Corpus-Paul

["David Inglis" <david AT colonialcommerce.com>]

Steve Black wrote in reply to Dave Inglis:

> >I would like to enquire if it is allowed to even discuss on this list (or
> >any related lists) whether Paul did (or even could) have actually received
> >information from a resurrected Jesus or from angels.  It seems to me that
> >to disallow this possibility completely shows a rather closed 'mind set'.
> >
> >I understand that in the current scientific age a belief in spiritual
> things is looked on by some as a kind of 'mental weakness',...
> 
> I think this is a matter of context. Within a scholarly biblical 
> discussion, I think the best we can do is to say that Paul *believed* 
> he had revelations from "the great beyond" (or whatever). It is kind 
> of like Jung's approach to religion. He took as factual the mental 
> impression within his human subject and bracketed out the question of 
> whether this content was "real" or not. It was a fact inasmuch as it 
> actually existed *as* a mental impression. I see no other way of 
> maintaining a scholarly conversation that will not deteriorate into 
> an some type of confessionalism (or anti-confessionalism). Perhaps if 
> the context for the discussion is not a scholarly biblical one - like 
> perhaps one within the church - perhaps then this issues might be 
> approached rather differently. Within this type of forum of biblical 
> scholarship, I think we must stay with with what we can know and 
> steer clear of metaphysical speculation. To do otherwise would 
> certainly undermine the foundation of our shared conversation, and 
> would certainly shift the whole focus of the conversation onto 
> philosophical debates, which would be a serious distraction.

The problem with this, as I see it, is that it give us no opportunity to
discuss whether Paul's 'mental impression' of Jesus or the Holy Spirit was
supported or not by the 'mental impressions' of other people written about
in the Bible.  For example, if Paul's revelations were generated entirely
in his own head, then you would expect them to be independent of the
revelations generated in other people's heads.  However, if there are
similarities then that would suggest a common cause, and that common cause
is IMHO a valid discussion topic.  For example, the revelations received
by Paul and others (from whatever source) clearly affected their
subsequent behaviour, and it is reasonable to examine the changes in
behaviour in these people and to look for parallels.

Dave Inglis
david AT colonialcommerce.com
3538 O'Connor Drive
Lafayette, CA, USA