Explanation For False Apostles

[bluegreenearth]

2 Corinthians 11:13 - "For such people are false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as apostles of Christ."

According to Paul, there were false apostles walking around and deceiving some Christians into following improper theologies during his lifetime. If identifying as an apostle for Christ was fraught with persecution, imprisonment, and even a painful death in many circumstances, what would be the advantage of deliberately misrepresenting yourself as a Christian apostle during the 1st century? Could these "false apostles" have strongly yet mistakenly believed they actually experienced the resurrected Jesus to have been willing to suffer the same or similar hardships as the traditionally accepted apostles? If false apostles could come to a mistaken belief through some unidentified means, then why rule-out this possibility for the accepted apostles?

[bluegreenearth]

[Replying to post 19 by JehovahsWitness]

Everything you claim about Paul being someone who appealed to reason for the sake of his congregation's spiritual welfare could be true and it would still not only be possible but plausible for authorized embellishments to exist in his accounts and for the book of Acts to reinforce those strategic fabrications given the fact that these early Christian cults were locked in a desperate competition against each other as well as a variety of non-Christian mystery cults. If there is a justifiable reason to rule-out this hypothesis, I'm not aware of it.

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 20 by bluegreenearth]

Since we have written records of the workings of the early church and named individuals disciplined and expulsed by church leaders from the community, it is you not I that is operating in the realms of groundless speculation if you are suggesting contrary to the physical verifiable evidence that such records existed but were somehow magically "disappeared" without a trace.


JW



RELATED POSTS


Did Peter and Paul eventually cut off all contact with each other?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 599#933599

[JehovahsWitness]

...if the claims of false apostles were sufficiently persuasive to be a threat to Paul's ministry, then why presume Paul's persuasive message wasn't equally unreliable?

This just seems to be wild speculation mostly devoid of logic. Firstly, there is nothing in scripture to suggest Pauls ministry was under threat. What seemed to have been in danger was the fledgling congregation. Any threat that existed to the welfare of believers Paul promised to deal with when he came and the available evidence indicates that he was more than capable of doing so.

As for the suggestion that opposition of itself calls into question the validity of Pauls writings, that is based on the premise that all opposition is valid and equal to that which is opposed. That is nonsense. The established Christian teachings were based on the testimony of the Apostles, the rumours and unauthorized mutterings of a few self appointed prominent ones in Corinth had the backing of nothing including any available scripture. There is no reason to the latter to cause us to question the former.

Wouldn't the existence of fierce competition between these early incompatible Christian theologies give Paul and any other self-identified Christian apostle a strong motivation to take certain theological liberties with their testimonial accounts in order to remain competitive and attractive new converts?

The suggestion that Paul resorted to "theological liberties" is unfounded speculation (I have already addressed the question of the validity of his testimony in an earlier post -see above).

Regarding theological showdowns, there would indeed arise within the Christian community "fierce competition between incompatible theologies" after the death of the Apostles but thankfully authoritative scripture and church father catalogues would already have been recorded for humanity, providing an indelible record of what was authentic. Pauls letters would, as we know would come to figure largely in them. The teachings of these self appointed experts would be deafening in their absence but for being condemned. In short the storm was prophesied to come but the one in the teacup of Corinth, wasn't it.



JW




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Does the imposing military escort Paul recieved indicate he was a member of the Herodian royal family?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 240#900240

[bluegreenearth]

[Replying to post 20 by bluegreenearth]

Since we have written records of the workings of the early church and named individuals disciplined and expulsed by church leaders from the community, it is you not I that is operating in the realms of groundless speculation if you are suggesting contrary to the physical verifiable evidence that such records existed but were magically "disappeared" without a trace.


JW

I wasn't referring to the known records of other people being disciplined by the early church but records of Paul being disciplined. Just because there are no known records of Paul being reprimanded by the church leadership for embellishing some or all his account, it doesn't follow that Paul or any other Christian leader within that community wouldn't have been authorized to strategically fabricate their accounts to some prescribed degree.

It could be argued, however unlikely, that the people who were reprimanded for embellishing or fabricating testimonies may have been initially encouraged by the church leadership to produce more attractive theological accounts for the sake of recruiting more converts. Unfortunately, some of those embellished or fabricated testimonies may have been inconveniently exposed in public. In order maintain credibility, the church would have been subsequently forced to deny their role in the scandal and make an example of the leaders who were caught. We see examples of this type of thing occurring all over the place throughout history up through the present day in both religious and non-religious contexts. I'm not sure how we could rule-out this possibility.

[Overcomer]

Jehovah's Witness wrote:

Firstly, there is nothing in scripture to suggest Pauls ministry was under threat. What seemed to have been in danger was the fledgling congregation. Any threat that existed to the welfare of believers Paul promised to deal with when he came and the available evidence indicates that he was more than capable of doing so.

I agree. When you read that verse in context, it's obvious that Paul's concern is for the well-being of the congregation, not himself or his own leadership. In fact, in Rom. 9:3, he is willing to give up his own salvation if it would mean the salvation of the Jewish people. Here in this passage from 2 Corinthians, he makes it clear that he wants all to come to Christ and be saved, but they won't be if they follow false prophets. He makes a comparison to Eve being deceived in the Garden of Evil.

So we know Paul considers the the false prophets in Corinth to be agents of Satan, meant to deceive people. One issue is performance-based Christianity and the erroneous belief that people could earn their way into God's favour -- a lie that still exists today and is expounded by some here in this very forum. A second issue is that of intellectualism and the belief that if you just knew the right philosophy then you'd be saved -- a Gnostic belief that had nothing to do with Jesus and the salvation he provided by atoning for our sins and which, too, still exists in a variety of forms today.

Scholars and theologians and historians of all ilks are aware of (and always have been aware of) different belief systems present in the early centuries, including some that taught variant ideas about Jesus -- such as Gnosticism that I just mentioned. The media started talking about so-called "lost gospels" a few decades ago, but the reality is that they were never lost to the experts who studied these things. The general public just wasn't aware of them, but they were always there, being studied by academics, never hidden at all.

And there were always heretics such as Marcion who was anti-Semitic and assembled a New Testament canon that left out books that he felt were "too Jewish" in the mid to late second century.

As for why there were false prophets, we can only surmise. Maybe some of them truly believed what they were teaching. Maybe some knew it was a pack of lies but they liked the power and everything that came with it. These are questions we cannot answer with any certainty.

And as to why we should believe Paul and not one of the others, if you study those other religions and so-called "lost" gospels, you can see why. For one thing, they cannot be backed up historically the way that the Bible can. Secondly, they fail when it comes to consistency and coherency. In short, they don't always make a lot of sense! Most of them are online and can be read by all. See here:

https://www.sacred-texts.com/gno/

Here is a site that offers Christian classics:

https://ccel.org/

Here is an article on the verse from Corinthians:

https://bible.org/article/deception-vs- ... thians-113

[Overcomer]

bluegreenearth wrote:

It could be argued, however unlikely, that the people who were reprimanded for embellishing or fabricating testimonies may have been initially encouraged by the church leadership to produce more attractive theological accounts for the sake of recruiting more converts. Unfortunately, some of those embellished or fabricated testimonies may have been inconveniently exposed in public. In order maintain credibility, the church would have been subsequently forced to deny their role in the scandal and make an example of the leaders who were caught. We see examples of this type of thing occurring all over the place throughout history up through the present day in both religious and non-religious contexts. I'm not sure how we could rule-out this possibility.

You have accused others here of speculation. That's what you are doing -- speculating. We can only work with what we have and what we know.

As for times when the Church has tried to cover up scandals, I can't see how that applies to Paul and his writing and the Church in Corinth under a threat from false prophets. I think you are reading things into the text that simply aren't there.

[bluegreenearth]

This just seems to be wild speculation mostly devoid of logic. Firstly, there is nothing in scripture to suggest Pauls ministry was under threat. What seemed to have been in danger was the fledgling congregation. Any threat that existed to the welfare of believers Paul promised to deal with when he came and the available evidence indicates that he was more than capable of doing so.

You can't refer to the scripture in defense of the scripture. That is circular logic. I'm asking how we rule-out the possibility that the scripture wasn't partially or entirely embellished for the sake of making Christianity more appealing to new converts. Of course the scriptures don't directly suggest Paul's ministry was under threat. If the scripture was embellished, we wouldn't expect the author to deliberately disclose a motive for strategically fabricating his account. So, regardless of what you want to believe, how do we rule-out what I've proposed as a possibility?

As for the suggestion that opposition of itself calls into question the validity of Pauls writings, that is based on the premise that all opposition is valid and equal to that which is opposed. That is nonsense. The established Christian teachings were based on the testimony of the Apostles, the rumours and unauthorized mutterings of a few self appointed prominent ones in Corinth had the backing of nothing including any available scripture. There is no reason to the latter to cause us to question the former.

Once again, it doesn't matter what you want to believe. How do we rule out the possibility I've suggested?

The suggestion that Paul resorted to "theological liberties" is unfounded speculation (I have already addressed the question of the validity of his testimony in an earlier post -see above).

Maybe, but can you rule-out the possibility?

Regarding theological showdowns, there would indeed arise within the Christian community "fierce competition between incompatible theologies" after the death of the Apostles but thankfully authoritative scripture and church father catalogues would already have been recorded for humanity, providing an indelible record of what was authentic. Pauls letters would, as we know would come to figure largely in them. The teachings of these self appointed experts would be deafening in their absence but for being condemned. In short the storm was prophesied to come but the one in the teacup of Corinth, wasn't it.

Maybe, but you can't refer to "authoritative scripture" to affirm scripture as authoritative without using circular logic. By the time the church father catalogues were composed, any authorized embellishments and strategic fabrications to the apostles's accounts would have already been incorporated into the accepted theology of the time. So, how can we rule-out this possibility?

[bluegreenearth]

bluegreenearth wrote:

It could be argued, however unlikely, that the people who were reprimanded for embellishing or fabricating testimonies may have been initially encouraged by the church leadership to produce more attractive theological accounts for the sake of recruiting more converts. Unfortunately, some of those embellished or fabricated testimonies may have been inconveniently exposed in public. In order maintain credibility, the church would have been subsequently forced to deny their role in the scandal and make an example of the leaders who were caught. We see examples of this type of thing occurring all over the place throughout history up through the present day in both religious and non-religious contexts. I'm not sure how we could rule-out this possibility.

You have accused others here of speculation. That's what you are doing -- speculating. We can only work with what we have and what we know.

As for times when the Church has tried to cover up scandals, I can't see how that applies to Paul and his writing and the Church in Corinth under a threat from false prophets. I think you are reading things into the text that simply aren't there.

There is nothing necessarily illogical or fallacious with speculating possibilities. It is only when we try to assert one speculation above all other speculations without an ability to disprove the validity of the other speculations that we run into a problem.

[bluegreenearth]

Jehovah's Witness wrote:

Firstly, there is nothing in scripture to suggest Pauls ministry was under threat. What seemed to have been in danger was the fledgling congregation. Any threat that existed to the welfare of believers Paul promised to deal with when he came and the available evidence indicates that he was more than capable of doing so.

I agree. When you read that verse in context, it's obvious that Paul's concern is for the well-being of the congregation, not himself or his own leadership. In fact, in Rom. 9:3, he is willing to give up his own salvation if it would mean the salvation of the Jewish people. Here in this passage from 2 Corinthians, he makes it clear that he wants all to come to Christ and be saved, but they won't be if they follow false prophets. He makes a comparison to Eve being deceived in the Garden of Evil.

So we know Paul considers the the false prophets in Corinth to be agents of Satan, meant to deceive people. One issue is performance-based Christianity and the erroneous belief that people could earn their way into God's favour -- a lie that still exists today and is expounded by some here in this very forum. A second issue is that of intellectualism and the belief that if you just knew the right philosophy then you'd be saved -- a Gnostic belief that had nothing to do with Jesus and the salvation he provided by atoning for our sins and which, too, still exists in a variety of forms today.

Scholars and theologians and historians of all ilks are aware of (and always have been aware of) different belief systems present in the early centuries, including some that taught variant ideas about Jesus -- such as Gnosticism that I just mentioned. The media started talking about so-called "lost gospels" a few decades ago, but the reality is that they were never lost to the experts who studied these things. The general public just wasn't aware of them, but they were always there, being studied by academics, never hidden at all.

And there were always heretics such as Marcion who was anti-Semitic and assembled a New Testament canon that left out books that he felt were "too Jewish" in the mid to late second century.

As for why there were false prophets, we can only surmise. Maybe some of them truly believed what they were teaching. Maybe some knew it was a pack of lies but they liked the power and everything that came with it. These are questions we cannot answer with any certainty.

And as to why we should believe Paul and not one of the others, if you study those other religions and so-called "lost" gospels, you can see why. For one thing, they cannot be backed up historically the way that the Bible can. Secondly, they fail when it comes to consistency and coherency. In short, they don't always make a lot of sense! Most of them are online and can be read by all. See here:

https://www.sacred-texts.com/gno/

Here is a site that offers Christian classics:

https://ccel.org/

Here is an article on the verse from Corinthians:

https://bible.org/article/deception-vs- ... thians-113

That entire post rests on the assumption that the referenced scriptures were not in any way embellished or strategically fabricated by anyone at any time. Meanwhile, you haven't demonstrated how we can rule-out that possibility. Until then, why should we accept your speculation about the reliability of the scriptures as being more valid than my speculation about their unreliability?

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 27 by bluegreenearth]

Your entire post is just a series of questions, do you have any conclusions to propose and if so based on what actual verifiable evidence? If we dismiss the faulty logic that if one can lie one probably is, what exactly are you proposing regarding Pauls writings other than groundless speculation?


JW