The Paradigmatic Rhetoric of Paul's Seven Authentic Letters

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PhilosopherJay
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The Paradigmatic Rhetoric of Paul's Seven Authentic Letters

Post by PhilosopherJay »

Hi All,

It is easy to see that the seven authentic letters of Paul are rhetorical exercises. They are paradigms showing how Paul might react to a certain set of possible developments in churches. They are not about resolving real situations but promoting a certain ideology. The ideology is a cross between Judaism and Greco-Romanism. Basically the deal proposed in the ideology is that the Jews give up their laws and the Greco-Romans give up their polytheism and they all come together in one spirit to worship the Jewish creator god. This cross between Judaism and Greco-Roman polytheism is the cross that the Christ (the anointed) like Paul was crucified on.


We need only look at the reason Paul has for writing the letters as described in each one of them to see that the writer is mainly interested in propagating his ideology. The letters to the churches are the vehicles that he is using. As his writings develop, the writer becomes increasingly concerned with proving the authenticity of the letters. The seventh letter, "Philemon" has no ideology at all, but is designed to be the only authentic sounding and to prove that Paul wrote all these works.

Here are each of the seven so-called "authentic" letters and the reason the text gives for their coming into being:

1. Ephesians: The text does not tell us why Paul is writing to the Ephesians. He just decides to tell them his ideology because he has heard that they believe the gospel. They are a good Church and Paul has never met them. The writer is just giving Pauline ideology and hardly pretending that it is a real letter at all.

2. 1 Thessalonians: The writer realizes that he has to at least give a reason for why Paul is writing and giving his ideology to make the epistles sound believable. This is a good church where the members are faithful. It is the first church that has converted outside Jerusalem and Paul just wants to say "keep up the good work." It is largely just another chance to present his ideology.

3. 2 Thessalonians: This is the resolution and sequel letter supposedly written a year or two later. It is basically a reinforcement of the first letter. Paul repeats that the Church should keep up the good work and warns them against straying from it.

4. 1 Corinthians: The writer reverses the earlier scenario of writing and encouraging Good churches to continue their work. This time Paul is writing to a bad church that he founded where things have gone wrong. The members are fighting over which Apostle to follow. Paul tells them not to fight, but be like the Thessalonkians, and be unified.

5. 2 Corinthians: This is another resolution and sequel letter. He tells them again to stop the fighting, straighten out and be like the good Thessalonikians.

6. Galatians: This is another bad Church. This was apparently not founded by Paul. Here, instead of other apostles being the problem, the problem is that the whole Church has decided to go fully over to Judaism and follow all the Jewish laws. Here's some Pauline ideology and some stories about Paul and the Apostles.

7. Philemon is the only letter not concerned with ideology, but completely concerned with proving the authenticity of the other epistles. We may conclude that the writer got feedback that the other letters did not sound real, but sounded like exercises in rhetoric. He is producing a real sounding letter to counter that criticism. This is the only letter which is actually addressed to a person, the head of a church. The other letters are addressed to churches which are corporations. Corporations do not have physical bodies so they cannot receive, read and hear letters. If I want the Coca-Cola company to change the formula for their soft drink or change the size of their bottles, I do not write a letter addressed to the coca-cola company, but a letter addressed to the President of Coca-Cola or maybe the person in charge of formulas or bottle sizes. Philemon is more of a memo than a letter. Paul has borrowed a slave from Philemon and used him without Philemon's permission. Paul is worried that Philemon might punish the slave Onesimus for listening to Paul and not returning to master instead. Paul asserts his right as head of the church to confiscate Onesimus' services for his own purpose. The letter is meant to show the authority of Paul and all apostles to use the property of heads of churches for their own purposes. At the same time, Paul is shown to be a nice guy concerned about a slave being beaten for obeying an apostle instead of his master. This is the one letter that imitates the form of an actual letter rather than a piece of rhetoric. It designed primarily to lend authenticity to the other letters that the author has written.

Thus we have Paul writing to six churches. Three letters are to good churches. One letter to a church that Paul has never met, the next two to a Church that Paul founded. The next three letters are to bad churches. These are churches that Paul founded or perhaps did not found, but things have gone wrong. The Church of Corinth has fallen victim to the preaching of other apostles and their different immoral - too Greco-Roman - interpretations, while the Galatia Church has missed the mark by turning too Jewish and accepting the laws.

Each of these churches are representative of four types of churches: Ephesus - Good Church not founded by Paul, Thessaloniki - Good Church founded by Paul, Corinth - Bad Church founded by Paul, but taken over by other apostles' ideas, and Galatia - bad church not founded by Paul, but taken over by Jews.

The seventh letter, Philemon, is designed as a counterpoint to the other six letters. It shows that Paul does not always write rhetorical speeches to corporations, but writes real letters to the heads of churches about ordinary things like borrowing a slave.

The paradigmatic rhetorical structure between the letters show them to be definitely not spontaneous letters responding to actual events, but they are altogether a kind of single power-point type presentation. The presentation could be named "Good Churches and Bad Churches and how Paul Might Have Handled them".

Warmly,
Jay Raskin
Last edited by PhilosopherJay on Tue Mar 04, 2014 11:57 am, edited 1 time in total.
beowulf
Posts: 498
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Re: The Paradigmatic Rhetoric of Paul's Seven Authentic Lett

Post by beowulf »

"Good Churches and Bad Churches and how Paul Might Have Handled them".That Is fine.

Go ahead, make a start.
The seven authentic letters are according to Catholic sources:
• Romans
• First Corinthians
• Second Corinthians
• Galatians
• Philippians
• First Thessalonians
• Philemon
PhilosopherJay
Posts: 383
Joined: Fri Oct 04, 2013 7:02 pm

Re: The Paradigmatic Rhetoric of Paul's Seven Authentic Lett

Post by PhilosopherJay »

Hi Beowulf,

Thank you for this.
Romans is so obviously bogus that it is hard to imagine anybody seeing it as authentic and including it as part of an authentic corpus.

The letter is like the letter to the Ephesians that it seems to copy. He is writing to a church that he hasn't founded and he does not know anybody in it. Paul rants his ideology for absolutely no reason. In Ephesians, the writes, "For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, 16I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers"

In Romans we get a copy of that with a queer elaboration, "First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed in all the world. 9For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I mention you always in my prayers, asking that somehow by God’s will I may now at last succeed in coming to you. 11For I long to see you, that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to strengthen you.

Paul is going to send a messenger to the Ephesians - 21So that you also may know how I am and what I am doing, Tychicus the beloved brother and faithful minister in the Lord will tell you everything. 22I have sent him to you for this very purpose, that you may know how we are, and that he may encourage your hearts.

This makes sense. He is sending envoys to see the situation in Ephesus and perhaps see what kind of relationship can be established. The epistle to the Romans copies this but in a far more ridiculous manner.
22This is the reason why I have so often been hindered from coming to you. 23But now, since I no longer have any room for work in these regions, and since I have longed for many years to come to you, 24I hope to see you in passing as I go to Spain, and to be helped on my journey there by you, once I have enjoyed your company for a while. 25At present, however, I am going to Jerusalem bringing aid to the saints. 26For Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make some contribution for the poor among the saints at Jerusalem. 27For they were pleased to do it, and indeed they owe it to them. For if the Gentiles have come to share in their spiritual blessings, they ought also to be of service to them in material blessings. 28When therefore I have completed this and have delivered to them what has been collected,b I will leave for Spain by way of you. 29I know that when I come to you I will come in the fullness of the blessing of Christ.
The letter to the Ephesians is ridiculous because Paul is writing his ideology (almost six chapters worth) to people he does not know. In other words he has no real reason to write to the Ephesians. The letter to Rome is more ridiculous, as he writing to people he does not know and giving 15 chapters of his ideology. At least the letter to the Ephesians does attempt to provide some kind of introduction and set up a meeting with Paul's envoys before Paul even talks about a visit. Assuming that he is still in Asia Minor at Antioch, the trip would be about 500 miles.

On the other hand, in Romans, he is planning a 3000 mile trip to Rome from Jerusalem when he still has to complete a 1500 mile trip from Ephesus to Thesaloniki to Corinth to Jerusalem. Then, he is going to make another 1000 mile trip to Spain. Apparently, with only 40,000,000 people between Rome and Jerusalem, Paul has run out of people to preach to and must now go to the other end of the Roman empire to find more people to preach too. Apparently, he no longer sends out envoys to prepare his way as he did before. He just shows up at a Church and like an ancient Matt Foley says "Hi, I'm Paul, I'm going to bunk with you guys."
He must have learned a way to do pantomime because 95% of the people of Rome and Spain would not understand the Greek he spoke.
Apparently, Paul has rethought all the bitching he did about the dangers of travel and the three shipwrecks he was in, because, like the energizer bunny, he just takes it and keeps on moving.

There is also the amazing irony that Paul plans a trip to Rome after going to Jerusalem and what happens according to Acts, he gets arrested although 99.99% of people arrested in Jerusalem do not get sent to Rome, Paul is one of the lucky ones who just happens to get sent to Rome for judgement.

I will try to show in another post that 2 Thessalonkians belongs with the other six authentic letters of Paul and Romans does not.


Warmly,

Jay Raskin






beowulf wrote:"Good Churches and Bad Churches and how Paul Might Have Handled them".That Is fine.

Go ahead, make a start.
The seven authentic letters are according to Catholic sources:
• Romans
• First Corinthians
• Second Corinthians
• Galatians
• Philippians
• First Thessalonians Philemon
beowulf
Posts: 498
Joined: Sat Oct 12, 2013 6:09 am

Re: The Paradigmatic Rhetoric of Paul's Seven Authentic Lett

Post by beowulf »

PhilosopherJay wrote:Hi Beowulf,

Thank you for this.
Romans is so obviously bogus that it is hard to imagine anybody seeing it as authentic and including it as part of an authentic corpus.

The letter is like the letter to the Ephesians that it seems to copy. He is writing to a church that he hasn't founded and he does not know anybody in it. Paul rants his ideology for absolutely no reason. In Ephesians, the writes, "For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, 16I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers"

In Romans we get a copy of that with a queer elaboration, "First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed in all the world. 9For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I mention you always in my prayers, asking that somehow by God’s will I may now at last succeed in coming to you. 11For I long to see you, that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to strengthen you.

Paul is going to send a messenger to the Ephesians - 21So that you also may know how I am and what I am doing, Tychicus the beloved brother and faithful minister in the Lord will tell you everything. 22I have sent him to you for this very purpose, that you may know how we are, and that he may encourage your hearts.

This makes sense. He is sending envoys to see the situation in Ephesus and perhaps see what kind of relationship can be established. The epistle to the Romans copies this but in a far more ridiculous manner.
22This is the reason why I have so often been hindered from coming to you. 23But now, since I no longer have any room for work in these regions, and since I have longed for many years to come to you, 24I hope to see you in passing as I go to Spain, and to be helped on my journey there by you, once I have enjoyed your company for a while. 25At present, however, I am going to Jerusalem bringing aid to the saints. 26For Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make some contribution for the poor among the saints at Jerusalem. 27For they were pleased to do it, and indeed they owe it to them. For if the Gentiles have come to share in their spiritual blessings, they ought also to be of service to them in material blessings. 28When therefore I have completed this and have delivered to them what has been collected,b I will leave for Spain by way of you. 29I know that when I come to you I will come in the fullness of the blessing of Christ.
The letter to the Ephesians is ridiculous because Paul is writing his ideology (almost six chapters worth) to people he does not know. In other words he has no real reason to write to the Ephesians. The letter to Rome is more ridiculous, as he writing to people he does not know and giving 15 chapters of his ideology. At least the letter to the Ephesians does attempt to provide some kind of introduction and set up a meeting with Paul's envoys before Paul even talks about a visit. Assuming that he is still in Asia Minor at Antioch, the trip would be about 500 miles.

On the other hand, in Romans, he is planning a 3000 mile trip to Rome from Jerusalem when he still has to complete a 1500 mile trip from Ephesus to Thesaloniki to Corinth to Jerusalem. Then, he is going to make another 1000 mile trip to Spain. Apparently, with only 40,000,000 people between Rome and Jerusalem, Paul has run out of people to preach to and must now go to the other end of the Roman empire to find more people to preach too. Apparently, he no longer sends out envoys to prepare his way as he did before. He just shows up at a Church and like an ancient Matt Foley says "Hi, I'm Paul, I'm going to bunk with you guys."
He must have learned a way to do pantomime because 95% of the people of Rome and Spain would not understand the Greek he spoke.
Apparently, Paul has rethought all the bitching he did about the dangers of travel and the three shipwrecks he was in, because, like the energizer bunny, he just takes it and keeps on moving.

There is also the amazing irony that Paul plans a trip to Rome after going to Jerusalem and what happens according to Acts, he gets arrested although 99.99% of people arrested in Jerusalem do not get sent to Rome, Paul is one of the lucky ones who just happens to get sent to Rome for judgement.

I will try to show in another post that 2 Thessalonkians belongs with the other six authentic letters of Paul and Romans does not.


Warmly,

Jay Raskin






beowulf wrote:"Good Churches and Bad Churches and how Paul Might Have Handled them".That Is fine.

Go ahead, make a start.
The seven authentic letters are according to Catholic sources:
• Romans
• First Corinthians
• Second Corinthians
• Galatians
• Philippians
• First Thessalonians Philemon
"Authorship of the Pauline epistles
There is wide consensus, in modern New Testament scholarship, on a core group of authentic Pauline epistles whose authorship is rarely contested: Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, and Philemon...
German scholar Ferdinand Christian Baur accepted only four of the letters bearing Paul's name as genuine, which he called the Hauptebriefe (Romans, 1 & 2 Corinthians, and Galatians).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authorship ... e_epistles




• The seven “Undisputed Letters” (a.k.a. the “Authentic Pauline Letters”).
• These can be put into three subgroups chronologically:
o The Earliest Letter (ca. 50-51 AD): 1 Thessalonians
o The Middle Letters (mid 50's): 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Philippians, Philemon, Galatians
o The Latest Letter (ca. 57-58 AD): Romans
• About 95-99% of scholars today agree that all of these letters were actually written by Paul himself."

http://catholic-resources.org/Bible/Paul-Disputed.htm



Who says that Romans is not a letter attributed to Paul?
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Blood
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Re: The Paradigmatic Rhetoric of Paul's Seven Authentic Lett

Post by Blood »

I guess I don't understand why the persons canonizing the NT didn't make any distinction between the supposedly "authentic" Pauline epistles and the ones they apparently wrote themselves.

Doesn't that damage the credibility of the canon, and say something about the supposed reverence that Paul's letters were held? If I have a sacred piece of writing, and then I write my own imitation of it and sign it under the sacred author's name, and try to pass it as by him, then I've just destroyed what was sacred about the original. But 2nd century Christians did precisely that.
“The only sensible response to fragmented, slowly but randomly accruing evidence is radical open-mindedness. A single, simple explanation for a historical event is generally a failure of imagination, not a triumph of induction.” William H.C. Propp
PhilosopherJay
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Joined: Fri Oct 04, 2013 7:02 pm

Re: The Paradigmatic Rhetoric of Paul's Seven Authentic Lett

Post by PhilosopherJay »

Hi Beowulf,

The Catholics have an ulterior motive for including Romans. They want to associate Paul with Rome as it gives the Roman Catholic Church more authority.

Getting rid of 2.Thessalonikians destroys the obvious chiastic structure that appears when it is included among the seven.

One has only to compare Paul's opening self description to see that the writer of Romans is not even close to being the writer of the other seven epistles:
Romans
1Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, 2which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, 3concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh 4and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, 5through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, 6including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ,
Ephesians
1Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God,
Thessalonkians
1Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy,
2 Thessalonkians
1Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy,
1 Corinthians 1
1Paul, called by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus, and our brother Sosthenes,
2 Corinthians 1
1Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,
Galatians
1Paul, an apostle—not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead— 2and all the brother who are with me,
Philemon
1Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother,
If you had to say that one of these openings is not like the other seven, which one would it obviously be?

Warmly,

Jay Raskin
Last edited by PhilosopherJay on Wed Mar 05, 2014 5:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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pakeha
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Re: The Paradigmatic Rhetoric of Paul's Seven Authentic Lett

Post by pakeha »

PhilosopherJay wrote:Hi All,

It is easy to see that the seven authentic letters of Paul are rhetorical exercises. They are paradigms showing how Paul might react to a certain set of possible developments in churches. They are not about resolving real situations but promoting a certain ideology. The ideology is a cross between Judaism and Greco-Romanism. Basically the deal proposed in the ideology is that the Jews give up their laws and the Greco-Romans give up their polytheism and they all come together in one spirit to worship the Jewish creator god. This cross between Judaism and Greco-Roman polytheism is the cross that the Christ (the anointed) like Paul was crucified on. ...[snipped for space]...
The paradigmatic rhetorical structure between the letters show them to be definitely not spontaneous letters responding to actual events, but they are altogether a kind of single power-point type presentation. The presentation could be named "Good Churches and Bad Churches and how Paul Might Have Handled them".

Warmly,
Jay Raskin
I'd not come across that idea before, Jay Raskin.
Thanks for bringing it up.
beowulf
Posts: 498
Joined: Sat Oct 12, 2013 6:09 am

Re: The Paradigmatic Rhetoric of Paul's Seven Authentic Lett

Post by beowulf »

Hi PhilosopherJay,

The important thing is whether or not a particular writing is canonical. Ancient religious literature did not follow the strict rules of ownership that contemporary practise follows: Hindu and Buddhist writings are examples of the growth of religious themes in their canon.

I am now holding in my hand the latest edition of a textbook, it happens to be the 15th edition. The author of this book did not survive past the 10th edition and the book is now being published under the name of the long dead original author with the addition of the name of the current updater. In the preface the current author claims that his contribution makes the original suitable for contemporary students while respecting the excellent quality of the first edition of the book.
The book is still spoken of by students by the name of the long dead writer and only formally by the composite name. The important thing is that the book is listed by the university as a recommended book.


In antiquity , and more so in sacred literature ,new editions of books would be published by honest updaters of religious thinking who would bring up to date the teaching of the subject. They were less careful than today in that they did not preserve the name of the updating author. The important thing is that the book is included in the Canon.
PhilosopherJay
Posts: 383
Joined: Fri Oct 04, 2013 7:02 pm

Re: The Paradigmatic Rhetoric of Paul's Seven Authentic Lett

Post by PhilosopherJay »

Hi beowulf,

In ancient time, myths were constantly changed. Any particular element in a myth could be changed in the retelling. We see the same process at work in movie remakes today. Some elements are kept and others abandoned. We know from the Dead Sea Scrolls that this was the process with the Hebrew Scriptures and we see this in the different versions in the NT gospels.
Regarding Romans, it is significantly different from the seven other letters that I have put in order. This may mean that it is composed by somebody else or by the same writer a long time later. This writer seems to be working from many different Hebrew Scriptures. Many more than the ones used in the other seven combined.

Most importantly, he seems to be interested far more in delivering what we may call a badspel (bad news) and not a gospel (good news). The writer of the seven letters I pointed out is interested in giving good news. The good news in the first seven letters is that Gentiles do not have to undergo circumcision and follow Jewish diet laws to worship the Jewish God. They just have to have faith. If they do this, like the elite of Yahweh organization called Jesus Christ (anointed of Yahweh), they will be reborn after they die.

The bad news that Romans delivers is that the gentile converts still have to follow the laws of God. This involves voluntary obedience to many Jewish practices.

To put it bluntly, the other seven letters gives the good news that you don't have to have your foreskin cut off to join us. The bad news delivered in Romans is that you have to act as if your penis were cut off and refrain from sex, drink, immoral behavior etc. in order to join us.

Is this the same writer expanding on some ideas in the other seven letters or is it a different writer. I am now uncertain. I'll have to study the text again.

Warmly,

Jay Raskin

beowulf wrote:Hi PhilosopherJay,

The important thing is whether or not a particular writing is canonical. Ancient religious literature did not follow the strict rules of ownership that contemporary practise follows: Hindu and Buddhist writings are examples of the growth of religious themes in their canon.

I am now holding in my hand the latest edition of a textbook, it happens to be the 15th edition. The author of this book did not survive past the 10th edition and the book is now being published under the name of the long dead original author with the addition of the name of the current updater. In the preface the current author claims that his contribution makes the original suitable for contemporary students while respecting the excellent quality of the first edition of the book.
The book is still spoken of by students by the name of the long dead writer and only formally by the composite name. The important thing is that the book is listed by the university as a recommended book.


In antiquity , and more so in sacred literature ,new editions of books would be published by honest updaters of religious thinking who would bring up to date the teaching of the subject. They were less careful than today in that they did not preserve the name of the updating author. The important thing is that the book is included in the Canon.
Last edited by PhilosopherJay on Wed Mar 05, 2014 9:34 am, edited 1 time in total.
PhilosopherJay
Posts: 383
Joined: Fri Oct 04, 2013 7:02 pm

Re: The Paradigmatic Rhetoric of Paul's Seven Authentic Lett

Post by PhilosopherJay »

Hi Pakeha,

Thanks.
I think these ideas may be original, but they are based a great deal on and inspired and influenced by the work of Earl Doherty in "The Jesus Puzzle". I don't agree with him in everything, but I do agree that the writer of the main epistles never heard the story of Pontius Pilate crucifying a guy named Jesus from Nazareth.

Warmly,

Jay Raskin
pakeha wrote:
PhilosopherJay wrote:Hi All,

It is easy to see that the seven authentic letters of Paul are rhetorical exercises. They are paradigms showing how Paul might react to a certain set of possible developments in churches. They are not about resolving real situations but promoting a certain ideology. The ideology is a cross between Judaism and Greco-Romanism. Basically the deal proposed in the ideology is that the Jews give up their laws and the Greco-Romans give up their polytheism and they all come together in one spirit to worship the Jewish creator god. This cross between Judaism and Greco-Roman polytheism is the cross that the Christ (the anointed) like Paul was crucified on. ...[snipped for space]...
The paradigmatic rhetorical structure between the letters show them to be definitely not spontaneous letters responding to actual events, but they are altogether a kind of single power-point type presentation. The presentation could be named "Good Churches and Bad Churches and how Paul Might Have Handled them".

Warmly,
Jay Raskin
I'd not come across that idea before, Jay Raskin.
Thanks for bringing it up.
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