Books about early Christianity

by EdenOne 32 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  Doug Mason

  Eden,

  I agree that Paul invented Christianity. He said he owed nothing to the Jerusalem Church. His writings were first and the others copied ideas from him, such as Jesus' words at the institution of the eucharist; he was not there and neither was any of the Gospel writers.

  However, I think that the Jerusalem Church is represented in the NT Canon by Mark (follower of Peter) and by Matthew (given its Jewish focus, character and culture). The Matthew Gospel does give priority to Peter (as against Paul) as having the "keys to the kingdom".

  As an aside, it is interesting to see how much use the NT writers made of the Jewish writings that are now considered apocryphal. And 2 Peter, which was written by a Pauline about 150 CE, is a commentary on Jude, which you say is Jewish Christian.

  Doug
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  EdenOne

  Doug, regarding the assumption that Mark and Matthew are less "Pauline" than Luke and John, and therefore, keep a more "authentic" record of the early Christian tradition, you really should read Eisenman's "James, The Brother of Jesus", because it utterly debunks that notion. Eisenman makes too much of certain "themes" and "reversions" [such as the 'cast out', 'whiteness', 'eat', etc] found in the synoptics and John, but he's absolutely thorough in demonstrating the anti-Jesus famiily [anti-Qumran] agenda that pervades Mark and Matthew. I was blown away. It's not an easy read, especially for me, a non-english native speaker, but it's based on fresh research, published very recently - and Eisenman is one of the scholars involved in the publishing of the Dead Sea Scrolls texts.

  Eden
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  EdenOne

  Phizzy, tell me: For a Jew, is it man that outreach for God, or is it God that outreaches for mankind In the first place?

  Eden