B
Ben_Masada
Guest
With this explanation above, you have only confirmed my assertion that Paul was lying when before the Sanhedrin, he answered saying that he had been arrested because of his hope in the resurrection. Lapell, come on! Don’t you think it’s high time to stop fighting against the Truth? What are you afraid of, that the Church will excommunicate you? Fear not. You will only be exchanging the Faith of Paul for the one of Jesus. Don’t you think you will be much better off?A first attempt was in Acts 22, 1-21, where he took the whole thing from the beginning, explaining where he came from, and his background before that turning point when on his way to Damascus the resurrected Jesus appeared to him. At one point, he said that the Lord (the resurrected Jesus) told him: “Go, I will send you to the Gentiles” and right then, he was interrupted by shouts: “Do away with him! This man shouldn’t be allowed to stay alive!” The next day, the Roman officer wanted to know exactly what were the charges the Jewish Council (that’s the High Priest and the Sanhedrin)had against Paul. Chapter 23. That’s where Paul, in verse 6, shouted: Brothers, I am a Pharisee and a descendant of Pharisees. I am on trial because I expect that the dead will come back to life." As you pointed out, this was not the charge against him per se, but since it all had to do with his preaching the resurrected Jesus as the Messiah, and the implications of this on a number of details on how to serve the Lord God from then on, not only in Paul’s view, but in the new Church authorities’ view (see the decision the Church took at the first historical Church Council held in Jerusalem in Acts 15, 1-31), it WAS certainly quite correlated! It was not the last time Paul would speak up. (Continued in my next post)