Saul Of Tarsus Essay

To describe the life of Saul of Tarsus is to pursue the question: “How did this zealous Jew, Saul the Pharisee, who by his own admission had been an active persecutor, a hater, of the early Jesus-movement, suddenly emerge as a fervent follower of the risen Christ?”. For the sake of understanding, Paul’s life can be neatly separated into three distinct stages: his identity prior to his conversion experience, his conversion experience, and his life as a follower of Jesus. In the following pages, these stages of life will be dissected to obtain a firm grip on the person of Paul. The Apostle Paul used his Jewish training and identity to disseminate the Gospel of Jesus Christ deep into Europe and Asia Minor. Seeing that he rejected many traditional

pillars of Judaism, and embraced Jesus as a risen messiah, Paul was indeed acting as one of the world’s first “Christians.”
Originally, Paul’s identity was on par with a model Pharisee: raised according to Jewish customs and rapidly ascending the ranks of Second Temple Judaism. Paul was a zealot: committed to the ideals of his religious sect, and opposed to progressivism, specifically as it took shape in the Jesus movement. In his letter to the Galatians, Paul admits that he “was violently persecuting the church of God and was trying to destroy it.” The narrative of Paul persecuting early followers of Jesus, as told in Acts, can be accepted with reasonable certainty given Paul’s firsthand corroboration of the events in his letter to the Galatians. In his quest to eradicate those who will later be called “Christians,” Paul obtains executive permission to seek out Christians in the city of Damascus. It is at this point in the narrative of Paul that the perfect congruence between the author of Acts, and Paul himself, begins to fade.
Almost undoubtedly, Paul underwent a life changing experience along the road leading from Jerusalem to Damascus. While the author of Luke-Acts depicts a fantastic scene of divine revelation and intervention in the life of a man doing wrong, Paul’s own account of the event in Galatians is drastically more modest–neglecting to mention almost every dramatic aspect of his experience with the risen Christ. Omissions as significant as Paul’s in the first chapter of Galatians have led many to question the integrity of the account in Acts. The two accounts can, however, be reconciled by appealing to Paul’s authorial discretion; it is possible that in the mind of Paul, the Galatian people simply did not need to know (or would not benefit from knowing) about his legendary experience. It is worth mentioning that there is also debate centered on the classification of Paul’s experience on the road to Damascus. From the account in Acts, one might be tempted to label the sequence of events as a supernatural conversion from an apostate of Jesus, to a follower of Jesus. From reading Galatians alone, a different conclusion might be drawn. Paul seems to attribute his turnabout of beliefs to a prenatal calling, very much akin to the Jewish tradition of a “calling of a prophet”. Characterizing the nature of Paul’s experience is nontrivial, because it allows us to better understand the motivations and self-image of Paul throughout his missionary journeys. From an objective point of view, any man who embraces the law and rejects the Christ, only to later reject the law and embrace the Christ, is a man who few would hesitate to identify as “converted.” The very nature of conversion is to change from one form to another. The fact that Paul changed into something ambiguous should not be sufficient justification to deny that a conversion took place at all.
As a changed man, Paul then sets out from Damascus with intentions to “bring salvation to the ends of the earth.” Here, at Paul’s departure from Damascus, another potential Acts-Galatians contradiction arises. Paul says rather explicitly that after leaving Damascus, he did not confer with any human being, nor did he go to Jerusalem to consult with other apostles. According to Paul, he went from Damascus into the wilderness for three years, and eventually journeyed to Jerusalem. The author of Acts seems to claim, albeit rather implicitly, that after Paul’s time in Damascus was over, he traveled to Jerusalem to consult with the Apostles there. While Acts may feel somewhat incomplete by neglecting to mention Paul’s intermediate travel between Damascus and Jerusalem, it does not claim that no such travel took place. One must formulate the idea of a contradiction between the accounts. In is equally likely that one author was being specific, while the other was just very vague on the topic.
Acts and Galatians view Paul very differently in terms of his relationship with the Jerusalem church.

After debate on the necessity of circumcision among the barbarians (Gentiles), the “Council of Jerusalem” took place to resolve the dispute. Acts recounts Paul attending the Council because he was “sent forth by the church” (προπεμφθέντες ὑπὸ τῆς ἐκκλησίας); effectively, Paul was summoned by those leaders in Jerusalem who possessed authority over him. This notion of subservience is in stark contrast with Paul’s aura of independence and pious. Paul records the events leading up the Jerusalem council including a “revelation” from God, which lead him to the city. There is a good chance that Paul was attempting to flaunt his autonomy regardless of whether or not it actually existed. Doctrinally, the conclusion of the Council at Jerusalem would have been a great victory for Paul. Paul’s vehement fight against the necessity of circumcision for the Gentiles was validated by the distinguished church leaders, namely Peter and James. As it is written in Acts, Paul was “dismissed” (ἀπολυθέντες) from the council, with only a few especially important Jewish laws for Gentiles to uphold. Possibly as a matter of hubris, Paul neglects to mention any laws imposed upon his gentile

followers.
Following his dismissal from the council, Paul travels around encouraging and solidifying churches he has established throughout Antioch. His bold stances and controversial messages go far from unnoticed by the Jewish establishment: imprisonment, beatings, and ridicule became commonplace for Paul. In his letter to the Romans, Paul expresses his desire to visit Rome, something he had been unable to do up to that point. In a brilliant way, Paul is able to employ his captivity to accomplish his goal of getting to Rome. Persistently appealing to his Roman citizenship, Paul is taken to Rome in order to be tried by Caesar. Rome would ultimately be Paul’s final destination, where he wrote the last of his epistles in captivity. Christian tradition holds that Paul was killed (likely by beheading) at the outset of Nero’s widespread persecution of the Jesus-movement. Little is offered to us from concrete history, but it is clear that the Apostle Paul ceases to exist after arriving in Rome. Thus the conclusion of the life of an early Christian who has been heavily debated, despised, rejected, embraced, and idolized. The life of Saul of Tarsus was undeniably impactful, and his legacy remarkably lasting.