It is somewhat of a puzzle. Paul was very successful creating a non-Jewish version of Christianity with no gospels, no miracles, not teachings, no history, just the resurrected lord. So why did the Gospels come about? Were they written by authors with different views than Paul's as an alternative? Were they written to create a figure consistent with Paul's risen Lord? At one time in my life I gave a fair amount of attention to the question of 'Who was the historical Jesus? When I was thinking about that, it never crossed my mind that the religion had begun and expanded with no historical Jesus at all. That expansion does make sense if it is based on a mystical experience of the risen Christ, but it doesn't explain why the Jesus of the gospels needed to be created? Just for background effect?

It probably reinforces Dennis McDonald's argument that the earliest gospel (Mark) was written on the model of an Homeric epic, following the life of the hero. If the person who created the religion had no knowledge of the person who had died and resurrected to save them, something would need to be developed to reinforce the salvation story.

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1977 300d 70k--sold 08
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1985 409d 65k--sold 06
1984 300SD 315k--daughter's car
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