mlinssen wrote: ↑Fri Jan 13, 2023 1:54 am That's interesting. The issue that I have with Pauline priority - period - is that I find it very hard to imagine that a letter from HQ is sent to various branch offices without any story every having been written about anything.
You cannot have a movement of anything, larger than a few hundred people, where there is nothing written down - that simply is impossible, nothing works that way It is insane
While the issue of numbers in early ecclesia, communities, gatherings or 'congregations' is worth considering and discussing, it isn't the only issue.Paul the Uncertain wrote: ↑Fri Jan 13, 2023 4:45 am
Why ought we to think that the Christian movement had more than a few hundred "members" by say 50 CE? (After which, on the consensus timeline, there is something written down - Paul's letters.)
Plus, of course, the Jewish scriptures were long since written down, and were still being consulted while Paul was preaching according to his letters.
Although I'm unsure of its relevance, Paul's letter to the Romans isn't from HQ to a branch office. Nor, according to Galatians, would Paul's office be HQ for the Judean assemblies, and his claim to any enduring leadership in Antioch is unclear - maybe a condominium* with the Jerusalem pillars, maybe nothing at all. What, if anything, was going on in Damascus is similarly unclear. And while Acts is dubious history, it surely is pro-Paul, and he plays no role at all in the conversion of Simon and his followers (an already somewhat organized group?) in Samaria.
I think key then concurrent or related issues are
- what the nature of the early texts might have been ie. the Pauline letters; the early gospels, including apocryphal gospels such as G.Philip, etc.; & other texts such as the so-called catholic letters (aka the Praxapostolos); and
- what order the early texts might really have been;
- what the early textual groupings were;
- what the early readership groupings might have been (and how those groupings interacted, grew and changed over time)
And G.John. I tend to agree. That raises the prospect that the Johannine epistles were : some scholars thing they preceded G.John
Revelation might have been earlier than its position in the NT canon might lead one to think
As might the Epistle to the Hebrews
Did some of the first versions of canonical texts - including the Pauline letters - arise in non-orthodox circumstances eg. Docetic='Gnostic' ones ??
* by condominium I presume you're using the olde Latin meaning of co-dominion or co-ownership or even 'co-coverage' of 'territory'
As Paul-the-Uncertain notes, what was going on with these letters and even in some places, such as Damascus, is unclear.
And it is noteworthy that Acts does not have Paul having a role at all in 'the conversion of Simon and his followers (an already somewhat organized group?) in Samaria.'
