A Virtual File Cabinet for Our Studies of Christian Origins & Hebraic Faith
Acts 22 – Was Paul Really a Roman Citizen? Extract from above link- There are a few scholars that deny the historicity of Paul’s citizenship. He does not mention it in his letters, the only source is the Book of Acts. Several questions have been raised. First, would a “tent-maker” be able to obtain citizenship? […]
Continue ReadingThis post begins with an extract from a Bart Ehrman “Miss-quoting Jesus” podcast and then there is a series of three ChatGPT prompt-responses. Q: Paul seems well-educated for an apparently blue-collar type of guy. He’s a tentmaker or leatherworker. How did someone of this social class learn to read and write? He also seems to […]
Continue Reading8/1/2026 – This long post contains 4 responses from Claude.ai that begin with Paul’s 1 Cor 15:3–5, the earliest written testimonies to the resurrection, predating the Gospels by decades. The second response is why that text is not believed to be Paul’s creation and how that makes it closer to Jesus. The third response is […]
Continue ReadingThis post contains the “We” passages from Acts extracted in order to show how they flow as one script, indicating they were inserted from a source who knew the Mediterranean and seafaring. This post stemmed from the post with a summary of a Dom Crossan interview here. Many scholars consider these passages central to the […]
Continue ReadingThis post contains Claude.ai’s summary of the transcript of JD Crossan’s interview on the History Valley podcast titled Luke Lied: He Never Traveled With Paul And Acts is Fictional!. That title does not represent what I found in the interview. Dom was explaining his view that Luke/Acts must be read as one 2-volume work with […]
Continue ReadingFrom Claude.ai on 7/21/2026. First Prompt – What do critical bible scholars say about how Paul and Jesus understood different biblical traditions, as Jesus would have understood the Bible in Hebrew or in Aramaic, whereas Paul’s biblical tradition is the Greek Bible? First Response – This is one of the more well-developed observations in critical […]
Continue ReadingBelow are extracted paragraphs by Charles Bledsoe in BSA’s form “God, Faith & Theology” here. He expresses his view that Paul and Paul’s followers’ concern is “is a promise of personal liberation from death, and the absence of a robust ethical spirituality, or a spirituality that understands love of God as an end in itself,“ […]
Continue ReadingBelow is Claude.ai’s summary of a summary by Joseph Nobles/BSA of Bazzana’s chapter in Paul Within Paganism, not the original article itself. Here’s a summary of what Joe’s summary contains. “Paul among the Other Possessed” — Giovanni B. Bazzana (pp. 121–138 in Paul Within Paganism, ed. Chantziantoniou, Fredriksen, and Young) Summarized by Joseph Nobles of […]
Continue ReadingYear 1689 Paul commandment about government went out of fashion in the English speaking World. In Romans 13:1 Paul states that governing authorities have been instituted by God and that no Authority exists that was not instituted by God. In 13:2 he writes whoever resists Authority resists what God has appointed and those who resist […]
Continue Reading6/21/2026 “Paula Fredriksen Interview” Short about Paul. Transcribed by TurboScribe from https://youtu.be/tYcifm-ATGA?si=OtadFRdlAliD5oet, YouTube date: Aug 14, 2012. We think of Paul as a Christian because we’re standing on top of 20 centuries of the development of Christianity. But if we’re interested as historians in how Paul looked at himself, it’s clear from his own letters […]
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