Not all that long ago.
I’ve mentioned before that went to a catholic boys school. As a teen, I was very curious and wanted to read the bible. We were actively discouraged from reading the bible, “Lest you become confused” (Hand on heart, I swear that’s
true) So naturally, I read the whole thing. I immediately understood why they didn’t want us to read it. It’s full of contradictions and some of it is just plain loopy. —Pretty much all of of the Torah, and in he gospels Revelations especially.
Saul and his hallucinations are a special case. Several books are claimed to be forgeries by many reputable scholars.
Further, without Saul the very Jewish sect which came to be called christianity would probably not exist. Saul went against Jesus’ claim that he had not come to change the law. Perhaps the most important change was abolishing the ritual commandments ,such as circumcision and the dietary laws. That meant gentiles could join. A large proportion of early members were from marginalised groups, especially women and slaves.
Of course the power of the new church became significant after it was made the state religion by the emperor Theodosius in the fourth century. With the approval and encouragement of the emperor, these holy people began murdering anyone who disagreed with them. They also burned any books which disagreed with their
recently established canon… Those practices continued with gay abandon for over 1000 years.
I happen to agree with Susanh’s (heretical for a catholic) idea that the historicity of Jesus is irrelevant. I think the same can be said for the founders of virtually all ancient religions. The reason is that religious belief is based on faith, not facts, reason or science.
Justas well, over the last year or so, my positions has ben slowly changing from an historical one to that of the mythicist . IE from: A wandering rabbi called something like Yeshua bar Yusuf may have existed in first century Judea.
To; it’s beginning to look to me as if Jesu was not an historical figure. That Christianity is a synthesis of Judaism and the Greek mystery religions***
***'Richard Carrier on the historicity of Jesus.