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corpus-paul - Re: EVIDENCE FOR PAUL?

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  • From: "Peter W. Dunn" <pwdunn AT ilap.com>
  • To: "Corpus-paul" <corpus-paul AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: EVIDENCE FOR PAUL?
  • Date: Fri, 29 Sep 2000 10:22:09 -0400


David Sutherland asks:


>Outside the NT, does anyone know of any evidence, or references to, or for
>the actual existence of Paul?
>
>Furthermore, apparently the Rabbis kept good records of all their students.
>
>There is no mention of any Saul, who supposedly sat at the feat of
prominent
>Rabbi's?


There is abundant Patristic evidence (passim). There is also the Acts of
Paul, which is however dependent partly on Paul's epistles and partly on
oral legend. 3 Corinthians, by the way, is now commonly considered to be
earlier than the Acts of Paul and to have been incorporated later into the
larger work. There is also the legacy of the Gentile churches that claim
Paul as its founding apostle.

F. F. Bruce writes (NT History [1969] p. 237): "It is just possible that
Paul's education under Gamaliel is recalled in a Talmudic reference to an
unnamed pupil of that rabbi who exhibited 'impudence in matters of
learning'. [TB Shabbat 30b; cf. J. Klausner, From Jesus to Paul (London,
1944) p. 310]"

Can it really be seriously doubted that Paul existed?

Peter W. Dunn
Concord, Ontario
(Visiting Professor, Faculté de Théologie Evangélique de Bangui)






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