky but now I can see that you come from a world of revelations, visions, and personal spiritual experience, while I come from a world of rigorous, professional, study in primary languages and ancient culture. Between the two, you’ve clearly got the edge on truth about ancient people. I don’t have visions. I haven’t been given an ancient mystical tradition through succession.
Thank you for your comments, Spark. I do recognize some commonality between us as I also come from a world of science, scholarship, research/research design and have advanced studies in anthropology, archaeology, psychobiology, neurology, and philosophy, with special attention given to linguistic epistemology, phenomenology and metempirics, as well as psychiatry. I have formally studied Freudian, neo-Freudian and Jungian psychoanalysis at the Philadelphia School of Psychoanalysis. I just reject its relevance to spirituality and especially Gnosticism.
You are very correct when you say that I “come from a world of revelations, visions and personal spiritual experience” which covers over thirty years of direct person-to-person Gnostic spiritual training. My own approach to spirituality is both empirical as well as phenomenological.
As Gnostics, I don’t see why we have to dichotomize each other. I know who you are and am mindful and respectful of your writings, even those which go against the grain of my experience of Epignosis. As I told Jeremy, I truly like the PTG web site. I recommend most of the books and DVD’s that are made available to our Seminarians. If I seem to chastise certain Gnostic mindsets, I am not necessarily speaking of you.
I am no enemy of science, scholarship and erudition, but I do challenge the inherent epistemological blinders that inhere in language, especially written language. I do not believe that mastery of the concepts of written documents will ever lead one to a state of Epignosis. This conviction is rooted both in empirical science as well as my own phenomenological research, if you will.
Peace,
Tau Christian-Thomas