better to remain single as I am; but if you would burn in the flesh, you should marry”? What really did drive him? Did he cause a split in the early church (or even a schism); and was it ever healed? Was he convinced that The End was very near? Why didn’t Jesus give any clue about Paul? Can one be a Christian but not accept the authority of Paul? If not, why not? How much of present Christianity is Paulism? Is it really what Jesus wanted?

Cheers, Greg

I’ve followed this debate since studying the subject in Theo college in the ’60s: AMHunter and CHDodd were helpful then. First, I don’t see too many major discrepancies between Paul and Jesus, particularly given that they were coming from opposite ends of the ‘grace-spectrum’ – Jesus from the prophetic end, Paul from the pharisaic end: and these are poles apart, in terms of an understanding of grace. Then, too, their audiences were different. And a significant proportion of Paul’s letters address exigencies/questions in particular Eurasian situations, whereas Jesus’ context was primarily Semitic. etc. etc…

Rowland Croucher

You’ve really got me on this one, Rowland. What on earth do you mean?

— Regards, Richard Kerr

You’ll have to follow the search engine on our website for other material, but briefly: for the pharisaic mindset, repentance precedes acceptance; with Jesus it was the other way around… Which is why Jesus and pharisees (ancient and modern) are like oil and water… (Which is why Lord Longford – of the 70’s Longford report on pornography in Britain – was so unusual. Unlike the Festival of Light/Mary Whitehouse people, he actually befriended people engaged in the industries he was condemning. For which actions, of course, he was condemned by many (pharisaic, presumably) Christians!) Back to the main issue: this question was addressed by F.F.Bruce in his book Paul and Jesus (Baker Book House). His point was that ‘the Paul of the popular imagination and the Jesus of the popular imagination are both figments of the imagination.’ Answering one instance of such prejudice – Denis Wheatley’s condemnation of Paul as ‘an intolerant religious bigot’ who ‘demanded obedience with threats of hellfire’ – Bruce retorts that Paul doesn’t mention hell (which I, for one, find interesting)… Moreover, says, Bruce, it’s Paul to whom we owe the great hymn to Love, and who in days before Women’s Liberation wrote ‘In Christ there is neither male nor female’. (Elsewhere Bruce says you must look at all Paul’s writings about women through the window of Gal. 3:28). Paul and Jesus agree about law and righteousness; both proclaimed a message of grace for the outsider; so both made enemies of Jewwish religious establishment; both were executed by Roman courts etc. etc. A good read…

Rowland Croucher