Paul - False Apostle & First 'christian' (Jesus, mission, experience)

[A. Ben-Shema]

Here is a very interesting article about Paul, giving much evidence of his false teachings and possible mental illness (possibly paranoid schizophrenia). It is too long to post here, but can be read in full HERE (CLICK).

PLU

[Jayhawker Soule]

From the referenced site ...

A variety of symptoms characterize schizophrenia. The most prominent include symptoms of psychosis – such as delusions and hallucinations – as well as disorganized thinking and speech.

From psyweb.com

A variety of symptoms characterize schizophrenia. The most prominent include symptoms of psychosis—such as delusions and hallucinations—as well as bizarre behavior, strange movements, and disorganized thinking and speech.

Predictable ...

[A. Ben-Shema]

Originally Posted by Jay

From the referenced site ...From psyweb.comPredictable ...

Strange, see here:
A variety of symptoms characterize schizophrenia. The most prominent include symptoms of psychosis—such as delusions and hallucinations—as well as bizarre behavior, strange movements, and disorganized thinking and speech.Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2006. © 1993-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Seems it is a universal definition!

[MidnightBlue]

That's the problem with the Internets.

[Mr. Peanut]

I love Paul!

[MidnightBlue]

Originally Posted by Mr. Peanut

I love Paul!

I don't.

Since nobody has actually addressed the topic of the thread, I'll throw this out and see if it gets any response.

First, Ben-Shema, my apologies for not reading the entire page you linked to. It's not very friendly to my eyes.

Whether Paul was mentally ill seems like an open question to me; personally, I'm not convinced you have to be mentally ill to have visions and similar religious experiences, but I am suspicious of them.

What's more interesting to me is Paul's departure from Judaism and from the teachings of Jesus, who was indubitably a Jew, who said quite plainly that his mission was to the Jews, and who never taught anything even vaguely like the teachings of Paul.

That the Paul's Christ is something quite different from the Jewish sage and wonderworker Jesus seems so obvious to me that I feel foolish pointing it out, yet Christians are so used to confounding the two that I think it needs pointing out. Paul has taken off on his own path, and that path was obviously satisfying to a lot of people, but I don't think it has much to do with Jesus.

I doubt Paul's honesty, too. He claims to be of the tribe of Benjamin, but it's not clear to me that any definite tribal identity survived among the Jews -- apart from the Levites and the Kohanim (who are just a subset of the Levites) -- as late as the first century. People claim that meticulous genealogies were kept, but were they? I'm not convinced. The genealogies given for Jesus are obviously contrived. Sometimes I wonder whether Paul was even born a Jew at all.

It seems to me that he was shifty and dishonest in his relationship with the Jesus community under James, that his theology is garbled and unclear, and that he was petulant and self-promoting. I don't see a lot to like.

Jesus I like. But I think Jesus would have been appalled to see what Christianity has made of him. As far as that goes, the Christian Fathers would have been appalled to see what modern Evangelical Christianity has made of Jesus, too.

[!Fluffy!]

Midnightblue, be pacific. i mean specific.

That the Paul's Christ is something quite different from the Jewish sage and wonderworker Jesus seems so obvious to me that I feel foolish pointing it out, yet Christians are so used to confounding the two that I think it needs pointing out. Paul has taken off on his own path, and that path was obviously satisfying to a lot of people, but I don't think it has much to do with Jesus.

[UltraViolet]

I don't have time to read the article right now,
but I do find it interesting
that after deciding the churches had NO authority,
I never read any of the books of Paul again...
(except to examine some of the parts that never sat right with me to begin with).

The 4 gospels I read anew...
with eyes wide open...
but Paul is like "an author" I would never choose to read.
Without the "church" to "make me"...
I had zero personal interest of my own.

4 whatever it's worth.

Paul definately rubs me the wrong way...
and seems NOTHING like Y'shua to me.

(I call him the "self proclaimed" appostle. eh)

[Scuba Pete]

Paul is cool.

Jesus is far cooler.

None of the apostles truly "got" Jesus' message: NO MORE RULES. Whoever wrote I Corinthians 13 and James came the closest. Love is the only commandment.