My Rebuttal

If you didn't listen to the last essay on yesterday's post's link, then you won't understand to what this essay is referring.  But I think you will be able to put two and two together.

The Conversion on the Way to Damascus (Conversione di San Paolo) is a work by Caravaggio, painted in 1601 for the Cerasi Chapel of the church of Santa Maria del Popolo, in Rome.

The last radio show closed with a piece explaining creativity.  St. Paul was used as an example of a creative spirit being utilized.

It was claimed that St. Paul was a phony.  On the road to Damascus Paul, who was an Ebionite, suddenly got a brilliant idea on how to win fame and fortune.  Instead of fighting the followers of the Nazarene, he would join them and make money off of them.

This claim sparked my creative juices because this depiction of Paul is contrary to the current popular depiction of Paul.  Historically, Paul is one of the most important figures in Western Civilization.  His letters give us knowledge of the culture, politics, and religion of the first centuries, and his biography in the Acts of the Apostles makes him a hero.

That being said, attacks against Paul have been surrounding him ever since he took that fateful journey to Damascus.  Usually, claims against Christian heroes pop up around Christian holidays.  Movies, magazine articles, books, social media, etc., will promote these ideas to sell their products.  You will hear that Paul was a Greek and became circumcised to win the favor of a Jewish girl;[1] Paul was a false apostle, Jesus was a twin, Jesus was married, Paul was married, etc.  All this is nothing new.  Some people like to rain on parades.  Wait for Thanksgiving when you hear that we shouldn’t be giving thanks for democide.  It should be a Day of Mourning.  Or, Columbus Day should be renamed Indigenous People Day.

However, this is not the subject of my essay.  My inspiration was the ending of last month’s reading with the statement, “And that’s the truth.”

What!!!!!!!!!!!!!

One thing everyone can agree on is that Paul was not stupid.  If what the Ebionites say about Paul making money off the followers of this New Way, is true, he must have been stupid.  Jesus was poor.  His Apostles were poor and the people they attracted were mostly poor.  It wouldn’t have taken Paul long to figure out that there was no money to be made going around preaching Jesus’ Gospel.  Paul was physically persecuted; he was beaten, stoned, left for dead, shipwrecked, imprisoned[2] and had to work as a manual laborer to support himself.[3] Where’s the money?  And this isn’t Paul’s personal claims, Paul’s life was witnessed by many others: Barnabas, Silas, Mark, Timothy, Luke, plus many Corinthians, Ephesians, Athenians, Romans, Philippians, Galatians, Colossians, Thessalonians, Hebrews, etc..

Personally, I think common sense would tell you that Paul was legit.  Let’s say Paul did create a scheme, as the Ebionites claim.  Then where did Ananias get the command to go to Paul and baptize him? Where did that come from?  Let me relate the event:

(Paul is in Damascus.  For three days he’s trying to make sense of things.) Now there was in Damascus, a certain disciple named Ananias, and the Lord said to him in a vision, ‘Ananias.’ And he said, ‘Here I am, Lord.’ And the Lord said to him, ‘Arise and go to the street called Straight and ask at the house of Judas for a man of Tarsus named Saul. For behold he is praying.’…But Ananias answered, ‘Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to the saints in Jerusalem. And here too he has authority from the high priests to arrest all who invoke your name.’ But the Lord said to him, ‘Go, for this man is a chosen vessel to me, to carry my name among the nations, and kings, and the children of Israel. For I will show him how much he must suffer for my name.[4]

Ananias probably exclaimed, “Are you kidding me? No way, Jesus!”  because Saul would have killed Ananias. Where did this idea come from, if not from God, Himself?

Another factor is that the other apostles accepted Paul.  Peter and Paul argued as teachers do: about dietary laws, circumcision, etc.  But Peter argues as one would with a respected colleague.  Paul was accepted as a bona fide teacher.

And what about Paul’s miracles: A man in Lystra with crippled feet, who was cured,[5] a possessed girl who was being exploited by her masters and Paul freed her,[6] the boy who fell from a great height and thought dead,[7] In fact, Paul’s miracles were so numerous that people just touched Paul with their handkerchiefs to take to others who were diseased, and they were cured?[8] Where did Paul get this authority if he were a false apostle?

Finally, there’s Paul message itself. Paul always taught the Old Testament and Jesus’ Gospel. No one said differently, especially not the other apostles. Paul lived in the same time as the other apostles and they vouched for Paul as specially chosen and anointed.

That being said, Paul does have his opponents: the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Romans, the Hebrews, the Ebionites and some other Gnostics. The animosity between these groups and Paul was mutual.

The heresiologist[9] Origen, said the name Ebionites is derived from a Hebrew word meaning “poor.” The early Christians, especially Paul had a field day with the name, saying that the Ebionites were “poor in understanding!”

Unfortunately, the Ebionites faded from history and all we know of them is from their opponents. The Ebionites were Christian followers of Jewish laws.  No wonder the Ebionites and Paul butted heads.  The Ebionites insisted on circumcision and Paul taught that circumcision wasn’t necessary. The Ebionites also taught that Jesus was born as the eldest son of the sexual union of Jesus and Mary.[10] But the subject of this essay isn’t the Ebionites’ beliefs.  Let’s just say that Paul and the Ebionites were at opposite ends of the spectrum.

As I mentioned previously, sources refuting our accepted iconic ideas are nothing new. You will hear: new gospel found, Jesus’ grave found, even Jesus’ body found! Actually, nothing is new. Those who don’t know history, repeat it. There were many writings that didn’t make it in the Bible. Who knows the exact selection process?

                Why wasn’t my story accepted by that magazine? Why wasn’t I hired? Why didn’t I get
                that scholarship?

Selection is arbitrary. I’m sure if a gospel were written by a woman, it was thrown out--there went the gospel of Mary Magdalene, the Acts of Thecla. Maybe a source was just repeating what was already said. For sure, some writings were just too crazy to be acceptable and others, like the Ebionites, were considered heretical. The early church fathers who collected the different sources to collate the Bible couldn’t accept everything. The Bible is a big book as it is! But these sources are still around and will surface every now and then (especially around Christian celebrations) as “newly found.”  They are not new, they are old sources that weren’t chosen to be in the canon of the Bible. Sorry, history is written by the winners, and thus today’s western culture is shaped by the societal ideas and ethics of Paul and the other apostles of Christ.[11]

One last thought regarding the Ebionites and Paul is expressed in a famous metaphor expressed by Jesus warning us against false prophets and how to identify them.  It is Matthew 7: 15: By their fruits you shall know them.

Fruits represent the outward manifestation of a person’s faith and behavior and works.

Faith of the Ebionites – doesn’t exist any more.
Faith of Paul—one of the most influential people in human history in shaping Christian thought.

Behavior of the Ebionites—rejected by Jews and early Christians.
Behavior of Paul—performed miracles, martyred for the Faith.

Works of the Ebionites—never popularly accepted and died out.
Works of Paul—thirteen of the New Testament’s twenty-seven documents are Paul’s letters and the book of Acts is his biography, which adds up to half of the New Testament.

 

So be it.

And that’s the truth!

 

 

 

 

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[1] Paulproblem.faithweb.com/ebionites.htm ; The picture of Paul as a disappointed lover is a typical creation of the folk imagination.

[2] 2Corinthians 11:23-27.

[3] 1Corinthians 4:12, 1 Corinthians 9:18, 1Thessalonians 2:9, Acts 18:3.

[4] Acts 9: 10-19

[5] Acts 14: 7-9

[6] Acts 16: 16-18

[7] Acts 20: 9-12

[8] Acts 19: 11-12

[9] Opponent of heresy

[10] Ehrman, Bart D. Lost Christianities. Oxford University Press. 2003, 96-99.

[11] Tabor, James D. Paul and Jesus. Simon & Schuster. 2012, preface.