Mistakes In Approaching The Pauline Writings

In modern evangelicalism, the writings of Paul--more specifically, misrepresentations of Paul's words--are often treated as the pinnacle of Biblical teachings, followed by those of Jesus, and then by those of the Old Testament.  In reality, the emphasis should be in reverse order.  The Old Testament is the foundation of the teachings of Jesus, with both serving as the foundation of the Pauline books.

If every part of the Bible has divinely inspired authority, no single part is "more true" than another.  No truth can possess more veracity than another truth.  However, some parts of the Bible are objectively more foundational or important than others.  Paul's writings have nothing to hold them up when they are removed from the context of the Old Testament, particularly the Pentateuch, and the gospels.  Isolating his contributions from these other books of the Bible inevitably results in an erroneous theology.

Just as damaging as the irrational elevation of Paul over the Old Testament, though, is the systematic distortion of what Paul actually says: Paul is not the sexist, anti-nomian Calvinist that he is often represented as being by many modern evangelicals.  Evangelicals rightly decry Catholicism for its heavy reliance on human traditions, when the bulk of their own theologies is nothing but popular straw men of Paul's claims that have become wrongly accepted as his actual positions.  When combined with a dangerous overemphasis on Paul, these distortions have horrendous ideological consequences.

If the Pauline books were omitted from the Bible, our understanding of only a few Biblical doctrines would be diminished, while, at the same time, a very large proportion of the passages that are often misinterpreted by Christians and non-Christians alike would be removed.  A significant number of the verses that are misquoted or referenced out of context in order to mistakenly argue for some unbiblical position--such as complementarianism, Calvinism, or modesty teachings--are from Paul's books.  This, of course, does not invalidate Paul's actual claims, but it is a largely unaddressed fact.

Other asinine theological claims, like the ones that God created everything [1] and that eternal conscious torment awaits all unsaved beings [2], do not originate from misinterpretation of Pauline writings, so not all major Biblical errors come from distortions of Paul's texts.  Great care is needed when approaching any Biblical passage precisely because there is not a single Biblical idea that has not been twisted, but some portions of the Bible happen to be more commonly misinterpreted, even though it is often out of sincerity.  Despite the manner in which his writings are usually twisted the most frequently, Paul is by no means the misogynistic, deterministic, anti-nomian author evangelicals and atheists alike often make him out to be.


[1].  See here:
  A.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/11/the-ramifications-of-axioms.html
  B.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/09/a-refutation-of-naturalism-part-2.html

[2].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/03/revelation-20-and-annihilationism.html