On the Gathercole's comparison between Paul's silence and Acts's silence (about an historical Jesus)

[Giuseppe]

On a final note, assessing the contribution of Paul to our knowledge of the historical Jesus can be described as a balancing act. One the one hand, especially when we come to Paul from the Gospels, as – given the canonical order – we inevitably do, we notice that Paul does not give us any sort of full picture of the episodes of Jesus’ life. The question, however, is how surprised we should be by this. (As a parallel case, we can note the book of Acts, where the reference to the pre-Easter Jesus is comparable to that of Paul, yet we know that the author is neither uninterested in, nor ignorant of, that pre-Easter Jesus.)

(The Historical and Human Existence of Jesus in Paul’s Letters, in the Journal for the Study of the Historical Jesus, Issue 16.2, December 2018, p.212, my bold)

As if Acts could be silent about Jesus, why not Paul also?

The point is that according to the same game rules given by Mark, it is perfectly legitimate to expect that Paul breaks the silence about the historical Jesus well more than how Acts could do, since it is highly plausible to believe that the possessed gerasene was just (a Jewish-Christian parody of) Paul:

18 And when he was come into the ship, he that had been possessed with the devil prayed him that he might be with him.
19 Howbeit Jesus suffered him not, but saith unto him, Go home to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee.
20 And he departed, and began to publish in Decapolis how great things Jesus had done for him: and all men did marvel.

(Mark 5:18-20)

[Bernard Muller]

to Giuseppe,

As if Acts could be silent about Jesus, why not Paul also?

Acts is not silent about an earthly Jesus:
1:14 "These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren."
1:21-22a "Wherefore of these men which have companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us,
Beginning from the baptism of John, unto that same day that he was taken up from us, ..."
2:22-23 "Ye men of Israel, hear these words; Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs, which God did by him in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also know:
Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain:"
3:13 "The God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God of our fathers, hath glorified his Son Jesus; whom ye delivered up, and denied him in the presence of Pilate, when he was determined to let him go."

Furthermore, Acts is not about the earthly human Jesus. And the life of Jesus had been already narrated (with a lot of fiction and embellishments) in Luke's gospel.

Cordially, Bernard

[Giuseppe]

The Gathercole's point is that Acts is silent about Jesus in the same measure of how Paul is silent about Jesus. So we should have no surprise about that relative silence of Paul about Jesus.

My point is that prof Gathercole is not correct insofar we have another description of Paul in Mark 5 (he may be alluded behind the Gerasene man) where it is said explicitly that he had to speak a lot of things about the historical Jesus. Not only to limit himself to say these (presumed) 4-5 things about the historical Jesus.