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Paul claims to be a Pharisee, I tend to doubt it because what he actually wrote is wildly different from what the Tanak actually says. There’s really no precedent in the Hebrew Bible for a dying rising god, human sacrifice for sins, or ritual cannibalism. He also gets very basic things wrong. The Passover lamb has nothing to do with a sin offering.
The other thing odd about Paul’s claims is that he’s claiming to have been taught by one of the most famous Rabbis of the era, Gamaliel. This is a really wild claim to make. It would be like some random guy claiming to have learned physics at the feet of Einstein, yet not understand very basic first year physics. The two don’t fit together.
If he was actually a Pharisee then he would have been taught in Jerusalem by the Rabbi there. It's like accusing someone who went to grad school in the University of Chicago in the 80's for economics of pretending they were taught by Milton Friedman or Robert Lucas. Of course they were taught by them, how could they not be?
He specifically claimed to have been taught by Gamaliel. It wasn’t just attending a university.
(https://biblehub.com/acts/22-3.htm) “ I, indeed, am a man, a Jew, having been born in Tarsus of Cilicia, and brought up in this city at the feet of Gamaliel, having been taught according to the exactness of a law of the fathers, being zealous of God, as all you are today.”
That’s not really attending the same school. That’s having someone as your teacher.
In my example it was also having that famous person as your teacher. Your advisor even. I don't see what's absurd about a Pharisee having another Pharisee as a teacher. Some people must have been taught by Gamaliel. Why not Paul?
He gets very basic Jewish theology wrong. There’s absolutely nothing in the Jewish Bible that suggests a human sacrifice for sins. The lambs killed during Passover were not sin offerings. These are pretty basic things to get wrong.
And? He was raised a Pharisees, then has his literal 'Road to Damascus' incident and adopts the Christian belief in Jesus' sacrifice for our sins.
No, but Jesus' death was in Christian belief. The lamb is just a parallel to Christs' sacrifice. The claim he is like the sacrificial lamb can easily be explained as a parallel coming from them both being sacrifices, not that the lamb was a way to remove sin from people (if it was why would Jesus' sacrifice be needed when we could already sacrifice a lamb?).
Jesus is the sacrifice that creates a new covenant. This parallels the creation of the old covenant in Egypt where lambs were sacrificed. Paul is very explicit that the new covenant parallels the old one that began in Egypt.
I think both religions are jokes, but you are misrepresenting Paul here.
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