Right, okay. Listening back through Acts, @benitocereno said something about the church in Jerusalem being more focused on good works than faith because of the focus on the law. Was that part of the discussion about gentiles in the early church? I’m curious because I know a lot of Sola fide focused denominations are really big on Paul and I’m curious about how that plays out in e.g: more euergetic denominations like the Catholic Church. Do they focus less on Paul as a result?
(I’m probably wording this terribly since I’m on my phone at work)
Friend of the Show Ben Rowe — 02/02/2022
I’m not entirely sure what the question here is and I’m answering off the dome, so I’ll try to answer best I can.
Basically, our best understanding is that the Jerusalem church was led by James the Just, aka Jesus’ brother. Generally speaking the early Christian movement saw itself as a Jewish splinter movement centred in Jerusalem and led by Jesus’ brother. You may regard this as making sense. These Christians saw themselves as Jews first and foremost, and thus encouraged the following of the Law and also that Christians be Jews first - so if you wanted to convert a gentile they had to convert to Judaism first and then to Christianity. For James, good works were the important element here. Being a good person.
This conflicted with Paul’s take on Christianity - where it is important to remember that Paul was a) a latecomer, b) not related to Jesus, c) not in Jerusalem, and d) just some guy. Paul basically came into the Church like Justin Timberlake in The Social Network: “What’s better than a million followers? A billion followers!” Basically, its easier to grow the religion across the Roman Empire if it’s okay for gentiles to join, if they don’t need to convert to Judaism first, if they don’t need to follow the Law, and if the most important thing is faith in Jesus.
To put it one way, James was focused on continuing Jesus’ mission and preaching his teachings. Paul was focused on winning converts. Signing people up to the program. Peter is generally viewed as something of a moderating factor between the two, but was also on team “let the gentiles in”.
So the conflict between James and Paul is both a conflict of Jew vs gentile and also a conflict of works vs faith. A lot of the Epistles can kinda be read as the remains of back and forth diss tracks between James and Paul, except we only have one of James’ remaining, hence the way Christianity kinda became Paul’s Version. (1/2)
So in Paul’s epistles we see a lot of “oh no, for sure, the Jerusalem guys? They’re great! James? Yeah, me and him are tight! How could we not be? Jesus appeared to me on the road to Damascus after all! Oh, also, if you hear anything about me from anyone saying I’m a poseur and full of shit and shouldn’t be trusted and don’t know what I’m talking about and how you need to, like, follow the Law or be a good person to get into heaven or what have you? Yeah, ignore that noise, just have faith in the Lord, you feel me?”
And then in James’ epistle we have James 2:14-20
BibleBot
BOT
— 02/02/2022
James 2:14-20 - New English Translation (NET)
Faith and Works Together
<14> What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but does not have works? Can this kind of faith save him? <15> If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacks daily food, <16> and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, keep warm and eat well,” but you do not give them what the body needs, what good is it? <17> So also faith, if it does not have works, is dead being by itself. <18> But someone will say, “You have faith and I have works.” Show me your faith without works and I will show you faith by my works. <19> You believe that God is one; well and good. Even the demons believe that—and tremble with fear. <20> But would you like evidence, you empty fellow, that faith without works is useless?
BibleBot v9.1-beta by Kerygma Digital
Friend of the Show Ben Rowe — 02/02/2022
Now, I mentioned Peter being sort of seen as a moderating factor. If we accept the notion that the Catholic Church descends from Peter, then in Catholicism we see a focus on good works as well as faith, rather than faith alone. We also see much less emphasis on Paul, because there’s just a lot more to Christianity than that.
The reason we see so much focus on Paul and sola fide in Protestant churches is probably because Protestantism came out of Renaissance humanism and the renewed focus on going back to the primary documents. Actually reading the Bible and seeing what’s in there in the original Greek and going off of that, rather than what the Church tells you.
And when you do that you come upon the inescapable fact that most of the New Testament is Paul. It’s his voice that dominates the texts that made it to canon. And so if you’re stripping away all of the Church dogma and basing your faith on just what’s in the texts, then you’re basing it mostly on Paul, and thus mostly on a sola fide doctrine where the most important thing for getting into Heaven is having faith in the Lord. “Have you accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour?” is a very Protestant and very Pauline phrase.
At least, that’s my take on it, speaking off the dome without access to my books and research.
Madison — 02/02/2022
Oh dang, yeah, that’s perfect! I was curious about the shift of leaning toward Sola fide (which feels very Paul) and how it got to be that way in protestantism, so I was wondering what the lineage was, as it were. Thank you so much!
benitocereno — 02/02/2022
I knew I was right to tag Ben in
Friend of the Show Ben Rowe — 02/02/2022
You’re welcome! Happy to help!
Basically sola fide makes it a lot easier to be Christian and get into Heaven and the easier it is to be Christian and get into Heaven the more Christians you’re gonna have and the more Christians there are the more influential Christianity can be over the state. Paul, after all, was a Roman citizen who believed in Christianity becoming a major part of Roman society and Christians serving the Emperor as good Romans, as opposed to believing that Christianity would overthrow the Romans on behalf of the Jewish people, which would have been more the position of, say, Simon the Zealot.
Tim “The Tool Man” Taylor — 02/02/2022
so Paul coopted a grassroots movement and bent it to serve his own purposes?
Centipede Damascus — 02/02/2022
Eh, I hesitate to say he co-opted it, there were a lot of things that led to his vision being so central to the movement, and there just wasn’t anyone else who was as prolific a writer in the early church as far as we know.
Beriah — 02/02/2022
I do not hesitate to say that Paul co-opted Christianity, but nearly all my education on early Christianity comes from the show
Margot — 02/02/2022
James the Just is the only early Christian I stan
sorry everyone else
Friend of the Show Ben Rowe — 02/02/2022
Or at least who’s writings survived, which probably has as much to do with how widespread the recipients of his writing were as it was how much he wrote.
Like, even if James wrote “more”, if it was all just kept in a desk drawer in Jerusalem and was burned in 70 CE, then poof it’s gone. But Paul sent letters to everybody and then those communities made copies and suddenly everyone’s got them.
Centipede Damascus — 02/02/2022
It seems at least that James wasn’t completely discounted by the early church, seeing as they included his letter in the canon. I am really curious why we don’t know who wrote Hebrews though.
Friend of the Show Ben Rowe — 02/02/2022
(My take is that Hebrews was written by a woman and that’s why we don’t)
Centipede Damascus — 02/02/2022
Yeah, I like the Apollos and Priscilla theories the most.
Friend of the Show Ben Rowe — 02/02/2022
Yeah Priscilla is my vote.
exquisite wizard samwise gamzee — Yesterday at 5:13 AM
while I wouldn’t be jazzed about the whole ‘christianity but it’s judaism first’ thing of the epistle of james coming back (hard stare at you, messianic judaism), i do like his arguments on works and faith
Womzilla (he) — Yesterday at 7:19 AM
Everything @Friend of the Show Ben Rowe is correct, and I’ll add in the historical context of Luther’s writing. The Western (Roman Catholic) church’s theological emphasis was a mixture of faith and good deeds, but the practical effect of “good deeds” was “give lots of money to the Church to spend on ‘your’ behalf”. In particular, purchasing indulgences for the dead in Purgatory was a massive cash cow that Luther abominated. Returning to the source documents and to the primacy of faith was a crowbar to attack that doctrine in particular.
Like Gorbachev centuries later, Luther was a true believer in a system stagnant with corruption and mismanagement and he thought that reforms would relegitimize the institution.
Friend of the Show Ben Rowe — Yesterday at 12:28 PM
