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Rabbi Paul: An Intellectual Biography

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In a companion work to his "Rabbi Jesus" (2002), Bruce Chilton writes a concise biography of the Paul from the New Testament. In both books, Mr. Chilton emphasizes the Jewishness of his subjects in his quest for the historical person. This work does not break new ground but pulls together the leading scholarship consensus on Paul.

This work is intended for the general reader as an introduction to Paul's life and evolving theology -- it is thorough but concise at 350+ pages. Working from Paul's letters to the leaders of the local churches and from the Acts of the Apostles, Mr. Chilton emphasizes how Paul was responsible for broadening the faith in Jesus as the Messiah to including gentiles without the burden of the Law (the dietary rules and circumcision requirements). Among Paul's many contributions to Christian theology, this was the key one -- when the Jewish-Christian Church based in Jerusalem disappeared during the chaos of the War against Rome in the late 60's, the Gentile Church remained to carry on.

For a different approach toward Paul, the reader can read Jerome Murphy-O'Connor's "Paul: His Story". Utilizing the same framentary material as Mr. Chilton, Mr. Murphy-O'Connor argues for a more unique and sometimes creative history of Paul. I prefer Mr. Chilton's less-daring but more probable account of the life of Paul. For a more advanced look at Paul, the reader can consult the earlier works of either E.P. Saunders or Gunther Bornkamm.

`Rabbi Paul, An Intellectual Biography' by Professor of Religion, Bruce Chilton has a barely tautological title which is still capable of a hint of misdirection.

The virtually obvious aspect of the title is the fact that so little is known with certainty of the hard details of `Paul of Tarsus' life that a 332 page book must, by necessity, spend a lot of time on the intellectual content of Paul's Epistles which make up the most robustly theological portion of the New Testament. There are two facts about this book that can be slightly misleading. First, I believe the title of `Rabbi' applied to Paul may be just a bit of a stretch. `Rabbi' is a strictly Jewish title which, I believe, is only applied to a teacher of `the law' as laid out in the Torah and explicated in the Talmud. The main thrust of Paul's Christian theology was to make the Torah irrelevant to being a Christian. Second, while this book does deal with Paul's theology, I find it very odd that the author devotes less space to discussing the Epistle to the Romans than he does the two Epistles to the Corinthians. `Romans' is commonly believed by everyone from Augustine to Martin Luther to Jonathan Edwards to Albert Schweitzer to 21st Century commentators to be Paul's greatest theological work. Professor Chilton appears to give that honor to the Corinthians letters, which probably have somewhat more gossip than `Romans', so they provide more material for the narrative. Even some of his statements on the provenance of `Romans' seem shaky. He claims the letter was written in the Greek Asia Minor city of Mellitus, while most other reliable Biblical commentaries say it was written while Paul was in Corinth (See `The Oxford Bible Commentary', page 1108).

In one sense, this book can be seen as an exegesis to the Book of Acts of the Apostles, as this part of the New Testament provides most of the hard factual material upon which Chilton builds his speculations on the events in Paul's life. One example of `speculation' is the author's surmises on what Paul did during the years he spent in the desert of the Nabatean Kingdom south of Judea. The author's reasonable guess is that he made tents, as he came from a prosperous family of tent-makers in Tarsus. Aside from `Acts', `1 Corinthians' and `Galatians', there is relatively little material taken from the other Epistles.

This is not to say the book has no scholarly credentials. The end of the book includes about fifty pages of notes and comments on sources. But Chilton is certainly aiming his narrative at a popular audience, since his main text is singularly free of the impedimenta to smooth reading found in scholarly works on Paul, of which there are thousands. This includes words, phrases, and sentences quoted in Aramaic, Greek, or Latin; long footnotes in barely readable fonts; and indecipherable references to six volume works in German, Latin, or French. Thus, while most of those thousands of works have no value for the average interested reader, this volume had interest aplenty. I almost wish Chilton had done just a bit more referring to his sources in the main line of his text. Chilton firmly subscribes to the belief that Paul was influenced by the Stoics, but he doesn't connect Paul's beliefs with concrete Stoic works quite as well as I would like. I would like to know more about the Paul, the Stoics, and `eastern' mystery religions of this period, because I suspect Paul's Stoic `doctrines' could have come from other sources; but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt pending more reading on my part.

If this work achieves nothing else, it will give Paul a human personality, combining all known biographical facts we have about him with reasonable hypothesizing about his character and his interactions with his congregations in Asia Minor and Greece. One interesting question it answers is why Paul planned to travel to the ultimate West (the Roman province of Hispania, modern Spain) when it is highly unlikely that Christianity had yet been brought to all cities in the eastern half of the Mediterranean. The answer seems to be that Paul simply wore out his welcome with the good citizens of Asia Minor, Greece, and his home bases of Antioch and Jerusalem.

Since Paul's most important interpreter for our times was Martin Luther, an opinion Chilton firmly endorses, it is easy to think of Paul as having the same kind of constantly doubting `existential' personality. Chilton shows this was not even close. Paul was nothing if not sure of his positions and his beliefs. In fact, he may have been just a bit too self-assured as when he held positions contrary to the young church leaders in Jerusalem, especially Jesus' brother, James, the leader of the Jewish Christians.

It is easy to discount James in the history of Christianity. This book firmly establishes that James was certainly one of the `big three' among Christian apostles around 45 - 55 CE together with Peter and Paul. The problem with James is that while the Catholics lionize Peter and the Protestants promote Paul, James has no strong advocate among modern Christian groups.

One problem with writing a book for a popular audience is that you let yourself slide on some details; as when Chilton refers to an Asia Minor location as being in Turkey. The term `Turkey' didn't exist until the Ottoman Empire, and even then, it was probably not common until after the end of the First World War. At any rate, it certainly was NOT the name used by the natives or their Roman governors!

This book is a great commentary to be read in conjunction with a study of the book of `Acts of the Apostles'. It is also a superior `popular' treatment when compared to `The Gospel According to Paul' by Oxford (Lincoln College) don, Robin Griffith-Jones. If you wish to study Paul's theology, stick with the scholarly commentaries on his Epistles.

The best part of this book that I have read is the quote by Martin Luther on page 184. Parts of the book are thought provoking and the book is filled with intriguing speculation which appears to be guesswork. Chilton claims that the revelation given to Paul upon Paul's visit to the third heavens was concerning the make up of the "new Israel" of God. He fails to convince. He puts Paul on probation from Jerusalem, at odds with Peter, James and Barnabas and portrays him as a cavalier egomaniac and makes several unsupported jumps and conclusions. From what I have read of reviews on his book Rabbi Jesus these things seem as nothing new. At times he speaks somewhat negatively about the writing in the Book of Acts. It is not a horrible book to read, can be thought provoking, at times good in bringing out the Greek meaning of a word (such as euangellion which means announcement of a great victory) . . . and finally the great humor found on page 184. For more accurate reading on Paul let me suggest Paul and the Self by Knox Chamblain or Apostle of the Heart Set Free by F.F. Bruce.

This book seemed to be just what I was looking for as I went hunting for the Jewish backgroung from which so many of the early apostles came! Here Chilton was to tackle the problem of how the context in which the Apostle Paul grew up would have effected his ministry. It appeared to be just what the priest ordered.

For the first half of the book, it was really insightful. Chilton spent a chapter talking about Tarsus in Cilicia, "a city of no small means", and the religious environment therein. He spoke specifically about Diaspora Jews in Cilicia and Alexandria and how their reliance on the Septuagint (as opposed to the Scriptures written in Hebrew) would have made them different from Jews of ancient Judea. He spent time discussing Gamaliel the Great, a teacher "at whose feet" Paul studied. He discussed the differences between Ananias, the High Priest, and Gamaliel and how their rivalry must have effected St. Paul. The initial material is profoundly insightful.

Chilton covers the Apostle's conversion, isolation in Arabia, return to Tarsus, call to ministry and the famed "first missionary journey." The amazing feature of Chilton's work up to that point is that he takes the Bible as being accurate. He skillfully reconciles Paul's own account of the events (from the Epistle to the Galatians) with St. Luke's account in the Acts of the Apostles. He says, in effect, Scripture is accurate. He does not dismiss it or say that it is incorrect or try to revise it to his own ends.

That is, he does not revise Scripture until he arrives at the Council of Jerusalem. Then he breaks from the position that takes the Scriptures as accurate and makes on revision that seems to eschew all his further assumptions and assertions. Chilton alleges that the Council of Jerusalem punished Paul and essentially reprimanded him and shut down his ministry. That the letter the Elders of Jerusalem sent to the brothers in Antioch was not sent immediately after the Council's decision, but rather after St. Paul's return to Jerusalem following the "Second Missionary Journey." Acting on this basis causes Chilton to make the following assumptions: 1) that Barnabas left Paul over theological reasons regarding Judaism rather than over a conflict regarding John-Mark; 2) that Silas was sent along on the Second Missionary Journey by St. James the Just (of Jerusalem) as a spy to ensure that St. Paul attended to the decisions of the Elders in Jerusalem; that when Paul parted company with Timothy and Silas in Berea, it was due to their inability to agree to Paul's new and innovative teaching.

Neither of these assumptions is borne out by Scripture, While Acts 16 acknowledges a conflict between Barnabas and Paul, Acts specifies the reason as a dispute over John-Mark, Barnabas's cousin who had previously abandoned the missionaries in Pamphilia on the "First Missionary Journey". Similarly, the notion of Silas as a Jacobean spy is not borne out by Scripture and the thought of Timothy and Silas parting company with Paul over theological reasons neglects their almost immediate reunion in Corinth, their collegial writing of two epistles to the Church at Thessalonica, and Timothy's longstanding relationship with Paul being his Father in the Lord.

Essentially, the quality of the work declines from then on. While there still some quality insight, those pearls of wisdom become fewer and further between as the work progresses. The more Chilton separates from what Scripture actually says and tries to read his "Paul as rebel outcast" theory into Scripture, the less value the text has in giving insight into the life of this incredibly fascinating figure. Ultimately the text ends with a fizzle and not with a bang.

Rewarding experience and refreshing insights by Mr. Chilton's writing about Paul. Everyone in church authority should be required to read this little volumn, especially individuals who use mass media for their message and platform. I am rereading a second time. Thank you again Mr. Chilton.

I really enjoyed reading Rabbi Jesus a few years ago and was looking forward to reading this book when I saw it. It did not disappoint. While I am not a biblical scholar or overly knowledgeable about what the bible really says & means (from Church authorities).

Like Rabbi Jesus, I found that this book did a good job of personalizing the subject, in this case Paul. The author takes from different sources to more round out the personality of Paul. Is this going to always be correct? I don't know, but I am aware of these fill-ins when reading the book, so I'm not concerned that the author is trying to lead me astray.

The last ½ of the book does a good job explaining how Christianity arose from it's Jewish roots. If you are interested in how Christianity got started, read this.

Rabbi Paul was an excellent, historical biography; it is not Scripture, so if you looking for that, of course read the Bible. However, if you are interested, on an intellectual level, about Paul as a person, his travels, his socio-political entanglements, his relationship with James, Peter, Silas and Barnabus, then you will enjoy this immensely. It is NOT a doctoral thesis, thank goodness, but it does contain a detailed notes section that will guide you in terms of the scholarly research used to substantiate each chapter.

If I didn't have a basic background in Christianity and a brush of knowledge of Judiasm, I'd have found this book more of a challenge than illuminating.

Chilton managed, in my view, to suck the life out of, to distance us from one of the pivotal figures in history.

I found it a fascinating read, like a great detective hunt to clarify the different strands of Paul's thought as revealed in his letters and Acts. You did a masterful job with this book.

I also found it much less speculative than Rabbi Jesus, which I think is a virtue.

The only thing that strikes me as objectionable is your inference that Paul struggled with an affinity for prostitutes due to his many warnings about sexual license. I think a more plausible reason is that since, as you admit, Paul is evangelizing in hitherto unexplored spiritual territory, following Isaiah 66:19's vision of westward expansion, and penetrating virginal areas of the Roman Empire, he needed to repeat these warnings since Gentile culture was so sexually immoral. Whereas Peter and others who were writing more to Jewish audiences did not see a need to emphasize this point.

I also do not understand your claim that Paul's harsh invective against Jews in 1 Thessalonians 2:14-16 refers to Jewish believers within the Messianic movement, since Paul refers explicitly to those who killed Jesus?

Thanks for creating this amazing book.

Dear Pastor,

Been reading a very interesting book by Bruce Chilton of Bard College: Rabbi Paul: An Intellectual Biography:

Here are some of the tidbits he offers that I wanted to share with you:

a. The Catholic use of the term Father for Priest derives from Paul, while the Protestant use of Pastor or Minister derives from Matthew who says to call no man father. He claims Paul and Matthew disagree about this. Furthermore, he shows that Jewish rabbis did use the title father, as in the well known Jewish ethical treatise Sayings of the Fathers.

b. Paul's unutterable vision in Third Heaven is that Gentiles become fully Israel upon Baptism. He claims that Paul sharply disagreed with James the Just, Peter and Barnabas about this. The latter permitted baptism without circumcision but still insisted that Gentile believers are inferior or subservient to Jewish believers. Paul seems to renounce this idea.

c. Paul's journey to Arabia after Damascus road was partly to find Sinai and discover the spirit of Moses. Saw himself as new Moses.

d. "Priest" is a contraction of Presbuteros, meaning Elder in Greek.

e. "Church" from Kirche in German which is from Kuriakon meaning "belonging to God" in Greek.

f. Mentions idea that Isa. 66:19 was an inspiration for Paul, and notes Tarshish as Tarsus but fails to note Pul as perhaps alluding to Paul.

g. p.164 claims that Paul's disparaging comment about Jews in 1 Thess. 2:14 refers to his Jewish opponents within the Messianic movement (the so-called Pharisaic Christians against whom he wrote in Galatians) rather than to Jews in general. But v. 15 speaks of those who crucified Jesus, which seems to suggest the reference is to unbelieving Jews in general???

This book shattered my misconceptions of Paul as an usurper of the message of Jesus and a charlatan who lured away Chrisitianity. On the contrary, this book demonstrates how Paul was a founding figure without whom Chrisitianity would probably have never held its own as a major world religion and would have forever remained an obscure sect. Chilton presents Paul as the first true universalist - one who believed there is no distinction between races or classes or ethnic groups. He reached out to all to build his new religion and vehemently resisted those who wished to seclude their beliefs to their own. He paid heavily for his idealogy, but his efforts for inclusion admitted the kind of corruption that the Romans later were able to heap onto Christianity: the idolatry of icons, the incorporation of Roman holidays and festivals into Christianity, etc. Regardless, this is an exciting book that keeps you thinking and inspires your desire to read Paul's letters, after placing them in historical context.

The maps leave a lot to be desired. It is basically the same map reprinted on several pages at various levels of zoom. What would have been more useful is to plot Paul's itinerary at different stages on the maps.