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In this episode, Dr. James Tabor (retired Professor from the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, where he taught Christian origins and ancient Judaism for 33 years) and Megan the facts and non-facts we know about the Apostle Paul:
~What are our sources of information about Paul?
~Misquoting (and misappropriation) of Paul
~Did Paul actually say women should be silent in church?
~Was Paul antisemitic?
~Did Paul meet Jesus in life?
~Paul’s argument about circumcision
~What is “astral immortality?”
~How does Paul describe his vision of Jesus? How is that related to Paul’s teaching on the resurrection of believers?
~How does Paul describe heaven?
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Thank you for exposing this false prophet/apostle.
Scholars, lol
Paul has gotta be the most interesting character.
But even Christians don't believe you go to heaven ultimately, ultimately you go to a "new earth" that will not recognize family
Sorry to hear about your mother
James Tabor's book Paul and Jesus and Robert Eisenman's books on the subject is very instructive.
Seems to me Paul was the first century equivalent of a modern televangelist. Can't stand him.
I wish it was talked more about Paul's esoteric practice with Kundalini/dionysus and meditation. I study this topic on my own free will intently. I even practice meditation with Kundalini. End result is, Paul practiced mysticism. I can gauruntee that he was taught kabbalh before kabbalah was even termed kabbalah. I'm not quite sure why this is such a taboo subject around Paul or around other prophets in the ancient world. These are all part of Paul's teachings. Mysticism is part of the man's teachings. It's his very foundation. His confrontation on the road to Demascus implies he was into Kundalini, meditation and chakras, even though it's not bluntly written. Again it's implied that Jesus meditated and had occult powers to through Kundalini even though it wasn't directly written in an obvious way. Maybe Bart Ehrman would like to do a segment on this. It would be greatly appreciated.
It sounds from this like Paul was bi-polar.
"We dont want to be found naked" Yeah, you dont😎 In inannas descent to the underworld, Inanna was not one for wearing many clothes, but she gets to the last gate, the last article of clothing gies off, and shes dead.
James's discussion is just brilliant, extraordinary. His discussion in lecture 2 about the mystical Paul and his ideas about heaven and the afterlife are extraordinary.
I would make one critique, however. The notion of a layered heaven come from mesopotamia. It comes from the evolution of belief from the prehistoric to the Persian period. As the civilization grew there was a top god, generally Anu, but often enlil or Enki, depending on whether you were more power devoted or spiritual. And below these are the grandchildren, spirits of various types, demigods, etc. By the end of the first Babylonian period there were thousands of gods and the levels indicated a type of heirarchy. I think Ezekial is reflecting a neobabylonian notion of heaven.
This layered structure of heaven feeds into prehellenized yahwism during a period when it was still polytheistic, but remains when it becomes "monotheistic". The problem however is that Anuism is so old we cannot really see its earliest tendrils interacting with other cultures. An example is the early beliefs of the civil Aegean, from what we understand, can be synchetized with neareastern belief. But more than that the greek written languages is phonecians and the scribes were also the teachers of religion.
In a really simple early model Hades was just a cave were dead people were placed, this notion evolved over time from stories flowing about the ancient world. So the question for the reader of Paul is how his version of heaven was picked from Jewish and other notions at the time.
The key notion here is that a mystic can explore heaven [as people claim todo today (See Mythvision Australian Jesus videos)], but in Jewish sensibilities people go to sheol in death and some, like the Essenes and Pharisses believe there is going to be some kind of restoration. What is Paul doing with these preexisting Jewish notions, how is he fitting gentiles into this afterlife picture.
It seems like he's fitting Jesus's mystical ascendency as the first fruits and that the gentile converts will follow. The only thing Paul is really doing is moving forward a preexisting Jewish notion and eliminating a replacing a dividic messiah with his invention.
Happy coincidence, I started reading Jesus and Paul a couple of days ago.
Does the third heaven correspond to the third celestial sphere? Would that correspond to the planet Venus?
I wish you all the best with your family issue, and thank you for posting another informative and engaging video.
IMHO..Paul's prison warden was over his shoulder editing the letters, for better control of the populace.
Split screen format is too distracting … puts too much emphasis on interviewer as opposed to the lecturer.
Misquoting a fictional story? More and more evidence that calls Jesus's existence into question, which would be a much better subject for a podcast.
There is one interesting detail/ similarity about the Paul’s Hebrew name “Saul” and story of King Saul in the Old Testament. King Saul persecuted David like Paul did with the early followers of Jesus (messiah). And the future Messiah is expected to come from this Davidic Line. This makes me think whether Paul chose or mentioned the name Saul refering the story of Kind Saul and David. I think this similarity would be impactful especially among the Jewish followers of Jesus and affirm the idea that Jesus was the Messiah from the house of David.
Peter, James and Jesus all came from Arabia. The lost gospel of Waraqah Ibn Nawfal in western Arabia @ 400 BCE has a ‘Issa ‘. Paul goes to Arabia to get the special parchments- above?- to understand Peter’s religious approach to Jesus. Kamal Salibi’s “Who was Jesus?: a Conspiracy in Jerusalem “,1988.
For my taste, too much theology, and too little history.
No one does a better job than Bernadette Roberts at explaining the difference between resusitation and resurrection.
Paul was just a big liar and fabricator. Anyone with common sense can see that. Jesus spends all his earthly time with his disciples. Then goes away for few days. Then appears one last time to have dinner with them. Time passes and Paul shows up with his huge news of seeing Jesus and start preaching something different than what Jesus taught.
Now Christians tell us Jesus is God himself. He performed all those miracles on earth. Supposedly he sees all this taking place. Why on earth did he not communicate with one of his close disciples like Peter and confirm Paul's stories? If he could appear to Paul he could have easily appeared to his other buddies. All in all Christianity has no solid foundation to stand on.
I have to admit, I've never found James Tabor that interesting but this is really great
We got a substitute teacher today? i bet he makes us watch a video…
Dr. Ehrman, I can honestly say that you are the professor I’ve learned the most from in my life, and I have never even had the pleasure of being in one of your courses. I’ve learned more from your online courses than all the professors I had when I got my bachelors degree in English. I just wanted to thank you for the great work you’ve done over the years and also offer my condolences for your loss. Loss is the most unfortunate reality of the human condition. Your family will be in my thoughts as you go through this difficult time.
DOES HE hear your comments?
Paul was just an obvious scam.
Christians need to wake up and face this absolute fact and break away from Paul’s Idolatry
Bart is one of the most favorite scholars .
A great video. The discussion in Part 2 concerning Paul's conception of the afterlife is very similar to modern-day NDE descriptions (i.e., Dr's Mary Neal and Eben Alexander). Paul possibly had a NDE after being stoned in Deby and being left for dead outside the city gate. Which may explain his 'vision'.
I love it when Megan chimes in with some cross-references to Messopotamia to give perspective. Very useful.
we should not be advised by folk from 2000 years ago …thank god the hospitals have moved away from their advice.
If this Paul had been with this Jesus, all I can say is that all this Jesús knew is what Paul knew. So it looks like Paul and Jesus was the same person.
Definitely want another hour of Tabor. He's very knowledgeable and I'll definitely be checking out his website now. That being said, I can't wait for Bart to be back next week!
I like a lot of what Dr Bart says about Christianity (not politics lol) but fortunately Dr Bart keeps his personal political views mostly to himself. 😉👍
Fantastic conversation, love Dr. Tabor
I like to listen to you late at nihte but Meghan is too loud