The Religion of Paul

According to Paul, Jesus does two things for us. His first gift is to die on the cross. Paul received a powerful experience on the Damascus Road. Despite the fact that he had been persecuting Christians and may have had a role in Jesus’ death, God chose to save him. His experience reconciled him with God. Because of it, he came to believe that Jesus had died for him.

Paul takes his experience of the death of Jesus on the cross and gives it cosmic significance. In doing so, he invents the idea of the atonement. Sin, for a Jew, was a crime, and thus it must be paid for. Jesus dies to pay the penalty of sin for all of us (Romans 3:23-25).

In creating this doctrine, Paul links the death of Jesus to the original sin of Adam. Because of Adam’s sin, humans became alienated from God. Because of Jesus’ obedience on the cross, humans are reconciled (Romans 5: 12-21 and 1 Corinthians 15:23). Adam becomes the symbol of man’s rebellion against God. Jesus’ act of obedience on the cross becomes the symbol of self emptying love that leads to reconciliation with God.

The second gift that Jesus gives us is deep love. In addition to seeing sin as a crime that must be paid for, Paul views it as a moral disposition. Sin is a turning away from God, a disposition to see the world through self, through ego. It is life of the flesh, and it has power, a power that humans are unable to defeat on their own (Romans 7: 14-25). The deep love that Paul encounters on the Damascus Road is what saves him. He literally felt that he had been taken over by Jesus. It is no longer I that lives, but Christ that lives in me (Galatians 2:20).

Only God can make humans righteous. The death and resurrection of Jesus brings this deep experience of love into the world (11 Corinthians 5: 14-16). All that matters is the love experienced in Christ. This love recreates humans (Romans 6:5-7). Faith, by which humans are saved, is not belief in doctrine, but a response to this profound experience (Galatians 5:6).

The love unleashed on the world by the death and resurrection of Jesus is available to all on an equal basis. God has no favorites. All are one in Christ—Jew/Greek, male/female, slave/free (Galatians 3:28-29). Gentiles, Paul’s main concern, need only confess their love of the God of Israel, and accept Jesus as their savior. This acceptance releases God’s transforming love (1 Thessalonians 2: 13-14). It also rescues one from the wrath that is coming. The future for Christians is a glorious existence in heaven in a transformed body (1 Corinthians 15: 35-50).

As mentioned above, only God can heal the divine/human divide. Obedience to religious law cannot. Humans cannot save themselves by their own devices. Paul argues that religious law was given to Israel as a temporary custodian of righteousness until Christ came. It is fine as a guide for human behavior, but it has no power to recreate human life and thus defeat sin. Law provides the knowledge of human sin, but not the solution (Romans 3: 20 and 7: 7-13, Galatians 3:22). The only solution is the deep love experienced in Christ.

As I pointed out in my blog entitled “The Sermon on the Mount,” the religion of Paul and Jesus are different. Jesus has a much higher view of human nature. Humans have the ability to obey religious law. The kingdom of God is given to those who bear good fruit. Jesus urges his followers to obey religious law, to be perfect as God is perfect. The best summary of Jesus’ position on these issues comes in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:1-7: 29). The gospel of Matthew is consistent throughout in espousing this position.

Christians must choose whether to be followers of Jesus or followers of Paul. The vast majority have chosen to follow Paul. I think this is a mistake which I will address in my concluding blog on Paul.