The Conversion of St. Paul

it is VERY odd to me that your eye is first drawn to horse rather than paul.

(mark's post made me laugh out loud here in the library)

Damn x-post!

http://www.artchive.com/artchive/C/caravaggio/st_peter.jpg.html

http://www.artchive.com/artchive/C/caravaggio/matthew.jpg.html

youve got me hooked on caravaggio ryan!

it IS vaguely sexy! none of the commentaries i have read so far really mention that. Paul's posture makes him look like he is in violent sexual ecstasy.

9 Do not add any widow to the list of widows unless she is over sixty years of age. In addition, she must have been married only once 10 and have a reputation for good deeds: a woman who brought up her children well, received strangers in her home, performed humble duties for other Christians, helped people in trouble, and devoted herself to doing good.

11 But do not include younger widows in the list; because when their desires make them want to marry, they turn away from Christ, 12 and so become guilty of breaking their earlier promise to him. 13 They also learn to waste their time in going around from house to house; but even worse, they learn to be gossips and busybodies, talking of things they should not. 14 So I would prefer that the younger widows get married, have children, and take care of their homes, so as to give our enemies no chance of speaking evil of us. 15 For some widows have already turned away to follow Satan. 16 But if any Christian woman has widows in her family, she must take care of them and not put the burden on the church, so that it may take care of the widows who are all alone.

Is there any Christian sect that rejects everything Paul ever wrote? Because this ^^^ is not related to Jesus' teachings at all.

17 The elders who do good work as leaders should be considered worthy of receiving double pay, especially those who work hard at preaching and teaching.

?

24 And so God has given those people over to do the filthy things their hearts desire, and they do shameful things with each other. 25 They exchange the truth about God for a lie; they worship and serve what God has created instead of the Creator himself, who is to be praised forever! Amen.

26 Because they do this, God has given them over to shameful passions. Even the women pervert the natural use of their sex by unnatural acts. 27 In the same way the men give up natural sexual relations with women and burn with passion for each other. Men do shameful things with each other, and as a result they bring upon themselves the punishment they deserve for their wrongdoing.

28 Because those people refuse to keep in mind the true knowledge about God, he has given them over to corrupted minds, so that they do the things that they should not do. 29 They are filled with all kinds of wickedness, evil, greed, and vice; they are full of jealousy, murder, fighting, deceit, and malice. They gossip 30 and speak evil of one another; they are hateful to God, insolent, proud, and boastful; they think of more ways to do evil; they disobey their parents; 31 they have no conscience; they do not keep their promises, and they show no kindness or pity for others. 32 They know that God's law says that people who live in this way deserve death. Yet, not only do they continue to do these very things, but they even approve of others who do them.

are you referring to something like the cainites or a refutation of (early) gnosticism? you quote 1 timothy so i assume you mean the latter?

"refutation of gnosticism" header might have some useful content (sorry if this is irrelevant to your search):

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06592a.htm

Paul was an officious and meddlesome man who felt very comfortable telling others how to live their lives and condemning those he disapproved of, while borrowing the mantle of God to cloak his personal judgments. Like a lot of preachers.

He did get some things right:

14 The Gentiles do not have the Law; but whenever they do by instinct what the Law commands, they are their own law, even though they do not have the Law. 15 Their conduct shows that what the Law commands is written in their hearts.

"Is there any Christian sect that rejects everything Paul ever wrote?"

there were a couple anti-pauline sects back in the early days like the ebionites- mostly jewish folks mad about his stance that gentile men didn't have to get circumcised to follow jesus- but they didn't leave any writings and their attempt to convince other jews that jesus was a cool dude, really, kind of faltered in the face of other christians talking about how they were the real jews, man, and decrying the actual jewish people as traitors.

anyway nowadays paul's letters (the ones he actually wrote and not the forgeries) are the earliest surviving christian writings, predating the gospels even, so it's kind of hard to endorse christianity while throwing out everything he said. also he did sometimes contradict himself which makes rejecting absolutely everything he said a little difficult.

what you do have is some christians who try to contextualize what he was writing, by saying that for instance he was not trying to set forth behavioural guidelines for the next two thousand years but was more concerned with trying to keep the christians in the churches he had visited from killing each other before jesus returned in approximately two weeks.

basically all christians find reasons to ignore parts of the bible they don't like, and i've never yet met a christian who likes the whole thing.