Paul visited the 3 leaders of the First Jewish Revolt

[Giuseppe]

This may explain why Paul despises de facto the 3 Pillars even if he has to show formal respect de jure in their presence.

So Doudna:

The conversion and visit to Jerusalem itself I think may read as ca. 66 and 69 CE, corresponding to Josephus’s “Saulus”, the noble herodian gangster who with cohorts was involved in organized crime in the early 60s. In 66 Saulus, as one of the well-connected “men of power”, visits Jerusalem and leaves as part of a delegation in association with Philip b. Jacimus, commander of king Agrippa’s horsemen (= Philip the hellenist leader in the book of Acts). The Jerusalem visit of Paul of Gal 1-2 may be 68 or 69 CE, with Saulus at that point in the company of Titus and Josephus and representing Roman interests in the siege of Jerusalem, with Saulus as part of a diplomatic meeting with leaders of the Revolt.

(my bold)

The sense of Galatians 2 is really something as: for diplomatic reasons, I am obliged to talk with them as "so-called" Rulers of Jerusalem, even if I deny the legitimacy of their power on Jerusalem, since Jerusalem is property of Titus.

The meeting ended with a nothing de facto: the Pillars wanted Judea for themselves, the Romans had limit themselves to rule only the rest of the world. Which means (for Titus): PROSECUTION OF THE WAR.

Only, the 3 Leaders of the Revolt warned Paul: even if he was their enemy (the diplomacy being failed), he had to remember the fate of the 'Poors', meaning: the people of Jerusalem who couldn't combat (as old people, women and children).

Obviously, the first visit of Jerusalem (Galatians 1) is probably a Christian interpolation Acts-based (a point, the only point, I had conceded to Detering, reading his Falsified Paul).


I like a lot this reading. It makes sense.

[Giuseppe]

The allusion to the threat of a forced circumcision as conditio sine qua non for the meeting:

not even Titus, who was with me, was compelled to be circumcised, even though he was a Greek.

(Gal 2:3)

...sounds to me as the condition to which those who are prisoners of Islamist terrorists submit themselves: becoming Muslims by force.

[Giuseppe]

Paul’s gospel message was that at some time in the indeterminate past at an indeterminate place Jesus had been crucified. In Paul’s theology and in the earliest church, details such as exactly when and where Jesus had suffered and died seems not to have been formally fixed, although it must have been recently and probably in or near Jerusalem because the destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem had just occurred.

George, Paul. On Christian Origins (p.292). Vivid Publishing. Edizione del Kindle.

I like a lot this book written by George Paul. It has a long list of evidences (one more suggestive than the other) confirming the birth of Christianity in 70 CE.

(The only disturbing note is his belief that GMatthew is the first gospel)

What has surprised me is that his conclusions above about Paul may be connected easily with Vermeiren's thesis about Jesus ben Saphat being the historical Jesus.

About this point, Doudna assumes that the 500 brothers who saw the Risen Jesus (really: the survived Jesus ben Saphat - the reader knows what I am talking about) were the 500 Zealots who saw Jesus ben Saphat returning to Jerusalem (during the siege).

Now, Adamczweski says something of very similar, when he thinks that the 500 brothers, the apostles preceding Paul, the Pillars in 1 Corinthians 15:5-11

...and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. 6 After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. 7 Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, 8 and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.

...as anti-pauline figures, they were midrashized by the pauline 'Mark' (author) as:

...some of the Pharisees and of the Herodians as being sent (ἀποστελλω: Mk 12:13a)...

(A hypertextual commentary, p. 148)

Hence: the 500 Zealots witnesses of the 'resurrection'/survival of Jesus ben Saphat became before the "500 brothers" in 1 Cor 15:6, then the 'Pharisiens and Herodians' questioning "Jesus"/Paul's authority in Mark.

[Giuseppe]

In particular, just as in Galatians 2 the 3 Pillars couldn't kill Paul/Saul (despite of him being a friend of the hated Titus), so in Mark:

The related reference to the Jerusalem leaders, who were apparently greedy and hostile against Jesus, but at that time did him no harm (Mk 12:12; cf. 11:27), by means of the hypertextual procedure of interfigurality again alludes to the apparently greedy and hostile leaders of the Jerusalem community (Gal 2:10a.12), who at the time of the Jerusalem agreement did Paul no harm (Gal 2:9).

(Adamczweski, ibid., p. 148, my bold)