Paul and fraud
November 1, 2009
In the case of Mohammed (of an earlier post) I used “forgery” for Mohammed’s recitation which he attributed to his Gabriel-in-the-cave. So it is a spoken forgery. Perhaps there is a word for that. Perhaps “fraud” is better.
It is not hard to imagine that Paul’s story is a fraud, his Jesus-in-the-sky (for Paul alone saw him). The only additional fact is that others heard the Voice-from-the-sky. So since at the time of his writing Paul would have been readers, some of whom eventually, would have heard the story and would have contradicted this. So I doubt the feasibility of such a conspiracy among Saul’s companions, as he was called.
But it was not only technically difficult, it is conceptually difficulty. What could have happened that this zealous “sword†of Zion, out purifying the Jewish group in compliance to God’s command, would have found it suddenly in their interest to concoct a story of Jesus and the Voice. The only way that could be understood is if they recognized Jesus as the Savior (and not just Messiah).* And so somewhere on the way Paul would have been converted and convinced this gang to cooperate. That seems far fetched, although that is exactly what I have been proposing for Mohammed.
[* Hitler would surely devise a Jewish plot where the leaders decided that since the gentile soldier had believed, the gentiles could be brought to worship this guy and be taught to send money to the Jews in Jerusalem (and which is not quite compelling).]
So what is it that could have convinced Paul before hand to become a Christian? Did he muse about it and think that the teaching of love attributed to Jesus would result in a happy world, including, but not limited to, the Jews?
[Smith probably picked up on this “other guys around†point and realized it improved the fraud that Mohammed perpetrated, and so have his five “sword†witnesses to the Golden Plates before being whisked off to God.]
To support the fraud theory all we have to do is to imagine that Paul conceived in advance of his communication just as we have maintained in recent pages of Mohammed (and Smith too). Now it is very very easy for Paul to have conceived of God’s communication, for it is the rule of neighborly love. Kant would have it that an understanding of practical reason itself calls for just such a supreme rule. So Paul will want to take care of the world, just as Mohammed did (in this hypothesis), and will have conceived of this natural product of pure practical reason and will have realized that any command of God would be based on this. And so Jesus must be right. The goal is the rectification of the world, the New Jerusalem, and this is acquired via the law of neighborly love. So this Jesus must have been right. Now, Paul will think, Jesus failed in getting the point across (no resurrection, for all this is before the sky bit) and I will now pick up what he started and make it more presentable to all people, and especially the gentiles who don’t have a back ground of Jewishness. Perhaps he felt that the Jews were so caught up in the rules and regulations that they simply could not fathom that people can be made acceptable in the sight of God by his writ alone (reflecting, of course, always a reality). In any case all that must be dispensed with in order to find the expression: let neighborly love be first and be under self control at all times. Paul will have realized that if people shared in a neighborly way that the world would be a perfect place to live and raise children, a New Jerusalem, and so obviously this was the message and Jesus was burdened down with trying to express this universal principle of favor of God to the Jews who had their rules and regulations and therefore took attention from the rule of love.
I think it is very difficult to imagine this as preceding the specter in the sky episode such that we can sustain a charge of fraud. He may have hallucinated, but whatever happened, something followed which resulted in his reorientation described above.
So he is certain that Jesus was killed and buried, and so he has this hallucination and was so stirred to give Paul the Abraham-like miracle of certitude (at the birth of Issac) that this man had indeed been rejected and killed and that he had indeed been raised from the dead by God (Küng). Based on that, he will have spent a period of time in which this grand vision of the Jesus being strapped in the clothing of the Jewish culture and having to express the will of God in that strange manner, and that he was actually doing was dying in order to convince all people that they were forgiven and were invited to join his band, and this was the purpose of the death(and where “Barabbas†is the variable for every person). The resurrection certifies Jesus death and his entire message, and which must merely be expressed in universal terms (which Paul will do).
I think Paul speaks of some miracles or signs and these should not rationally be expressed in any letter if the witnesses to these events might contradict him. And these only come in the course of his travels and ministry.
Considering now the three possible frauds, Paul, Mohammed and Smith (and the latter is clearly so by external evidence), Paul’s strikes me as the most difficult to maintain. And certainly this is the case: Paul’s conception and goal is an outstanding expression of Kant’s Moral Religion, at least in its strictly practical aspects, for what Paul required was the supremacy of the law of neighborly love and one’s best efforts (only to be supplemented by, but not substituted for, God). That’s it. As far as peace in the soul was concerned, this could only be achieved through a belief in the death and resurrection of Jesus for the individual, for only in this way was the human able to comprehend how something dirty could be declared clean (in advance) by God.
And so if you were to hear the three stories in an unbiased way you might or might not think that Paul’s story were compelling with respect to its historical accuracy (being perhaps a fraud), but you would most certainly at least hope that of the three, Paul’s communication is more accurate than the others.
To make Paul’s case more compelling not much is needed except to accept his principle and to reject his empirical understanding for our time and instead to apply his principle (love of neighbor) for our time but according to our own best understanding. As a result we will see homosexuality as much honored and considered as left-handedness, and will have a perfect vehicle for enlisting all people into a single cooperation for the promotion of the New Jerusalem (a commune including also Jesus as a member).
To accept Paul’s condemnation of same-sex sex would have him contradicting himself, for he has clearly told us to apply the law of love in total sincerity and that this is sufficient. Obviously then all else he ever said with regard to the application of this principle would have been based on his understanding. He expected us Christians to become like him and be able to think and not require dictation. [I’m not considering his organizational rules.] And we remove the universality of Paul’s practical message, namely the moral law and then also the liberty and soverignity of each follower of Jesus to decide for ourselves and to stand alone before Christ (Romans 14:4).
In brief then: after the sky incident Paul unveiled a new order for the world as well as the means for attaining to that which were valid for all people. This means reached out to all people whatsoever, and not just this or that cultural group, and provided a great incentive, namely the second chance to be right with God and to join in the great celebration of New Jerusalem, and a chance which was also a done deal, and whose belief provided peace of mind. [Joy, I think, arises upon the experience of having done good things more easily than before. Immediately there is peace and eventually there is joy.]
It is not plausible that Paul conceived of this before the sky incident. And while it could all be the composition of a genius named Paul, it has the advantage of being this very good representation of a faith according to Kant’s Moral Religion, and so it very much the sort of communication that you would want from any God, telling us to do what we know we ought to do anyway, and what you would expect. In the Christian conception it will be clear that in a world organized according to the rule of love there would be no more misery, for even the natural earthquakes would be anticipated (due to the sharing of information according to love, and the development of the sciences) and made ready for and enjoyed by spectators, and never again feared.