Paul --- A Rock and a Hard Place

[Ben C. Smith]

Gal 3 literally tells you Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law. What does "redeem" mean? To pay the price to reclaim. Redeem from what? The curse of the law. How did Christ pay the price? He was crucified for our sake (or "on our behalf", υπερ ημων) (1 Cor 1:13) and back to Gal 3, he redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for our sake (υπερ ημων). He takes our place, becoming the curse instead of us.

The explanations are by necessity becoming so basic now that they are starting to sound like an adult Sunday School class at the local evangelical church. I think this conversation is at an impasse. That happens a lot, it seems. I cannot explain why Bernard cannot see the problem(s) we are having with his reconstruction, and doubtless he is at a loss to explain why we cannot see his point of view.

[Bernard Muller]

to Ben,

spin wrote:

Gal 3 literally tells you Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law. What does "redeem" mean? To pay the price to reclaim. Redeem from what? The curse of the law. How did Christ pay the price? He was crucified for our sake (or "on our behalf", υπερ ημων) (1 Cor 1:13) and back to Gal 3, he redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for our sake (υπερ ημων). He takes our place, becoming the curse instead of us.

The explanations are by necessity becoming so basic now that they are starting to sound like an adult Sunday School class at the local evangelical church. I think this conversation is at an impasse. That happens a lot, it seems. I cannot explain why Bernard cannot see the problem(s) we are having with his reconstruction, and doubtless he is at a loss to explain why we cannot see his point of view.

Yes, this is Sunday school material, coming from an unlikely source.
I have nothing against spin's theology regarding Gal 3. But I don't see that in 1 Cor 1:13 "was Paul crucified on your behalf?".
Actually, I don't think in any Sunday schools, someone would link "was Paul crucified on your behalf?" to "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law".
In 1 Cor 1:13, Paul was telling he (and also for Cephas & Apollos) should not have followers, because he was not crucified (for us), as Jesus did; instead, it is Christ who should have followers (as some Corinthians did => 1 Cor 1:12). Period.

Cordially, Bernard

[Ben C. Smith]

to Ben,

spin wrote:

Gal 3 literally tells you Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law. What does "redeem" mean? To pay the price to reclaim. Redeem from what? The curse of the law. How did Christ pay the price? He was crucified for our sake (or "on our behalf", υπερ ημων) (1 Cor 1:13) and back to Gal 3, he redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for our sake (υπερ ημων). He takes our place, becoming the curse instead of us.

The explanations are by necessity becoming so basic now that they are starting to sound like an adult Sunday School class at the local evangelical church. I think this conversation is at an impasse. That happens a lot, it seems. I cannot explain why Bernard cannot see the problem(s) we are having with his reconstruction, and doubtless he is at a loss to explain why we cannot see his point of view.

Yes, this is Sunday school material, coming from an unlikely source.

You are rather forcing him to it.

I have nothing against spin's theology regarding Gal 3. But I don't see that in 1 Cor 1:13 "was Paul crucified on your behalf?".
Actually, I don't think in any Sunday schools, someone would link "was Paul crucified on your behalf?" to "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law".
In 1 Cor 1:13, Paul was telling he (and also for Cephas & Apollos) should not have followers, because he was not crucified (for us), as Jesus did; instead, it is Christ who should have followers (as some Corinthians did => 1 Cor 1:12). Period.

You can get away with this only by draining "Jesus died for us" of any and all potential meaning. I can understand doing this in the case of somebody who lost his life by pushing you out of the way of a bus: that person has literally died for you in a way that requires no explanation. But, in the case of Jesus dying for many (be they Christians or gentiles or all people in general), when those many have never even met him nor necessarily even knew who he was before Paul introduced the concept, an explanation is required: not only for Paul's converts, but also for Paul himself. Those words must have meant something to him, right from the start. I do not think it is possible that Paul got that notion, "Jesus died for us," into his head, believed it to any degree, and preached it without having some idea of what it actually meant, including answers to several extremely obvious questions (to which your entirely insufficient analogies, such as the questions on marriage in chapter 7, do not even come close).

To the extent that Paul's gentile audiences were already admirers and/or seekers after the Jewish religion, such explanations would have been less necessary, since they were already part of Jewish belief. But they were still there. A Thessalonian believer had to know that Jesus saved us from the wrath to come, which makes no sense unless s/he also knew that the wrath was divine (of God), which in turn makes no sense unless the reason for that wrath is known: human sin. All of these concepts are explicitly present in 1 Thessalonians, and they make perfect sense in the context of Jesus dying for our sins, thus satisfying the divine wrath and saving us from it. That is already a theology of atonement and redemption; that is what those words mean. The more detailed treatments in Romans and Galatians add only more specification, theological justification, and (of course) detail. The background material in Isaiah, Daniel, and 2 and 4 Maccabees just goes to show how the concept of one man dying for the sins of many was already part of a theological stream of speculation; it removes any and all surprise at Paul expressing similar ideas about Christ.

[Bernard Muller]

to spin,

This is the thing: it's my metaphor and to me you do. You can deny my intention as much as you want, but you won't change my statement of it. You won't change what Paul communicated by you wanting a different result either.

So Gematria is a metaphor. Now I know. It's part of your fierce (but misleading) rhetoric that you like to unleash on your opponents. Actually, you prefer to use that over-the-top rhetoric instead of discussing the topic.

How can you decide that? It's a text that has been preserved in fragments and those fragments don't declare that they are "complete fiction". It is a narrative which has some fanciful bits in it, which you can cut out and put aside, so as to read the good stuff that's left. From that remainder you can do what you like doing. What makes you think Encolpius was not a real person, as you have decided Jesus was?

"What makes you think Encolpius was not a real person, as you have decided Jesus was"
Good question which I answered already:

First, the testimony of Paul about a human (rather regular) Jesus:
http://historical-jesus.info/6.html
Also, http://historical-jesus.info/18.html, http://historical-jesus.info/25.html & http://historical-jesus.info/27.html

Second, the testimony of Josephus in Antiquities 20, 9,1 (the short TF): http://historical-jesus.info/33.html & http://historical-jesus.info/104.html
No explanation for any form of unauthenticity is convincing, certainly not the one from Carrier.

Third, the testimony of Tacitus, about a "Christus" or "Chrestus" in Annals 15:44:
Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular.
Once again, I see no reason to declare the passage as being interpolated, despite the efforts of some to prove otherwise.
Let's also say that Tacitus could have heard (and remembered) about this events in 64 because he was about 8 years old at the time.
The same thing can be said about Josephus, who was a young adult in Jerusalem during James' last years.

Fourth, 'Hebrews': http://historical-jesus.info/40.html
Against the arguments of Doherty: http://historical-jesus.info/45.html and the ones of Carrier http://historical-jesus.info/96.html

Fifth, the gospel according to Mark, which has the author fighting testimonies which were against Christians beliefs:
http://historical-jesus.info/28.html

Can you say these kinds of evidence have been written about the existence of Encolpius as a real person?

Cordially, Bernard

[iskander]

Has anyone said , "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law".?
It is certain that man must utterly despair of his own ability before he is prepared to receive the grace of Christ. A Christian is to lay claim to nothing as far as his own ability is concern

Matthew 19
25When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astounded and said, ‘Then who can be saved?’ 26But Jesus looked at them and said, ‘For mortals it is impossible, but for God all things are possible.’

Luther's last written words
I. Hoc est verum. Wir sind alle Bettler

We are beggars, this is true

[Bernard Muller]

to spin,

Every time you point me to this stuff and I go and look at it, I come back thinking, why did I bother?

What did you look at? Can you make some intelligent comments about something specific that you do not accept? Try one. Saying that my work on dating is Gematria, even as a metaphor, is not much of a counter argument.

I can see you spent a lot of time in your efforts. I just don't appreciate the methodology or the results. You can guess that by the "arbitrary piffle" comment.

So what is this ""arbitrary piffle" comment"?

I've argued with you for many years on your lack of methodology and often spurious results, but, hey, you're happy.

And I have argued back, and as far as I can remember, with some success. And I am not particularly fond of your methodology which let you correlate 1 Cor 1:13 "was Paul crucified for your sake?" with Gal 3:13, written much later, "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for our sake".
Because both sayings have υπερ ημων, that does not mean Paul was thinking about that verse from Galatians when he wrote "was Paul crucified for your sake?".

Cordially, Bernard

[spin]

to spin,

Every time you point me to this stuff and I go and look at it, I come back thinking, why did I bother?

What did you look at? Can you make some intelligent comments about something specific that you do not accept? Try one. Saying that my work on dating is Gematria, even as a metaphor, is not much of a counter argument.

I did for example point to your use of Acts, as though it was something that provides useful historical data.

I can see you spent a lot of time in your efforts. I just don't appreciate the methodology or the results. You can guess that by the "arbitrary piffle" comment.

So what are these ""arbitrary piffle" comments"?

You were the one who cited the phrase of mine when you responded earlier.

I've argued with you for many years on your lack of methodology and often spurious results, but, hey, you're happy.

And I have argued back, and as far as I can remember, with some success. And I am not particularly fond of your methodology which let you correlate 1 Cor 1:13 "was Paul crucified for your sake?" with Gal 3:13, written much later, "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for our sake".
Because both sayings have υπερ ημων, that does not mean Paul was thinking about that verse from Galatians when he wrote "was Paul crucified for your sake?".

This is the sort of blunder by you that confounds your efforts. There was no claim made that 'Paul was thinking about that verse from Galatians when he wrote "was Paul crucified for your sake?"' Both the reference to Gal 3 and to 1 Cor 1:13 reflect Paul's thinking which relied on the notion of Christ dying for the sake/on behalf of us—a notion which he clarifies in Gal 3—in order to redeem us from the curse of the law. "On our behalf" (υπερ ημων) is also explained by the L&S link I supplied earlier as "for, instead of, in the name of" us. It might be nice if you attempted to interact with the meanings of Paul statements. When you refuse to read the texts for what they say, there's no wonder that you remain clueless of their content.

[spin]

to spin,

This is the thing: it's my metaphor and to me you do. You can deny my intention as much as you want, but you won't change my statement of it. You won't change what Paul communicated by you wanting a different result either.

So Gematria is a metaphor. Now I know.

Had you shown an understanding of the term in the first place, it would have been nice.

How can you decide that? It's a text that has been preserved in fragments and those fragments don't declare that they are "complete fiction". It is a narrative which has some fanciful bits in it, which you can cut out and put aside, so as to read the good stuff that's left. From that remainder you can do what you like doing. What makes you think Encolpius was not a real person, as you have decided Jesus was?

"What makes you think Encolpius was not a real person, as you have decided Jesus was"
Good question which I answered already:

What follows is not a response to the question.You don't muddy your thoughts explaining how Encolpius is not a real person by your reductiveness. You rehearse the same sort of non-historical mantra that most apologists use for their efforts to give Jesus historicity.

First, the testimony of Paul about a human (rather regular) Jesus:
http://historical-jesus.info/6.html
Also, http://historical-jesus.info/18.html, http://historical-jesus.info/25.html & http://historical-jesus.info/27.html

There is no evidence here. Paul's savior by necessity had to have suitable characteristics, just as Stan Lee's characters have to have certain characteristics.

The following litany involves no contemporary indications. They are all to be expected given the tendentious nature of the means of preserving the literary material you are naively presenting.

Second, the testimony of Josephus in Antiquities 20, 9,1 (the short TF): http://historical-jesus.info/33.html & http://historical-jesus.info/104.html
No explanation for any form of unauthenticity is convincing, certainly not the one from Carrier.

The onus is not on others to show unauthority, once some of the content has been universally accepted as bogus. You have to do the piss bucket test to extract the good piss from the not good piss. You know that at least there is bad piss in the bucket. How do you know there is good piss? How can you then extract it?

Third, the testimony of Tacitus, about a "Christus" or "Chrestus" in Annals 15:44:
Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular.
Once again, I see no reason to declare the passage as being interpolated, despite the efforts of some to prove otherwise.
Let's also say that Tacitus could have heard (and remembered) about this events in 64 because he was about 8 years old at the time.
The same thing can be said about Josephus, who was a young adult in Jerusalem during James' last years.

You see no reason to declare that this little nugget of testimony for the existence of Jesus who was put to death under the procurator Pontius Pilate as being interpolated??

Tacitus knew when the role of the procurator changed (in the reign of Claudius) so to think that he would call the military ruler of Judea under the laegate of Syria a "procurator" can only be expect from someone ignorant of historical Roman administration, such as all the apologists who use this passage. But as to the full range of problems concerning this passage I have been over it many times on BC&H over the past decade or so. While you can expect testimony for Jesus to creep into sources when the copyists are christian monks, you need to explain how you know that such tendentious materials should be considered veracious.

Fourth, 'Hebrews': http://historical-jesus.info/40.html
Against the arguments of Doherty: http://historical-jesus.info/45.html and the ones of Carrier http://historical-jesus.info/96.html

Fifth, the gospel according to Mark, which has the author fighting testimonies which were against Christians beliefs:
http://historical-jesus.info/28.html

These last two are just silly. You cannot expect to get any historical materials from undated, unprovenanced, anonymous sources.

Can you say these kinds of evidence have been written about the existence of Encolpius as a real person?

As the litany of apologetics has no weight you should try to do the task asked of you and not fob it off. You show no willingness to evaluate the sources you manipulate. Ultimately when the veneer of christian apologetic (no implication of you being christian) is removed, you are left with your "it looks ok, so it must be ok" argumentation.

[spin]

Here are some of the problems with Annals 15.44:

1. The testimonium taciteum is not part of the discourse that Tacitus constructed against Nero. It is tacked on with little interest in maintaining the discourse against Nero and it took no account of the previous statement that ended the discourse by focusing the reader's attention on the fact that the fire seems to have started via an order (implicitly from Nero).
   
   The description of the fire started in A.15.38. He analyzes the impact of the fire in A.15.41. In A.15.42 Tacitus then describes the new palace of Nero built after the fire as well as further wasteful measures he enacted, but which got nowhere. A.15.43 talks about Nero's city reconstruction measures. We finally arrive at the close of the discourse:
   
   "Such indeed were the precautions of human wisdom. The next thing was to seek means of propitiating the gods, and recourse was had to the Sibylline books, by the direction of which prayers were offered to Vulcanus, Ceres, and Proserpina. Juno, too, was entreated by the matrons, first, in the Capitol, then on the nearest part of the coast, where water was procured to sprinkle the temple and image of the goddess. And there were sacred banquets and nightly vigils celebrated by married women. But all human efforts, all the lavish gifts of the emperor, and the propitiations of the gods, did not banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order."
   
   What Tacitus has done, and he has consciously constructed his text with meticulous care, was to place the relevant post-dated facts, including the passage about the reconstruction, before this conclusion. This conclusion is masterly:
   
   "But all human efforts, all the lavish gifts of the emperor, and the propitiations of the gods, did not banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order."
   
   There is no escaping the fact that Nero is guilty of starting the fire. Tacitus doesn't need to say it. His statement has all the subtlety of the snake. Having displayed his art so well, is he going to waste that effort to insert a nugget concerning christian martyrdoms, a distraction from his condemnation of Nero?
   
   In the narrative, this treatment of the christians is just another human effort already covered by the fact that all human efforts didn't banish the sinister belief. Why it was not placed before the conclusion is unfathomable for the quality of the rest of the narrative. The conclusion about the conflagration being "the result of an order" is drowned by a description of christian martyrdoms and all of Tacitus's work pinning the fire on Nero has dissipated into a gorefest of christians going crispy crackly into the night.
   
   
2. It erroneously calls Pontius Pilate a "procurator" when Tacitus is a major source for the fact that procurators weren't given control of provinces before the time of Claudius.
   
   A prefect was in origin a military posting. A procurator was someone appointed by the emperor to look after the finanial side of administration.
   
   Here's a pre-Claudian reference in the Annals to a procurator is 4.15:
   

   • Everything indeed was as yet in the hands of the Senate, and consequently Lucilius Capito, procurator of Asia, who was impeached by his province, was tried by them, the emperor vehemently asserting "that he had merely given the man authority over the slaves and property of the imperial establishments; that if he had taken upon himself the powers of a praetor and used military force, he had disregarded his instructions; therefore they must hear the provincials."

   You note that the procurator has no judicial powers, but merely had charge of the province's property. The province of Asia was ruled by a proconsul, eg Caius Silanus (3.66) or Junius Silanus (13.1). The role of the procurator changed with Claudius in A.12.60:
   

   • That same year the emperor was often heard to say that the legal decisions of his procurators ought to have the same force as if pronounced by himself.

   They didn't have judicial power in their own right because they weren't patricians. Judicial power was necessary to make legal decisions necessary as a provincial governor. Suetonius alludes to the same decision (Claud. 12):
   

   • [Claudius]requested of [the senate] permission for the prefect of the military tribunes and pretorian guards to attend him in the senate-house; and also that they would be pleased to bestow upon his procurators judicial authority in the provinces.

   And so started the governance of imperial provinces by procurators alluded to in Histories 5.9,
   

   • The kings were either dead, or reduced to insignificance, when Claudius entrusted the province of Judaea to the Roman Knights or to his own freedmen, one of whom, Antonius Felix, indulging in every kind of barbarity and lust, exercised the power of a king in the spirit of a slave.

   Procurators were not a part of the Roman cursus honorum, the sequential order of public offices, being private employees of the emperor to administer the finances of his provinces. Until the time of Claudius, they had no power to tell Romans who were in the cursus honorum what to do, so couldn't govern. Tacitus, knew the cursus honorum inside out, having risen through those ranks to become a proconsul himself. He knew when procurators gained judicial power and was well aware that prior to Claudius no procurator had the power to govern.
   
   Pilate was not a procurator. He was a military prefect, as indicated by an inscription found in Caesarea Maritima, in charge of a small province answerable directly to the proconsular legate in Antioch. (And bringing up Richard Carrier's opinions as to the possibility of Pilate being a procurator is pure desperation.)
   
   Tacitus obviously didn't write about Pilate as governor of Judaea being a procurator.
   
   
3. It has Nero's gardens being given over to the burning of christians at night in 15.44.5, when the gardens were filled with people made homeless by the fire who were waiting while new dwellings were being built and living in temporary (flammable) structures, traumatized by the fire. (15.39.2)
4. It is a passage about something Nero attempted in order to dispel the rumours that he'd started the fire, after Tacitus stated that none of his efforts could dispel the rumours.
   
   The description of the fire started in A.15.38. He analyzes the impact of the fire in A.15.41. In A.15.42 Tacitus then describes the new palace of Nero built after the fire as well as further wasteful measures he enacted, but which got nowhere. A.15.43 talks about Nero's city reconstruction measures. We finally arrive at the close of the discourse:
   
   "Such indeed were the precautions of human wisdom. The next thing was to seek means of propitiating the gods, and recourse was had to the Sibylline books, by the direction of which prayers were offered to Vulcanus, Ceres, and Proserpina. Juno, too, was entreated by the matrons, first, in the Capitol, then on the nearest part of the coast, where water was procured to sprinkle the temple and image of the goddess. And there were sacred banquets and nightly vigils celebrated by married women. But all human efforts, all the lavish gifts of the emperor, and the propitiations of the gods, did not banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order."
   
   What Tacitus has done, and he has consciously constructed his text with meticulous care, was to place the relevant post-dated facts, including the passage about the reconstruction, before this conclusion. This conclusion is masterly:
   
   "But all human efforts, all the lavish gifts of the emperor, and the propitiations of the gods, did not banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order."
   
   There is no escaping the fact that Nero is guilty of starting the fire. Tacitus doesn't need to say it. His statement has all the subtlety of the snake. Having done that he's going to waste that effort to insert a distraction about christian martyrdoms, isn't he? In the narrative, this treatment of the christians is just another human effort after describing the fact that all human efforts didn't banish the sinister belief.
   
   The conclusion about the conflagration being "the result of an order" is drowned by a description of christian martyrdoms and all of Tacitus's work pinning the fire on Nero has dissipated into a gorefest of christians going crispy crackly into the night.
   
   
5. Tacitus, known as one of the greatest orators of his era, writes a passage that blames the christians for something, but is unclear as to what it was that they pleaded guilty of.
   
   Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind.
   
   A whole body of scholarly discourse has grown up around what the first christians mentioned might have pleaded guilty of. Then the writer admits he is not interested in the fire at all, stating that "an immense multitude (!) was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind." Carried away by such a rhetorical frill, the author is unaware of the general topic. (There's no need to contemplate the lack of seriousness involved in this "immense multitude.")
   
   
6. The style of the passage wildly does not reflect Tacitus's renowned style of reserve and understatement.
   
   Tacitus is known for his restrain, yet in our passage we get the full gory details of torture and mayhem against the christians. Ronald H. Martin writes of Tacitus' choice not to cite the gruesome detail of Galba's head in his Histories, saying:
   
   "His practice elsewhere suggests that he judged it beneath the dignity of history to record such sordid events." (Tacitus and the Writing of History, U. Cal. Press, 1988, p.73.)
   
   It apparently wasn't beneath the dignity of history for our passage to tell us:
   
   "Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired."
   
   This is below the dignity of Tacitus as a historian.
   
   
7. The passage is functionally a martyrdom story outlining how awfully the christians were treated--so badly that passers by could feel pity (this is in the city where people went to the amphitheatre to watch people being torn apart by wild animals for entertainment). Arguing that the picture was not favorable to christians, is merely an accusation that a christian interpolator was incapable of trying to fit into the style of the original writer.
   
   As this material doesn't fit the tenor of Tacitus's writing, the only people to whom this passage would have much interest were christians, for it is functionally a story of christian martyrdom, though a story apparently unknown to Tertullian who refers to Tacitus and christians under Nero, but not to this passage. What we find in reading it is that the christians suffer horribly for their faith and even pagan passers by are driven to feel compassion for their sufferings.
   
   The passage does talk of the christians as criminals, which might suggest to some that christians couldn't write such things about christians. However, such a tendentious approach to the endeavor would render the passage obviously out of place.
   
   The story serves no polemical value to Tacitus's efforts to inculpate Nero for the fire.
   
   

(As this material was getting lost in the passage of time on internet, I thought I would collate it here, so that it might live a little longer. I've put more out there, such as why Sulpicius Severus makes a good candidate for the seed source of the testimonium taciteum, but time and complexity does not permit further at the moment.)

[Bernard Muller]

to Ben,

You are rather forcing him to it.

If it is so, if spin used what you call "Sunday school" material against me, from a non-Christian to a non-Christian, that would mean he is desperate.

You can get away with this only by draining "Jesus died for us" of any and all potential meaning.

I did not drain "Jesus died for us" of all potential meanings that Paul might have thought (if he thought of one). He simply did not indicate any after saying Christ crucified was considered foolishness by Gentiles & a stumbling block for Jews, Paul did not answer that concern and hid the explanation inside God's secret & hidden wisdom.
Before Paul was talking about "salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ" for deliverance from God's wrath (to come) (1 Th 5:9, Ro 5:9)
Later came several explanations by Paul, freeing from the Law and atonement of sins.
I also think that Paul wrote "Jesus ... died for us", in order to involve Jesus into the salvation process, without offering, or being asked, further explanations.

I can understand doing this in the case of somebody who lost his life by pushing you out of the way of a bus: that person has literally died for you in a way that requires no explanation. But, in the case of Jesus dying for many (be they Christians or gentiles or all people in general), when those many have never even met him nor necessarily even knew who he was before Paul introduced the concept, an explanation is required: not only for Paul's converts, but also for Paul himself.

I recall a story where a group of soldiers sees from afar a suspicious person walking in their direction. The leader of the group asks the others to stay put and walks towards the suspect. When close to him, the suspect explodes his body bomb, and both died.
Certainly the others in the group can claim that the sacrifice of their leader saved their live.
Anyway, from that, I do not see why a sacrifice would save one individual only, and not a whole collectivity.
So he died for us in order to save the life of others, I think, can be another explanation that Paul might have been thinking when 1 Thessalonians was written. After all, Paul said his Christian will be saved from death on earth by going to heaven for eternal life.

Those words must have meant something to him, right from the start. I do not think it is possible that Paul got that notion, "Jesus died for us," into his head, believed it to any degree, and preached it without having some idea of what it actually meant, including answers to several extremely obvious questions (to which your entirely insufficient analogies, such as the questions on marriage in chapter 7, do not even come close).

Maybe that meant something, maybe not. For you & spin it is very important. I do not know about spin, but I think you were a former seminarist (no offence intended). Because of that, you got interested about theology and were given theological answers for almost anything. But I do not think that these Thessalonians, most of them illiterate, would be interested in that. Being promised to have eternal life and saved from God's wrath to come soon, for whatever reason, such as the sacrifice of Christ, was enough to have them converted.
As for my example of relation (sexual or not) between man & wife, it was not a concern while Paul was with the Corinthians, but then something happened, and that became an issue requiring an answer by Paul (which he did).
The same thing for "Jesus ... died for us". Likely not a concern at first, but then something happened, and that became an issue requiring an answer by Paul (which he did).

To the extent that Paul's gentile audiences were already admirers and/or seekers after the Jewish religion, such explanations would have been less necessary, since they were already part of Jewish belief. But they were still there. A Thessalonian believer had to know that Jesus saved us from the wrath to come, which makes no sense unless s/he also knew that the wrath was divine (of God), which in turn makes no sense unless the reason for that wrath is known: human sin.

I think these Thessalonians knew about your two first beliefs.
BTW, in Ro 1:18, God's wrath is applied to the suppresser of truth, which are sinners only because they suppress the truth.
In Ro 2:5, God's wrath is supposed to be administer on those with "hard and impenitent heart", not exactly your normal sinner.
Just to show that from wrath to human sin is not so automatic. There are other destinations.

All of these concepts are explicitly present in 1 Thessalonians, and they make perfect sense in the context of Jesus dying for our sins, thus satisfying the divine wrath and saving us from it.

I showed already that "Jesus dying for our sins" is not the only reason expressed by Paul for Christ's sacrifice.

and That is already a theology of atonement and redemption; that is what those words mean. The more detailed treatments in Romans and Galatians add only more specification, theological justification, and (of course) detail. The background material in Isaiah, Daniel, and 2 and 4 Maccabees just goes to show how the concept of one man dying for the sins of many was already part of a theological stream of speculation; it removes any and all surprise at Paul expressing similar ideas about Christ.

Theology, theology, theology based on Isaiah, Daniel, 2 and 4 Maccabees. But I don't see any mention of that in the Pauline epistles & Hebrews concerning "he died for us in order to atone of our sins".

Cordially, Bernard