What happened to Paul on the road to Damascus?

[Wootah]

Acts 9 English Standard Version (ESV)
The Conversion of Saul
9 But Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest 2 and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. 3 Now as he went on his way, he approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven shone around him. 4 And falling to the ground, he heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?� 5 And he said, “Who are you, Lord?� And he said, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. 6 But rise and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.� 7 The men who were traveling with him stood speechless, hearing the voice but seeing no one. 8 Saul rose from the ground, and although his eyes were opened, he saw nothing. So they led him by the hand and brought him into Damascus. 9 And for three days he was without sight, and neither ate nor drank.

What happened to Paul on the road to Damascus?

[Zzyzx]

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It could also be the case that another physiological condition could have been responsible for Paul's symptoms.

Can a psychological condition (rather than physiological) be eliminated as a causative factor in his 'experience' -- if there was one as Acts claims?

[bluegreenearth]

[Replying to post 170 by Zzyzx]

I see no reason to rule that out either. Thanks for reminding me to include that option.

[AgnosticBoy]

Obviously you are free to take whatever position appeals to you. You must recognize however that if you take a position that is contradictory to all common observation, common experience, and therefore all common sense, you will have lost an argument based on logic. Taking a position that is contradictory to all common observation, common experience, and therefore all common sense, is little different than stating "It's true because I say so." Which is not offering an argument at all.

Go on believing whatever appeals to you to believe. But you've lost this argument.

We have your explanation and Luke's. You offer a natural explanation and Luke offers a supernatural one. I can see why you believe your conclusion is correct but I disagree that is based on evidence and logic.

In terms of evidence, nothing in the text says that Paul was hallucinating. To the contrary, it describes the event as being a real encounter of Jesus. . You only 'infer' that Paul was hallucinating. Neither you or I were there so there is no empirical evidence to be had here beyond what Luke wrote.

In terms of logic, your argument is nothing more than an argument from ignorance. Sure, we can say that our current day scientific observations don't support any existence of the supernatural, but that doesn't make something false. The obvious reason for this is that the current state of science does not cover all that exists. So instead of saying that the supernatural is "contradictory" to all that we know, wouldn't it be more reasonable to say that it would (or could) be something "in addition to" all that we currently know? That is to say that scientists discover new things all the time, and that intelligent/highly advanced beings besides humans, may be one of those discoveries.

In my view, we can't be sure what happened to Paul while he was travelling to Damascus. Perhaps we can say that it's a historical fact that he travelled and experienced things along that travel. But I don't think historical and textual information alone can validate a supernatural experience.

[Red Wolf]

Who was Paul fleeing from?

Acts 9:22-25 New American Standard Bible (NASB)
22 But Saul [Paul] kept increasing in strength and confounding the Jews who lived at Damascus by proving that this Jesus is the Christ.
23 When many days had elapsed, the Jews plotted together to do away with him, 24 but their plot became known to Saul. They were also watching the gates day and night so that they might put him to death; 25 but his disciples took him by night and let him down through an opening in the wall, lowering him in a large basket.

2 Corinthians 11:32-33 New American Standard Bible (NASB)
32 In Damascus the ethnarch under Aretas the king was guarding the city of the Damascenes in order to seize me, 33 and I was let down in a basket through a window in the wall, and so escaped his hands.

Two contradictory explanations ......isn't Paul a liar?

[Tired of the Nonsense]

Obviously you are free to take whatever position appeals to you. You must recognize however that if you take a position that is contradictory to all common observation, common experience, and therefore all common sense, you will have lost an argument based on logic. Taking a position that is contradictory to all common observation, common experience, and therefore all common sense, is little different than stating "It's true because I say so." Which is not offering an argument at all.
Go on believing whatever appeals to you to believe. But you've lost this argument.

We have your explanation and Luke's. You offer a natural explanation and Luke offers a supernatural one. I can see why you believe your conclusion is correct but I disagree that is based on evidence and logic.

In terms of evidence, nothing in the text says that Paul was hallucinating. To the contrary, it describes the event as being a real encounter of Jesus. . You only 'infer' that Paul was hallucinating. Neither you or I were there so there is no empirical evidence to be had here beyond what Luke wrote.

In terms of logic, your argument is nothing more than an argument from ignorance. Sure, we can say that our current day scientific observations don't support any existence of the supernatural, but that doesn't make something false. The obvious reason for this is that the current state of science does not cover all that exists. So instead of saying that the supernatural is "contradictory" to all that we know, wouldn't it be more reasonable to say that it would (or could) be something "in addition to" all that we currently know? That is to say that scientists discover new things all the time, and that intelligent/highly advanced beings besides humans, may be one of those discoveries.

In my view, we can't be sure what happened to Paul while he was travelling to Damascus. Perhaps we can say that it's a historical fact that he travelled and experienced things along that travel. But I don't think historical and textual information alone can validate a supernatural experience.

dead
adjective
no longer living; having died
naturally without life; inanimate: dead stones
characterized by little or no movement or activity;
https://www.yourdictionary.com/dead

We have your explanation and Luke's. You offer a natural explanation and Luke offers a supernatural one. I can see why you believe your conclusion is correct but I disagree that is based on evidence and logic.

In terms of evidence, nothing in the text says that Paul was hallucinating. To the contrary, it describes the event as being a real encounter of Jesus. . You only 'infer' that Paul was hallucinating.

All empirical evidence indicates that the dead are no longer capable of communicating with the living. Paul seemed to believe that he had a face to face meeting with Jesus, who had been executed by the Romans some few years earlier. All empirical evidence, what I have referred to as common experience, common knowledge, and common sense, indicates that it is physically impossible for an individual to have a face to face meeting with a dead person. Such a claim is the very definition of an hallucination. An hallucination which, in Paul's case, can rather easily be explained by the information provided by Acts, which indicates that Paul experienced some sort of physical collapse, and that Paul was experiencing severe dehydration at the time.

Neither you or I were there so there is no empirical evidence to be had here beyond what Luke wrote.

In terms of logic, your argument is nothing more than an argument from ignorance.

The author of Acts was not present either. The source for the story in Acts is Paul himself. And Paul was the afflicted person.

[Goose]

As was previously indicated by a few others in this thread, epilepsy manifests through a variety of different symptoms.

That’s not much of a counter argument. It’s a little like throwing manure at the wall in the hopes something sticks. Besides, many of those symptoms were known to the ancients and associated with evil spirits.

• â€�The earliest detailed account of epilepsy is in the British Museum, London. It is part of a Babylonian text on medicine, Sakikku [All diseases], which was written over 3000 years ago, i.e. before 1000 BC. I have had the privilege of working with a Babylonian scholar, James Kinnier Wilson, on the translation of this text (Figure 1.1) (7). The Babylonians were keen observers of clinical phenomena and provide remarkable descriptions of many of the seizure types (miqtu) that we recognize today, including what we would call tonic clonic seizures, absences, drop attacks, simple and complex partial seizures and even focal motor (Jacksonian) or gelastic attacks. They also understood some aspects of prognosis, including death in status as well as post-ictal phenomena. The Babylonians had no concept of pathology, however, and each seizure type was associated with invasion of the body by a particular named evil spirit. Thus treatment was not medical but spiritual.â€�
  Atlas: Epilepsy Care In The World 2005, The World Health Organization, pg. 16

Here’s the text of the Babylonian Treatise on Epilepsy.

That text was formed 1000 years before Paul was on the scene and those views hadn’t changed by his time.

�Unfortunately the Hippocratic concept of a treatable brain disorder had little influence on the prevailing supernatural view, as is well described in the scholarly history of epilepsy from the Greeks to the late 19th century by Temkin (9)� - Atlas: Epilepsy Care In The World 2005, The World Health Organization, pg. 16

Not every person with epilepsy displays the same symptoms consistently.

What, then, were Paul’s epileptic symptoms that the ancients would not have associated with demonic possession? That’s going to be tough for you to answer because it seems the ancients had a surprisingly broad and detailed understanding of a wide variety of epileptic symptoms. And they associated all those symptoms with evil spirits.

The references you've cited refer to specific symptoms that may have been absent or less noticeable to Paul during his experience on the road to Damascus.

But the argument is that Paul had some kind of attack of temporal lobe epilepsy on the road to Damascus. If this attack had no symptoms noticeable to Paul or his companions what’s the counter argument supposed to be here? That Paul may have had a kind of epileptic attack and type of epilepsy with no symptoms? How convenient.

It could also be the case that another physiological condition could have been responsible for Paul's symptoms.

Why are you attempting to move off my argument falsifying the epilepsy explanation? Are you ready to concede the epilepsy argument has been falsified? Let’s put the epilepsy argument to bed before we move on to yet another strained psychological condition argument, shall we? Your challenge to premise (2) of my argument has been met as far as I can see. At least you haven’t been able to offer any evidence to think it false and I've provided quite a bit to think it was the case.

[AgnosticBoy]

All empirical evidence indicates that the dead are no longer capable of communicating with the living. Paul seemed to believe that he had a face to face meeting with Jesus, who had been executed by the Romans some few years earlier. All empirical evidence, what I have referred to as common experience, common knowledge, and common sense, indicates that it is physically impossible for an individual to have a face to face meeting with a dead person. Such a claim is the very definition of an hallucination. An hallucination which, in Paul's case, can rather easily be explained by the information provided by Acts, which indicates that Paul experienced some sort of physical collapse, and that Paul was experiencing severe dehydration at the time.

My disagreement is on the nature of the evidence. I know what the current evidence says but that evidence has limitations. It only applies to 'natural' processes. It only applies to what's been observed SO FAR. Sure, we can use inductive logic to generalize to all cases but inductive inferences aren't about proof, but rather about probability (all of which are subject to change based on NEW observations and evidence).

Paul's claims were not scientifically tested.

Neither you or I were there so there is no empirical evidence to be had here beyond what Luke wrote.

In terms of logic, your argument is nothing more than an argument from ignorance.

The author of Acts was not present either. The source for the story in Acts is Paul himself. And Paul was the afflicted person.

Basically, none of us were there except Paul. So none of us have empirically testable evidence in Paul's case.

[Zzyzx]

.

Basically, none of us were there except Paul. So none of us have empirically testable evidence in Paul's case.

There is no assurance that Paul/Saul 'was there'. It is a story told by the writer of Acts (whoever that may have been) long afterward -- in promotion of a splinter group religion being developed.

The world's literature contains many, many accounts of supposed supernatural 'experiences' -- none of which have been verified as truthful and accurate.

Why give any special treatment to the Paul/Saul tale?

[AgnosticBoy]

.

Basically, none of us were there except Paul. So none of us have empirically testable evidence in Paul's case.

There is no assurance that Paul/Saul 'was there'. It is a story told by the writer of Acts (whoever that may have been) long afterward -- in promotion of a splinter group religion being developed.

The world's literature contains many, many accounts of supposed supernatural 'experiences' -- none of which have been verified as truthful and accurate.

Why give any special treatment to the Paul/Saul tale?

Actually, the apostle Paul mentioned it himself if you refer to 1 Corinthians 15:7-8. Scholarly consensus is that Paul authored 1 Corinthians. So there are two sources (one first-hand account) that refers to the same event.

1 Corinthians 15:6-8

6 After that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep; 7 then He appeared to [c]James, then to all the apostles; 8 and last of all, as [d]to one untimely born, He appeared to me also.

[AgnosticBoy]

It is an EXTREME position to think that the apostle Paul did not exist, or that he did not author or report anything, including his supernatural experiences. Such extreme positions are what turn off and separate reasonably-minded scholars from the hyper-skeptics.