著者

ZION Mark N.

出版者

中央大学総合政策学部

雑誌

総合政策研究 (ISSN:13417827)

巻号頁・発行日

no.21, pp.81-108, 2013-03

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When presenting the fundamental beliefs of Christianity to students in Asia, the question is: Where to begin? "Begin with Jesus of Nazareth" is the common answer. Yet, was Jesus of Nazareth the founder of Christianity? In reality, Christianity began from one person's formal letters, Paul of Tarsus (c. 5-67 CE). Through these letters, addressed to various Christ communities around the Roman Empire, we encounter an extraordinary consciousness, one of the great figures of Western civilization and arguably the most influential. These letters show not only Paul's complicated personality but also a complicated social-historical context: the mixtures of ethnic groups in the Eastern Mediterranean of the first-century CE. Paul's letters ignited the most far-reaching social experimentation the world has known. But why would Paul, a Jew in the Diaspora, insist that his religion of Judaism transcend its ethnic boundaries? In this article, I will review a little of these extraordinary letters, with a short biographical sketch, before highlighting two of Paul's permanent contributions to Western religious consciousness: 1) the belief that Jesus of Nazareth's death and resurrection were experientially redemptive; 2) the belief that the Christ congregations were the New Israel. Why Paul articulated these ideas can only be hinted at.