Oscar Wilde quipped that the chief argument against Christianity was the style of St Paul. He should have also added Paul's teachings.

Jesus thought of himself purely as a Jew, sharing the ideas of the prophets, continuing their work, preaching like them only to the Jews and instructing his disciples to spread his gospel only to Jewish cities. Jesus told them "go not into the way of the gentiles". He pointed out to the Samaritan woman that "Salvation is of the Jews". Paul ignored Jesus's injunction, and went "into the way of the gentiles".

Will Durant wrote in Caesar and Christ: "Paul created a theology of which none but the vaguest warrants can be found in the words of Jesus. Egypt, Asia Minor, and Hellas had long since believed in gods – Osiris, Attis, Dionysus – who had died to redeem mankind. Paul added to this popular and consoling theology certain mystic concepts already made current by the Book of Wisdom and the philosophy of Philo. "Christ," said Paul, is "the wisdom of God, the first-born Son of God". 

Through these interpretations, Paul could neglect the actual life and sayings of Jesus, whom he had not directly known.

Jesus had said: "It is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one tittle of the Law to fail." Paul repudiated the same Law, and called it a curse.

Wilde told a "parable" about Jesus and Paul to the poet W.H. Yeats: "It seemed that Jesus recovered after his crucifixion, and, escaping from the tomb, lived on for many years, the one man on earth who knew the falsehood of Christianity. On one occasion, Paul visited the town where Jesus lived. Jesus was the only one in the carpenters' quarters who did not go to hear Paul preach. Henceforth, the other carpenters noticed that, for some unknown reason, Jesus kept his hands covered."

John Guillaumier

St Julian's