Documents - MX Operation Messiah Did Christianity Start As A Roman Psychological Counterinsurgency

This article was downloaded by: [Universitat Politcnica de Valncia]
On: 29 October 2014, At: 01:17

Publisher: Routledge
Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House,
37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK
Small Wars & Insurgencies

Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information:
http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/fswi20
Operation Messiah: Did Christianity Start as a Roman

Psychological Counterinsurgency Operation?
Thijs Voskuilen
a
MA in History and Journalism from the Rijksuniversiteit Groninggen , The Netherlands
Published online: 25 Jan 2007.
To cite this article: Thijs Voskuilen (2005) Operation Messiah: Did Christianity Start as a Roman Psychological
Counterinsurgency Operation?, Small Wars & Insurgencies, 16:2, 192-215, DOI: 10.1080/09592310500079940
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09592310500079940
PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE
Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the Content) contained
in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis, our agents, and our licensors make no
representations or warranties whatsoever as to the accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the
Content. Any opinions and views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors, and
are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and
should be independently verified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for
any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoever
or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of
the Content.
This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic
reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply, or distribution in any
form to anyone is expressly forbidden. Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://
www.tandfonline.com/page/terms-and-conditions
Small Wars and Insurgencies
Vol. 16, No. 2, 192215, June 2005
Operation Messiah: Did

Christianity Start as a Roman
Downloaded by [Universitat Politcnica de Valncia] at 01:17 29 October 2014
Psychological Counterinsurgency
Operation?
THIJS VOSKUILEN
MA in History and Journalism from the Rijksuniversiteit Groninggen, The Netherlands
ABSTRACT Through examining the life and work of the man who is generally
known as the Apostle Paul, I hope to challenge the idea that the founder of
Christianity was a saint and replace it with the possibility that he really was an
agent-provocateur working for the Roman administration in Palestine and various
other parts of the Empire. Pauls biography and his own letters, both of which were
taken up in the New Testament, hold numerous clues to the effect that this former
persecutor, originally named Saul of Tarsus, never left the ranks of the government,
but instead went undercover after his famous conversion en route to Damascus.
The self-proclaimed successor-to-Jesus was not only treated dramatically
differently from Jesus by the Romans, but they were his friends and allowed him
to live and work for 20 years instead of crucifying him. Jesus original followers
distrusted Paul, and made various attempts to kill him throughout his life. I will
conclude by arguing that Pauls claim that Jesus, this candidate-king of the Jews,
was the Messiah and had been crucified as the will of God (the prime assumption
upon which Christianity is based) should be read as a sadistic mockery of Jewish
faith, meant to divide a Jewish resistance organisation and pacify it.
More than one author has read the New Testament with an eye toward
identifying espionage activities. In a province like Judaea that was rife
with revolutionary activity between the Roman takeover in 6 CE and the
actual outbreak of rebellion in 66 CE, it is not impossible to suggest that
underground networks were run by both the Jews and the Romans.
Those networks may have contained undercover agents who feigned
loyalty to one side while serving the other.1 An agent who served the
Roman side may have been Saul of Tarsus, the police officer who became
known as the Apostle Paul.
A Roman born citizen, Saul of Tarsus first became a persecutor of
the early Jesus movement. After Jesus death, he claimed to have left
Correspondence Email: t.voskuilen@planet.nl
ISSN 0959-2318 Print/ISSN 1743-9558 Online/05/02019224q 2005 Taylor & Francis Ltd
DOI: 10.1080/09592310500079940
Operation Messiah 193
the ranks of the government on his way to an operation in Damascus.

As their new self-proclaimed brother Paul, he consequently wrote
several letters to the movement he had originally been persecuting,
seven of which were ultimately taken up into the New Testament.
These letters are the oldest writings in the New Testament. In them,
Paul was the first person to spread the word that the Messiah, Israels
anointed king, had died by the will of the God of Israel, thus breaking
off Christianity from the Jewish religion. As far as we know, this
trained law enforcement official was the first Christian with any
authority to preach total submission to Roman laws.2 Even though he
always claimed to speak for the late Jesus, he had never met him.
Could the persecutor have been lying about his new religious
convictions?
In this article, I will discuss the possibility that the persecutor, Saul of
Tarsus, faked his conversion to the faith in Jesus in the service of the
Roman government and that he switched to the role of agent
provocateur using the alias of Paul. I believe he attempted to
undermine a Jewish messianist movement by introducing a radically
new concept of a crucified King of the Jews, among other religious and
ethical doctrines that most Jews still find highly provocative to say the
least. An article of this size cannot encompass every aspect of the history
of Paul and the origins of Christianity, but instead I will attempt to
provide a new model through which we can study the writings of Paul
and the works written about him. Our sources shall be Pauls own
letters, the book of Acts, and the most recent authoritative studies on the
founder of Christianity.
We really know very little about Saul of Tarsus, both before and after
his alleged conversion. What we must examine is the political situation
in Palestine in the first century CE, which was significantly different
(read less pro-Roman) than the Palestine as it is described in the New
Testament. I will also attempt to point out the many peculiarities in
Pauls life and work that hint that he had more than a merely friendly
relationship with the Roman authorities. Lastly, I will briefly discuss the
nature of the evidence and what it suggests.
Gaps
Let us first take inventory of some of the things we do not know about
persecutor Saul of Tarsus:
(1) We do not know where he lived during about 95 per cent of his life,
how he sustained himself during that time period, or whose company he
was in.
194 Thijs Voskuilen
(2) We do not know what Sauls reputation was like concerning

integrity and political loyalty prior to his alleged conversion; nor do
we know anything about his personal or sexual proclivities.3
(3) We do not know whether his self-proclaimed vision of Jesus was
caused by a medical condition, a true divine revelation, or whether he

lied about it altogether.
(4) We do not know what he read and wrote during his lifetime.
(5) We do not know who might have recruited and trained Saul as a
persecutor.
(6) We do not know for whom he worked when he was persecuting
Jesus original messianist movement.4
(7) We do not know his source of income after his conversion.
(8) We do not know who his friends and aides were and how they made
a living.
(9) We do not know where Saul died or how he died.
A Brief History of Distrust

Distrust of Sauls motives after his alleged conversion to the faith in
Jesus as the resurrected Messiah was rife from the outset. The first
to suspect him as a pseudo-apostle were the original followers of
Jesus, among whom was Jesus own brother James. The most
important modern scholar to have raised serious questions on Pauls
activities and his relationship with the Roman government is Robert
Eisenman. Eisenman has claimed since the 1980s that Paul, albeit
genuinely religious, acted as a secret agent of the Romans by
informing them on the membership list of the early messianist
movement.5
This distrust towards Pauls relationship to the Romans
authorities seems to be more than justified. After all, what we are
basically dealing with is a persecutor, or a government agent who
was recruited and trained to identify and imprison the members of
a dissident movement. Therefore, it must be assumed that, prior
to his alleged conversion, Saul of Tarsus was actively familiar
with methods like the recruitment of informers and saboteurs,
stirring up the members of a movement to provoke them into
betraying themselves and/or others, and other deceptive techniques,
such as taking on disguises and using aliases. In other words:
Saul of Tarsus was familiar with the concept of deceiving for a
living. The possibility, then, that this thoroughly-screened govern-
ment agent faked his conversion, rather than having an authentic
religious experience, seems to deserve more than just fleeting
attention.
Insurgency in Palestine
The political situation in Palestine under Roman occupation is not
portrayed accurately in the New Testament. Direct Roman occupation
in Judaea began in 6 CE and after that the atmosphere was rarely
without tension. The Jewish military officer-turned-historian, Flavius

Josephus, describes the history of these hostilities in his Jewish War,
which he wrote while living in the imperial palace in Rome. Even
though Roman legions occupied Judaea, resistance in the early 30s AD
remained widespread.6
Many religious groups that fought to drive out the Romans were often
identified as messianist, meaning that they longed for a Messiah to
come and reinstall Jewish sovereignty over Palestine. It is important to
note that the definition of Messiah as it is used here should not be
confused with the Christian definition, which was constructed later. By
meshiach, most Jewish people meant a political figure, appointed and
installed by God. This king was to reign over Palestine in the tradition of
King David, not to suffer and die for the sins of mankind or any other
reason. After all, a king who had died and gone to heaven would be of
little political or military use to an occupied, tyrannised, exploited and
slaughtered people.7
The Roman authorities took every measure they deemed necessary to
kill off Jewish resistance to their rule. The Romans recognised the
danger of intra-ethnic rivalries and acted on them swiftly and
decisively.8 They often used crucifixion of Jewish individuals as a
means of stifling dissent. The Roman procurator Felix, for example,
used indiscriminate mass crucifixions to deal with widespread Jewish
resistance and guerrilla warfare.9
The Execution of Jesus

In the early 30s AD, around the time of Jesus crucifixion and Sauls
alleged conversion, the Roman government was kept extremely busy by
the brewing resistance in Palestine, most particularly in Jerusalem.
Intelligence historian R.M. Sheldon has dealt with the tense political and
military situation in an article, in which she describes the course of
events leading up to the execution of Jesus from a Roman perspective.10
Even though the sources are too scarce and unreliable to describe the
actual course of events with as much certainty as we would wish, it is
still possible to come to certain conclusions.
1. The Romans, not the Jews were responsible for the crucifixion of
Jesus11
The punishment for a religious crime, as Jesus is accused of in the
Gospels, was stoning, not crucifixion. Crucifixion was usually reserved
196 Thijs Voskuilen
for political dissidents and performed only by the Romans to deter

others from engaging in subversive activities.12 It can be deduced that
the reason for Jesus execution was primarily political.13 This
impression is strengthened by the title King of the Jews which the
Romans mockingly gave him during his last hours. The titulus, INRI,
spelt out the charge: he was considered to be a political threat by the
Romans, not a religious one.14 Yet the New Testament remains silent
about Romans suspicions regarding Jesus political activities. These
documents, written much later by men who were not eyewitnesses, place
the responsibility for the crucifixion solely in Jewish hands, and
portrayed the crucifixion as the result of a religious conflict between the
Jews.15
2. After Jesus execution, the movement was still persecuted
Jesus movement remained a political threat in the eyes of the Romans.
There is no reason to assume that the Romans stopped viewing the
movement as a threat to their rule in the midst of a highly volatile region,
merely because its leader had been killed. Moreover, there are at least
two members of Jesus group that have nicknames that point to their
identity as armed rebels: Judas Iskariot and Simon the Zealot.16 These
two men were not reported to have been crucified along with Jesus and
therefore presumably remained at large after the execution of their
leader.17 Also, in the Gospels, Jesus movement appeared to have been
armed, since one of them cut off an ear of an officer who came to arrest
Jesus.18 If the movement was indeed armed and willing to use these
weapons against Roman soldiers and/or the representatives of the
Jewish puppet authorities, that alone would be reason enough for the
Romans to persecute it. Moreover, the movement was to make several
attempts to take police officer Sauls life after his alleged conversion,
which seems to confirm the impression that it was armed and willing to
use violence to destroy its opponents, after its leader had been arrested
and executed. Finally, it is assumed that the remnants of the movement
were destroyed when they took part in the uprising in 70 AD, which can
also serve to point up their political identity.
With these premises in mind, namely: (a) that Jesus movement was
regarded as a political threat, and (b) that the movement kept on being
regarded as a political threat after the execution of its leader, we have to
conclude that Saul of Tarsus was the persecutor of a politically
dangerous organisation at least in Roman eyes. This radically changes
the atmosphere in which his biography should be read, including his
conversion and his activities following the crucifixion. This biography,
moreover, includes a remarkably good relationship with the Roman
authorities certainly compared to the crucified Jesus. The movement
Saul consequently attempted to create under the name Paul, in
opposition to the original movement, was not politically dangerous to
the Romans at all. After all, its members were supposed to be law
abiding, tax paying citizens with anything but armed insurgency on their
minds.
Saul of Tarsus Persecutor

Who, then, was the real Saul of Tarsus? Scholars have labelled
him, among other things, a genius,19 a chameleon,20 creative,21
multilingual,22 sarcastic,23 a closet homosexual,24 a man of
two cultures,25 and Liar.26 In his own letters, Paul portrays himself
as a weak, uncharismatic, dishonest, self-serving, unimposing interloper
in the apostolic circle (2 Cor. 10:1 2,10).27 Even though the above
character traits can be considered remarkable for a saint, they are
typical, indeed ideal, for an agent provocateur.
Acts
Very little is known about Sauls life prior to his employment as a
persecutor and, later, his alleged conversion. According to Acts, Saul
was a Jew born a Roman citizen in the city of Tarsus, located in present-
day Turkey. Those who believe Saul of Tarsus was born a Roman citizen,
assume that his father, a tentmaker, acquired his citizenship. At a later
age, Saul himself became a tentmaker to the Roman legions, according
to some sources.28 Somewhere along the line Saul must also have
received some kind of religious training, since in his letters he appears to
be very well educated in both Jewish religious thought and Greek
mythology, combining the two in what was later to be known as Pauline
Christianity. Even though it is unknown from whom the Romans
themselves received information about the Jewish faith and customs, it
is equally possible that Saul received training from the same people, or
that he, being a Roman citizen and possibly a tentmaker for the legions
with a Jewish religious background, was such a teacher himself,
institutionally or informally.
Pauls Career
In the New Testament, no information is given about the trajectory that
led to Saul of Tarsus being employed by the authorities in the area of
secret policing. Neither in Acts, nor in his own letters is there any
mention of his recruitment, his training, the duration of his employ-
ment, the nature of his work, where he worked, the range of his victims,
his specific tasks, or the names of his superiors. Scholars have mainly
assumed Saul was persecuting anti-Roman dissidents on behalf of
the High Priest, since he himself links his persecution activities to his
198 Thijs Voskuilen
life in Judaism, and because Acts makes this claim.29 However, in his
letters he never states directly that he was working for the High Priest. In
any case, Saul was working for the Romans indirectly no matter who
was giving the orders, since the High Priest had been installed by the
Romans to keep order, functioning as a chief of police. A second

possibility is that Saul, being a Roman citizen, was an open or covert
Roman representative within the High Priests ranks. It seems likely that
the Romans would at least have loyal eyes and ears within the puppet
regimes they had installed.30 A third possible scenario would be that this
Roman-born citizen was working directly for the Romans, keeping a
close watch on the messianist movement just after its leader was
executed. It would be very unlikely that the Romans would leave the
surveillance of the messianist movement entirely up to the Jewish High
Priest and his men without any involvement or checks of their own.
In any of these scenarios, however, Sauls work furthered the Roman
cause by keeping messianist Jews in check.31
Acts 7:58 first mentions Saul as present at the stoning of Stephen:
On that day a great persecution broke out against the church at Jerusalem, and all
except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria. Godly men
buried Stephen and mourned deeply for him. But Saul began to destroy the
church. Going from house to house, he dragged off men and women and put them
in prison. (Acts, 8: 1 3)32
Pauls Letters
In his own letters, Paul only hints at his activities as a persecutor,
without going into much detail. In Galatians 1:13 he remarks: You have
heard, no doubt, of my earlier life in Judaism. I was violently persecuting
the church of God and was trying to destroy it. In 1 Corinthians 15:9 he
says: For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle,
because I persecuted the church of God. In Philippians 3:6 he recalls he
was a persecutor of the church. And lastly, in Galatians 1:23 he recalls
from over two decades that he was known to the messianist movement
in Judea as: The one who formerly was persecuting us [and] is now
proclaiming the faith he once tried to destroy.
It is important to repeat that Paul, after his alleged conversion, did not
join the early movement, but rather started giving a different spin to
their religion, introducing various new thoughts and concepts that were
beneficial to the Roman authorities and threatening to the Jewish
messianist nature of the original movement. For now it suffices to note
that he did not start proclaiming the faith he once tried to destroy, as he
writes. Technically, he was still trying to destroy that original faith,
albeit with words rather than with weapons in other words: he was
a theological warrior, as Calvin Roetzel calls him, but possibly in a

different way than has been previously assumed.33
The Conversion
In Pauls own letters, there is no account of his conversion, which is

described only in chapter nine of Acts, written by Luke:
Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lords
disciples. He went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues in
Damascus, so that if he found any there that belonged to the Way, whether men or
women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem. (9:1 3)
It has been doubted whether this journey ever took place, because the
High Priest in Jerusalem had no jurisdiction in Damascus. The city was,
at that time, not even under Roman jurisdiction. It had been ceded by
Caligula (37 CE) and belonged to the independent Arab Kingdom of
Nabatea under the rule of King Aretas IV (9 BCE 40 CE). So if Saul
really went there to capture dissidents, he must have done so as part of a
covert operation, under direct orders from the Roman authorities, or
not at all.34
In the simplified version in Acts:
As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed
around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him: Saul, Saul, why
do you persecute me? [. . .] The men travelling with Saul stood there speechless;
they heard the sound but did not see anyone.
Saul was blinded, and his fellow travellers took him to Damascus.
According to Acts 9, this unknown number of anonymous fellow
travellers ceased their persecuting activities along with Saul, even
though they did not convert. Next, they did not take Saul to a regular
doctor, but left him to the care of Ananias, a man of God whom they
had originally come to persecute. Ananias allegedly cured Saul of his
blindness, and told him that he would be the Lords instrument to
carry his name before the Gentiles and their kings and before the people
of Israel.
So far, the behaviour of the team of Sauls fellow persecutors in Acts
can be called remarkable to say the least. Even though this organised
group of agents had travelled all the way to Damascus with specific
orders to persecute messianists, apparently they did not even contemplate
apprehending the first member of the enemy movement they
encountered. Acts does not mention an interrogation of Ananias to
obtain names and addresses of other members, nor another kind of effort
made by the persecutors to find out who belonged to the movement.
Moreover, the team of government agents did not attempt to interrogate
200 Thijs Voskuilen
their colleague Saul about his sudden desire to join the subversives, nor
did they try to keep him from joining. Of course, it would have been
perfectly possible for them to let Saul enjoy his newfound spiritual
insights in jail, in order to prevent an increase of the number of dissidents
in the streets. Instead, they simply let him walk, allowing him to take
highly sensitive information with him, such as government strategy, the
identities of his fellow persecutors, and the identities of possible traitors
within the movement, both in Damascus and Jerusalem.
Contemporary Distrust
Acts then goes on to say:
Paul spent several days with the disciples in Damascus. At once he began to preach
in the synagogues that Jesus is the Son of God. All those who heard him were
astonished and asked, Isnt he the man who raised havoc in Jerusalem among
those who call on this name? And hasnt he come here to take them as prisoners to
the chief priests? Yet Paul grew more and more powerful and baffled the Jews
living in Damascus by proving that Jesus is the Christ. (9:19 22)35
Acts gives us no information about the activities that Sauls fellow

persecutors undertook during the several days that deserter Saul spent
baffling the Jews (22) in Damascus. Judging by Acts, they were not in
the least bit concerned that he might reveal persecution tactics, the
names of informers, or other secrets to the persecuted movement, even
though Saul was the agent who had been given the operational
instructions by their superior officer in Jerusalem from which it can be
deduced that, up to that point, Saul had not given his superiors any
cause for concern about his mental stability, loyalty or dedication. And,
indeed, it turned out that his fellow persecutors had no reason to worry:
neither Acts nor Pauls own letters ever mention his sharing any
government secrets with the persecuted movement he had supposedly
joined. We must therefore assume that he never shared any with them.
This was a very odd state of mind for a deserted persecutor who had the
survival of his persecuted friends at heart, but it does fit the profile of an
agent who kept on undermining his original victims.
Not surprisingly, the Jews were deeply distrustful of the changed
persecutor:
After many days had gone by, the Jews conspired to kill him, but Paul learned of
their plan. Day and night they kept close watch on the city gates in order to kill
him. But his followers took him by night and lowered him in a basket through an
opening in the wall. (9:23 25)36
Judging by this account, for many more days, then, Sauls fellow
persecutors continued to keep their distance, while, in the synagogues,
their colleague was spreading his own version of a messianist message,

causing havoc among the very same Jews he had come to persecute, even
to the point where they tried to kill him.
This passage gives us a possible indication that Sauls fellow agents
might not have been totally ignorant of the events as they unfolded.
After all, from this passage it can be deduced that these anonymous
followers who came to his rescue were non-Jews, since Acts puts them
in contrast to the Jews. Sometimes god-fearing non-Jews were allowed
inside the synagogues, so it would indeed have been possible for Paul to
acquire some non-Jewish followers during the previous days.37
Nevertheless, for various reasons it seems more likely that these
rescuers were Pauls old followers, namely his fellow agents, who
intervened to bring their provocateur to safety in the face of Jewish
assassination attempts.
Acts states that day and night [the Jews in Damascus] kept close
watch on the city gates in an operation that was designed to kill Paul.
This implies a sizeable and organised clandestine assassination effort by
a group of highly motivated people. If these assassins were Jewish
messianists, who by that time had survived a certain degree of
persecution, it seems reasonable to assume that they had gained some
experience in clandestine activities. Government agents would have
been trained and prepared to carry out a rescue operation in the face of
such an enemy operation. A hastily organised group of untrained and
inexperienced civilians, on the other hand, would not. To begin with,
rescuing Paul would require a trained eye to identify a possible
surveillance and the non-uniformed assassins who were watching out
for him in the hustle near the city gates. The rest of the operation would
involve advanced clandestine strategy as well, such as getting Paul past
these assassins unnoticed and preparing a clean getaway for the rescuers
themselves.
Also, if these followers were indeed random non-Jews whom Paul had
encountered during their quest for spiritual guidance in synagogues or
other meeting places for Jews, it seems reasonable to assume that these
people were not hardline anti-Jewish. It is then difficult to believe that
they had all suddenly and simultaneously developed anti-Jewish
convictions that were strong enough for them to put their lives on the
line to save a total stranger, a rather suspicious persecutor-gone-
preacher with whom their familiar Jewish spiritual instructors had a
conflict. There is no doubt, on the other hand, that Sauls fellow agents
would have been sufficiently anti-Jewish, organised, focused and loyal
both to Saul and to each other to jump to their colleagues rescue in his
conflict with the Jews.38
Moreover, an intervention by the persecutors at that point would
explain their remarkably passive behaviour up to that point: they had
202 Thijs Voskuilen
simply been waiting for the most aggressive and dangerous messianists
to be flushed out, provoked into doing so by their own provocateur-
apostle Paul. A deception operation involving Saul as a provocateur
and the rest of the team functioning as bodyguards on standby seems to
be the only plausible rational explanation for the passive behaviour of

the team of fellow agents until that time. Moreover, the non-Jewish
identity of these agents would be in line with the assumption that the
Romans, not the High Priest, had sent these persecutors to
Damascus.39
From a psychological viewpoint, this seems to be a somewhat more
realistic scenario than one in which an experienced government agent
suddenly tossed aside all of his previous loyalties, including the ones he
had sworn to, and then changed his complex set of convictions to the
other side of the political and the spiritual spectra with his entire team
of trained persecutors assisting him in contacting the enemy and then
standing by idly while he deserted right under their noses. This would
involve an incredible degree of irrational, if not outright dim-witted
behaviour on behalf of these professional persecutors. From a strategic
viewpoint, moreover, a deception operation-gone-violent, involving
Saul as a provocateur, seems more likely a scenario than one in which
both the original team of persecutors and their fellow agent Saul had
developed unrelated, yet fully-fledged armed conflicts with the same
messianist Jews in Damascus, only days after they had taken an
extraordinarily long journey under specific orders to fight these very
same Jews together.
Pauls own letters tell us another reason why he had to steal away
from Damascus secretly. The Police Chief of King Aretas was
seeking to arrest him. This is in contrast to Acts (the later source)
which says that the Jews objected to Pauls advocacy of the
Messiahship of Jesus. If King Aretas was looking for him, he must
have been guilty of some political crime. He may have discovered
that Paul himself was a police agent of the High Priest in Jerusalem
and that he was in Damascus on a mission that infringed on
Nabataean sovereignty. Had Saul been questioned by the authorities
and claimed he gave up his mission because of his conversion, they
would have assumed this was a front for an undercover agent. Paul
had to get out of town fast. He escaped down the walls of Damascus
in a basket.40
Lastly, Acts gives away another strong clue that Saul might have
faked his alleged conversion, which is of course a religious term for
what the government would have called a desertion. Despite what
standard police procedures would have dictated, from the moment Saul
went over to the enemy, judging by Acts and his own letters, the
authorities: (a) never once accused Saul of desertion; (b) never went
through any trouble to snatch him back from the messianist movement;
(c) never tried to stop him from leaking sensitive information to the
enemy; and (d) never tried to talk their former agent into giving them
inside information on the persecuted movement he had allegedly
joined. However, during the following years, Paul was to be in frequent

contact with the Roman authorities, namely when Roman soldiers
protected him against unremitting Jewish assassination attempts. These
Jews supposedly tried to kill him for reasons of blasphemy, but not
because he had betrayed the High Priest. Had persecutor Saul really
deserted, it seems likely that either the Roman or the Jewish authorities
would have at least accused him of desertion.
Suspicions in Jerusalem
Acts then tells us that Paul, instead of letting himself be killed like his
alleged example Jesus, returned from Damascus to Jerusalem, the city
out of which the movement was persecuted.41 Paul appeared to have
nothing to fear from the authorities, however, since he moved freely
in Jerusalem, speaking boldly in the name of the Lord. (Acts, 9:28)
The original messianist movement, on the other hand, again distrusted
him deeply.
Acts explicitly states that:
when he came to Jerusalem, he tried to join the disciples, but they were all afraid
of him, not believing he really was a disciple [i.e. believing he was still a
persecutor, probably involved in some kind of deception operation]. But
Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles. He told them how Saul on
his journey had seen the Lord and that the Lord had spoken to him, and how in
Damascus he had preached fearlessly in the name of the Lord. [. . .] He talked
and debated with the Grecian Jews, but they tried to kill him. When the brothers
learned of this, they took him down to Caesarea and sent him off to Tarsus.
(9:26 27; 29 30)
Here the book of Acts starts giving us a distorted view of the

relationship between the original movement and post-conversion Paul.
After all, what was to follow in the next 20 years was a vehement
correspondence between the newborn apostle and the (mostly Jewish)
original members. Pauls letters in the New Testament are his
contribution to this polemic debate. In this debate, Paul preached an
extremely pacifist and pro-Roman set of doctrines in which the original
members of the movement among whom was Jesus brother James
did not believe. Therefore, it is hard to believe that Barnabas was able to
convince the disciples of Pauls sincerity by pointing out how the Lord
had spoken to him, especially since, according to this passage, they kept
on plotting to kill him.
204 Thijs Voskuilen
Roman Espionage
For a proper understanding of the historical context of these events it
is necessary to return briefly to the relationship between the Jewish
people and their Roman occupiers. Jesus had by no means been the
only possible Messiah during those times. From the lengthy

succession of different candidate Messiahs, it can be deduced that
the killing of a single candidate Messiah could never kill the idea of a
Jewish Messiah, which survives to this very day. This idea, of course,
was the most threatening part of a messianist movement, namely the
deeply rooted belief in the coming of a Messiah and the implied
illegality and temporary character of Roman rule. Messianism was
the primary source of inspiration and cohesive element of these
Jewish groups.42
How, then, to fight such an idea? Ancient answer: by introducing
another idea. For example, Roman citizen and government agent Saul
of Tarsus could have said: How about the idea that: (a) the long-
awaited Messiah has come and gone (after all, in Roman eyes, what
better king of the Jews than a dead king of the Jews?); (b) that the late
Messiah now wants the Roman occupation forces (an equally absurd
thought to contemporary Jewish messianist movements); (c) that the
originally Jewish movement has to let its guard down and open itself
up to non-Jews (i.e., Romans); and (d) that the crucified Messiah will
return some unknown day (a highly provocative scenario that had
never been prophesized in the Jewish Scriptures).43
In point of fact, these are all elements that Saul of Tarsus
introduced to the movement using the name Paul. It was police
officer Paul who introduced a kind of Messiah-theory and a set of
moral guidelines that hardly had any foundation in Jewish Scriptures,
but which was rather an ad hoc amalgam of pro-Roman political
theory, Jewish religion, and Greek mythology.44 Therefore, it can be
concluded that everything the Roman citizen and persecutor did after
his alleged conversion remained structurally beneficial to the Roman
authorities and dangerous for messianist Jews. My assumption is that
had persecutor Saul decided to lie about his conversion while
working for the Romans, he would have done and said exactly what
he ended up doing and saying, changing tactics rather than loyalties
and his name rather than his true identity, in order to disrupt the
movement and provoke Jewish possible messianist insurgents into
speaking and/or acting up.
The question is, therefore, whether the Romans were intelligent and
strategically advanced enough to undertake such a clandestine
operation.
Roman Psychological Warfare

Espionage was a vital characteristic of Roman foreign policy.45 Among
their wide array of unconventional warfare and espionage techniques,
were the concepts of:
(1) Psychological warfare. The Romans were known to use pamphlets,

which were shot by arrow over city walls, to demoralise the enemy.46
(2) Agent provocateurs. Pontius Pilate, the provinces proconsul,
employed this kind of agent to provoke riots, which he could then
brutally suppress.47
(3) Divide-and-conquer tactics which they applied to political parties.48
(4) Propaganda.49
(5) Plants. The Romans occasionally took a member of an occupied
society to Rome, where they influenced him with Roman ideology. This
foreigner was then sent back to his mother country to fulfil a leadership
position. At that point he had sometimes become unacceptable to his
own people.50
Paul and the Romans Post-Conversion

Of the 20 years Saul of Tarsus acted as the Apostle Paul, we know
nothing of his whereabouts, company, activities, or sources of income
during 17 of those years. Since the remainder of his biography is so
questionable regarding its veracity, I will focus on those parts in Acts
that deal with the last years he spent in Palestine, and then the remainder
of his life, which he spent in Rome. These passages contain information
that is not contradicted by his own letters.51
Temple Riot
After several journeys abroad as an apostle, Paul eventually returned to
the Temple in Jerusalem. Here he was accused of bringing non-Jews into
the Temple complex. This admission of non-Jews was a highly
controversial subject under the Roman occupation, and an inherently
political subject at that, since the extent of Jewish autonomy was at
stake. Was the (former) persecutor and Roman citizen disrupting a
meeting place for anti-Roman elements in the strictly Jewish area?
Whatever his direct intentions were, he was not received very kindly.
A riot erupted:
While they were trying to kill him, news reached the commander of the Roman
troops that the whole city of Jerusalem was in an uproar. He at once took some
officers and soldiers and ran down to the crowd. When the rioters saw the
commander and his soldiers, they stopped beating Paul. (Acts 21: 31,32)
206 Thijs Voskuilen
After the events surrounding his conversion in Damascus and the

assassination attempts upon his return to Jerusalem, this was the third
time that Paul was rescued from a group of Jews who tried to kill him.
Paul was taken to the Roman military barracks (Acts 21:37), where he
asked permission to speak to the rowdy crowd, a permission he received.

The question is, of course, why the Romans would arrest him with the
intent of stopping a riot only to allow him to address the rioters a little
later, protected by Roman soldiers. Apparently, their main intent was
not to stop the riot, but to protect Paul from getting hurt or killed. Had
they wanted to calm things down, after all, they would not have run the
risk of further inflaming the populace by having Paul speak to them once
again. It seems to make more sense to assume that they used their former
persecutor as a provocateur to inflame the mood, as Pilate had already
done once before, to flush out their most aggressive opponents.
Caesarea
After this speech, Paul was taken to the coastal city and provincial
capital of Caesarea, guarded by two hundred soldiers, seventy
horsemen and two hundred spearmen. This was an operation that
had been organised by two centurions after a personal request by the
commander of the barracks in Jerusalem. (Acts 23:23) This is an
astonishing number of soldiers if the Romans merely considered him to
be a lowly Jewish preacher. After all, the only time Jesus ever had guards
was when he stumbled towards Golgotha. If the Romans valued Paul as
a strategic asset, however, this effort to protect him would make sense.52
What followed in Pauls case was not a crucifixion but two years of
custody in king Herods palace in Caesarea, during which he
was allowed to receive friends. (Acts, 23:35; 24:23)53 Acts does not
mention the name, background or profession of these friends. The cost
of guarding and sustaining this prisoner for all this time must have been
tremendous and stands in stark contrast to the efforts (or lack thereof)
the Romans made to protect Jesus in the face of Jewish grievances.
In other words, Paul was not executed but allowed to live in relative
freedom and receive friends, and thus in all likelihood to spread his
dangerous message for which Jesus had supposedly been executed.54
The conclusion seems inevitable that Pauls message was different and
better suited to the needs of the Romans than that of Jesus had been.
After all, it is difficult to believe that his Roman citizenship could have
been sufficient counterweight to the spreading of a politically dangerous
message during wartime which Paul had been doing for about 19
years by that time, since his conversion around 36 CE.55 On balance,
the reign of emperor Caligula (37 41 CE), during which Paul would
have developed his ministry, is not known for its tolerance of political
dissent. Known as a vicious tyrant, Caligula banished or murdered most
of his relatives, had people tortured and killed when he dined, and made
his favorite horse a consul. The odds would not have been good for a
deserted police officer who, in a highly volatile region of the empire,

started spreading a messianist message for which the Roman military
had already executed its alleged founder.56 The same holds true for the
reign of Nero (5468 AD), during which these episodes in Jerusalem
and Caesarea (5558) are estimated to have taken place. As shall be
discussed next, it was during Neros reign that Paul was to spend the last
years of his life, boasting his messianist message while guarded by the
Roman military, living in Rome, within walking distance of emperor
Neros palace.
Paul to Rome
When, after two years in Caesarea, the Jews wanted the governor
Festus and King Agrippa to hand over Paul so that they could convict
him themselves, Paul insisted that he be sent to Rome for a trial. Even
though king Agrippa did not think another court case was necessary
he was willing to release Paul there and then said: This man could have
been set free if he had not appealed to Caesar. (Acts 26:32) Pauls
request was honoured and the suspect was taken to Rome, again
accompanied by a costly military escort.
It seems rather strange that a suspect who is about to be released asks
for another court case, simply because he insists on being released to
someone else. From Pauls perspective it makes perfect sense that he does
not want to be released in the midst of Jewish enemies who are
clamouring for his head, but what motives could the Romans have had
to release him to Rome? Why spend more time and money on the
prisoner? It seems that the only reason for this would be that he had
already served their strategic interests. Otherwise they could have
simply released him in Caesarea and told him to charter his own ship to
Rome and pay for his own journey to a destination of his own choosing.
Instead, Paul was taken to Rome with a costly military escort,
supposedly to be tried there, even though it had already been established
that a trial was no longer necessary.
Paul in Rome
On board the ship Paul developed a friendship with another high-
ranking Roman, a centurion named Julius, who some believe arranged
for Pauls accommodation upon his arrival in Rome.57 In any event,
208 Thijs Voskuilen
the regime subversive Paul lived under in Rome turned out to be

incredibly lax.
Once the Romans had transported him from the other side of the
world to Rome to be tried, after two years of imprisonment supposedly
awaiting a trial, and after they had spent a fortune on feeding, guarding,
clothing, and sheltering him, he never got a court case. Instead, he was
allowed to live by himself, with only one soldier to guard him (Acts,
28:16). Since, judging by Romans 13:1 7, Paul considered the Roman
government and its laws the highest worldly authority, established by
God, it is difficult to believe that this guard was there to prevent Pauls
possible fleeing from Roman justice, and therefore from Gods will.
Moreover, Paul had requested the court case himself, so there seems to
have been little chance of his trying to escape. Perhaps most remarkably,
the prisoner still had not said or done anything anti-Roman that could
explain why he should fear a court case, or why the Romans would want
to imprison him. It seems likely, therefore, that the Roman military was
again protecting him from possible Jewish assassination attempts, rather
than imprisoning him.
While in custody in Rome, the (former) police officer set forth on his
preaching mission, all the while remaining under guard, from morning
to evening, proclaiming, I want you to know that Gods salvation has
been sent to the Gentiles, and they will listen!58
For two years Paul stayed in the capital of the empire, in his own
rented house, and received visitors. Boldly and without hindrance he
preached the kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ.
In other words, Jesus was executed without delay for being a political
threat to the Romans; deserted police officer Paul was allowed to spread
his messianist message in the capital of the empire without hindrance.
This was a message that included: (a) an extremely pacifist Spirit
Messiah instead of a living militaristic Jewish king; and (b) total
submission to the Roman authorities. And that is where the story of Acts
ends. There is no reason to believe he could not have returned to
Palestine after his appeal to Caesar, but he would have had to have
done so with the permission of the Romans, or whilst still in their
employ which is why Acts may be so silent about his fate.59
We do not know what happened next. Some have suggested Paul may
have gone on to Spain as he had said he wanted to.60 However, there is
no reliable information on his ultimate fate. We do not know when or
how he died.61 The conclusion seems to be justified, however, that there
is no reason to assume the Romans stopped protecting him, as they had
been doing for years by that time. He had practically become a personal
investment to them. Moreover, they would have to have been utterly
blind not to see that Saul of Tarsus was furthering their goals by his
actions, speeches and writings under the name of Paul. Therefore, it
seems unlikely that they would suddenly decide to martyr him, as

Christian mythology has insisted. After all, why would the Romans kill
one of their own citizens, a (former) member of the secret police in
Jerusalem, who: (a) said that Gods salvation had come upon them; (b)
that the Jews were bad; and (c) that everyone had to pay their taxes to
the Roman authorities, be a good citizen and refrain from resisting
persecutions? It is possible that they had already trained a Jew to say all
that, and that man may have been Saul, using the alias of Paul.
Pro-Roman Theology
In his seven letters, Paul often contradicts himself, which makes it
difficult to extrapolate the nucleus of his theology. However, he never
contradicts himself on some core issues:
1. A call for total adherence to Roman law, such as expressed in
Romans 13:1 7:62
Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is
no authority except that which God has established.63 The authorities that exist
have been established by God. Consequently, he who rebels against the authority
is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring
judgment on themselves. For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for
those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority?
Then do what is right and he will commend you. For he is Gods servant to do you
good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing.
He is Gods servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.
Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible
punishment but also because of conscience.64 This is also why you pay taxes, for
the authorities are Gods servants, who give their full time to governing. Give
everyone what you owe him: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue;
if respect, then respect; if honour, then honour.
Paul wrote this passage to the movement in Rome, referring to the

local authorities.
Since this passage is part of the same letter in which the director of
public works in Corinth sent his greetings (Romans, 16:24), it can be
concluded that Paul remained on rather intimate terms with the Roman
authorities. To Paul, then, the Roman government can hardly have been
merely a theoretical, distant concept that had to be passively respected
and taken for granted, as some scholars have suggested.65 Instead, it was
a government for which he had not only worked as a police officer
himself, directly or indirectly, but of which he probably knew some
high-ranking officials better than his own followers. This impression is
strengthened by his sending greetings on behalf of members of Caesars
household in Philippians 4:22. He was allowed to write this letter and
Philemon while in prison for his subversive message.
210 Thijs Voskuilen
2. Paul kept making a strong case for the admission of non-Jews into
the originally Jewish body of messianists. One of Pauls most important
fields of endeavor was to argue that circumcision was no longer required
for new members. Thus, the (former) persecutor facilitated the entrance
of non-Jews, for example Romans, into that persecuted movement.

3. Paul introduced the death of the Messiah, the king of the Jews, as the
will of God. Some argue that he might have copied this standpoint from
other, earlier Christians, as he claims himself, but any proof thereof in
the form of documents, quotes or names of these earlier Christians is
lacking. Again, the original movement around Jesus among whom
was Jesus own brother James disagreed with this vital aspect of Pauls
theology. It seems that they would have less of a motive to lie about
Jesus heritage than a persecutor would.
4. Paul often borders on the anti-Semitic. He repeatedly says that the
Jews are sinful and have to be punished, whereas he does not utter one
anti-Roman remark in all of his letters, even though the Romans
supposedly put him in jail several times for being rebellious against their
authority.
5. Paul wrote that a true follower of his had to enjoy being persecuted
and insulted:
Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christs
power may rest on me. That is why, for Christs sake, I delight in weaknesses, in
insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am
strong. (2 Cor. 12:9,10)
[. . .] I urge you, brothers, in view of Gods mercy, to offer your bodies as living
sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God this is your spiritual act of worship. (Rom.
12:1)
These passages may very well have been an over-confident agents

sadistic mockery of his messianist audience, in line with the mockery the
Romans and the on-looking crowd had instigated just before the
crucifixion of Jesus.66 Coming from a persecutor who had inflicted a
certain amount of pain on the movement before, these passages, like the
rest of his letters, can certainly very easily be interpreted as derisive and
sadistic.
The Nature of Proof

How much smoke is allowed before one should suspect that there is a
fire blazing somewhere? Some might say that if Saul faked his
conversion, the Romans failed horribly in their mission, since most Jews
were not converted. However, it probably did not matter that not
everyone believed this radical new idea of a dead pacifist Messiah. This
was to be expected. But at least the authorities had divided the original
group of (potential) insurgents, stirred up their ranks, established a line

of communication with them under the guise of a religious discussion,
and maybe actually altered the minds of some. If it worked, they could
work with it. If not, they could try something else. In between total
success and failure there would still be a grey area in which the target
audience could get talked into a state of paralysing doubt about the
desirability of resistance against the Roman authorities. This would
equal pacification. Moreover, the authorities had sowed seeds of distrust
of traditional messianist Jews, which was sure to result in division of the
movement. Lastly, persecutor Pauls pro-Gentile letters could function
as a Trojan horse for fellow agents.
The ultimate question is, then, who needs to prove what exactly?
Does it have to be proven that persecutor Saul faked his conversion? Or
does it rather have to be proven that an agent was sincere when he joined
the movement he had recently been fighting in the name of the
government? In the authors opinion, it has to be proven that a
persecutor is sincere about his joining a persecuted organisation. Saul
had the means, motive and opportunity to lie about a change of mind.
In addition, his actions validate the possibility of treachery both in
biographical detail and literary content. Therefore, until it can be
proven that Saul of Tarsus was sincere about his shift in loyalties, the
possibility that he acted as an agent-provocateur under the name of
Paul must prevail, until contradicted by credible evidence.
Acknowledgements
For their help and support during my work on this thesis I would like to thank the following people.
In alphabetical order, at the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen in The Netherlands: Professor Frank
Ankersmit, professor Jan Bremmer and Dr Valerie Robillard. In the United States of America:
Professor Robert Eisenman of California State University at San Diego, and Professor Rose Mary
Sheldon of the Virginia Military Institute for editing this article and helping me to find sources at
various times. All errors in fact, reference or interpretation remain my own. All translations from
the New Testament are from the NIV unless otherwise indicated.
NOTES
1. On revolutionary activities in Judaea, see R.M. Sheldon, Jesus, The Security Risk: Intelligence
and Security in First-Century Palestine, Small Wars and Insurgencies, Vol.9, No.2 (Autumn,
1998) pp.137; S.G.F. Brandon, Jesus and the Zealots (Manchester: University of Manchester
Press, 1967 ). H. Maccoby, Revolution in Judaea: Jesus and the Jewish Resistance (New York:
Taplinger Pub. Co., 1973).
2. Jesus command, as rendered in the Gospels, to give to Caesar what is Caesars, and to God
what is Gods (Matthew 22:21) was written later than Pauls letters. Moreover, this quote is
possibly an edited version of the original quote: Give to God what is Gods, give to the emperor
what is the emperors, and give to me what is mine, as described in the Gospel of Thomas, part
of the Nag Hammadi library, found in Egypt in the mid-1940s. Parts of the Gospel of Thomas
212 Thijs Voskuilen
are estimated as being older than the Gospel of Mark, which is estimated as being the oldest
Gospel in the New Testament. In The Gospel of Thomas, no context is given that could prove
that Jesus actually said these words meaning that he wanted his audience to submit itself to the
Romans or pay taxes to them. Moreover, considering Jesus ultimate execution by Roman
soldiers for political reasons, it is doubtful whether he ever really preached submission to the
Roman authorities at all. On the dating of Gospel of Thomas and its contents, see H. Koester,
The Gospel of Thomas, in: J.M. Robinson (ed.) The Nag Hammadi Library (San Francisco:
Harper Collins, 1988) pp.12426.
3. C. Roetzel, Paul. The Man and The Myth (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1999) p.1 says Paul prayed
repeatedly for the removal of a thorn in his flesh. Inspired guesses have suggested that the
thorn might be anything from epilepsy to migraine headaches, impotence or sexual abuse in
childhood. Bishop John Shelby Spong, Rescuing the Bible From Fundamentalism (San
Francisco: Harper, 1991) p.117.
4. C. Roetzel, Paul p.10. H. Maccoby, The Mythmaker; Paul and the Invention of Christianity
(New York: Harper&Row, 1986) p.15.
5. In a private communication, Robert Eisenman wrote to the author that he thinks Paul was
mentally sick. His thesis that Paul was an informer to the Roman authorities is described at
length in James the Brother of Jesus (London: Faber and Faber, 1997) p.551.
6. Josephus, BJ 4.157. R.M. Sheldon, Jesus, as Security Risk: Insurgency in First Century
Palestine?, Small Wars And Insurgencies 5, 1 (1994) p.1. See also R.A. Horsley and J. Hanson,
Bandits, Prophets and Messiahs. Popular Movements at the Time of Jesus, New York: Winston
Press, 1985; M. Hengel, The Zealots. Investigations into the Jewish Freedom Movement in the
Period from Herod I until 70 AD (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1989); R.A. Horsley, Ancient
Jewish Banditry and the Revolt Against Rome, AD 6670, CBQ 43 (1981) pp.40932.
7. B.D. Ehrman, The New Testament. A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings.
Second Edition (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000) p.61.
8. C. Roetzel, Paul p.40.
9. N. Elliot, The Anti-Imperial Message of the Cross, in: R.A. Horsley, Paul and Empire.
Religion and Power in Roman Imperial Society (Harrisburg, PA, Trinity Press International,
1997) p.168.
10. R.M. Sheldon, Jesus, as Security Risk: Insurgency in First Century Palestine, Small Wars and
Insurgencies, 9, 2 (1998) pp.137.
11. Paul appears totally uninterested in tracking down and identifying the villains responsible for
Jesus crucifixion, nor does he offer any historical reasons why they did it. He simply blames
the Jews. See 1 Thess. 2: 1516 (thought to be an interpolation) and 1 Cor. 2:8.
12. R.M. Sheldon, Jesus, As Security Risk p.22.
13. The Romans, in their Wet Operations, sometimes killed pretenders to a foreign throne to
prevent a succession. In R.M. Sheldon, The Ancient Imperative, Journal of Intelligence and
Counterintelligence 10, 3 (1997) p.311.
14. Of course, in traditional Judaism, there is no clear distinction between a religious cause and a
political one. The urge for religious autonomy automatically meant a threat to the political
status quo, since a religious autonomy defined by the Roman occupation forces is inherently
not real religious autonomy at all. Neil Elliott has called the crucifixion of Jesus one of the
most unequivocally political events recorded in the New Testament. See The Anti-Imperial
Message of the Cross, in Paul and Empire p.167.
15. The authors of the Gospels chose to remain anonymous. The names Mark, Matthew, Luke and
John were added to the texts later. B.D. Ehrman, The New Testament. A Historical
Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. Second Edition (New York: Oxford University
Press, 2000) p.8. See also: Sheldon, Jesus, as Security Risk p.23, and the introduction by M.A.
Wes to Flavius Josephus, De Joodse Oorlog&Uit Mijn Leven (Baarn, Ambo, 1992).
16. The fact that the term zealot will be applied to James and the majority of the Jerusalem church
in Acts 21:50 shows that this was a political charge even as used by Paul. On the name Iscariot,
see: See A. Ehrman, Judas Iscariot and Abba Saqqara, JBL 97 (1978) pp.5723; and
Y. Arbeitman, The Suffix of Iscariot, JBL 99 (1980) pp.12214.
17. R.M. Sheldon, Jesus as Security Risk p.20. We do not know which members of the movement
were persecuted and which were not. However, there is no evidence that these two members
were arrested along with Jesus. They could have evaded the Romans at this point and been
arrested at a later date, or not at all.
18. John, 18:10; Matthew 26:54.
19. E.P. Sanders, Paulus, trans. Henriette Havelaar (Kampen, Kok, 2000) p.159.
20. Den Heyer, Paulus (Zoetermeer, Meinema, 1998) p.169.
21. Den Heyer, Paulus p.275.
24. J.S. Spong, Rescuing the Bible p.119.

25. Den Heyer, Paulus p.186. [. . .] Paul [was] a man of two worlds, who worked tirelessly to
reconcile and unite those two worlds. (Translated by TV.) Uniting Judaea with the rest of the
Roman Empire was, of course, Roman government policy as well.
26. For Pauls defensiveness on this charge, see Gal. 1.20; 2 Cor. 11.31; Rom. 9.1. R.H. Eisenman,
James, The Brother of Jesus (New York: Viking, 1997) p.52.
27. Phrasing by Roetzel, Paul p.9. On Pauls defensiveness on being called a liar, see Gal. 1:30; Cor.
11.31; Romans 9:1.
28. E.P. Sanders, Paulus p.32. A.N. Wilson also assumes Saul picked up his fathers trade. If Saul
did indeed make tents for the Roman military, it can serve as evidence that the Roman military
trusted Saul enough for them to employ him, and that Saul was indeed willing to further
Roman strategic objectives.
29. Acts 9:2. In Galatians 1:13, Paul himself links his persecuting activities to his life in Judaism.
On pages 38 and 39 of his Paul, Roetzel gives an overview of the different scholarly theories on
his employment as a persecutor, all of which assume he was working for the Jewish authorities,
not for the Romans. Of course, it was perfectly possible to live a life in Judaism and work for
the Romans at the same time. After all, technically this was exactly what the High Priest
himself was doing, since the Romans had installed him.
30. R.M. Sheldon, Jesus, As Security Risk p.25.
31. H. Maccoby, The Mythmaker; Paul and the Invention of Christianity (New York:
Harper&Row, 1986) p.86 points out that the High Priest was able to send his officers into
synagogues to arrest people whose activities he disapproved of as chief of police, not as a
religious figure. He did this not because he disagreed with their theology but because they were
a menace to the Roman occupation.
32. All translations come from the NIV. The Holy Bible. New International Version. (Grand
Rapids, Zondervan Publishing House, 1984).
34. H. Maccoby, The Mythmaker; Paul and the Invention of Christianity (New York:
Harper&Row, 1986) p.86 believes that Paul was on a clandestine mission sent by the High
Priest to kidnap certain leading Nazarenes and bring them back to Judaea for imprisonment or
for handing over to the Romans. He was sent with a band of mercenaries to wipe out a nest of
activists in Damascus. An echo of this charge possibly survives in later Christian literature.
In the pseudo-Clementine Recognitions (1.70ff) we are told that Saul travelled to Damascus
with the intention of arresting none other than St. Paul himself who had fled there after a
persecution involving the near-murder of James.
35. Eisenman rejects the historicity of this claim. To begin with, it is hard to believe there were
synagogues (plural) in Damascus. It was not a particularly Jewish city at the time, and there
may not have been any synagogues at all. R. Eisenman, James, The Brother of Jesus p.151.
36. This passage is paralleled in 2 Corinthians 11:32, the only difference being that there it is not
the Jews who wish to arrest Paul, but rather the ethnarch (i.e., King Aretas). Acts always
inverts the accusations against the Romans or Herodian officials. See R. Eisenman, James, The
Brother of Jesus p.152.
38. Since this is a biblical story, it is tempting to go along with an explanation of these events in
terms of the will of God, or miracle, since this is what the author of Acts implicitly stated
when he wrote about these events. However, a historian, searching for rational explanations of
historical events, is not allowed to use the terms God or miracle. God as a historical
explanation explains everything, and therefore it explains nothing at all. (See F. Ankersmit,
Denken Over Geschiedenis, Groningen, 1986.) As a result, in the case of the account of Sauls
conversion in Acts, a historian has to look for other explanations than supernatural ones, for
example when it comes to the unlikely blunders made by the entire team of persecutors, the
extraordinary feat of the anonymous men who rescued Paul in Damascus, and the number of
214 Thijs Voskuilen
times in Acts when Paul was released from jail miraculously quickly (by angels and
earthquakes) instead of being crucified or otherwise hindered.
39. There would be no Jews in Damascus who would sympathise with the pro-Roman
collaborating views of Saul, for there was no pro-Roman party among the Jews living in a city
that had been removed from Roman rule. H. Maccoby, The Mythmaker, p.88.
40. Acts 9:24. See also, H. Maccoby, The Mythmaker p.88.
41. This is an example of where Acts and Pauls own letters diverge (see note 51). In Galatians 1:17
he says that he did not go back to Jerusalem after his conversion, but went straight to Arabia
and later returned to Damascus, before returning to Jerusalem. The alleged conversion does
seem to have taken place in Damascus, then. For some reason, the writer of Acts chose to omit
Pauls stay in Arabia and his second visit to Damascus completely, if he was aware of them at
all. Since the Jewish assassination efforts are included in Acts, it seems likely that they took
place during this first visit, not the second.
42. Bagoas (Josephus, Ant. 17.2.4), Judas the Galilean (Josephus, Ant. 17.10.5; BJ 2.4.1, Acts
5.37; Origen, Celsus, 1.57), Simon (Josephus, Ant. 17.10.6; BJ 2.4.2); Athrongeus (Josephus,
Ant. 17.10.7; BJ 17.10.7; BJ 2.4.3); and the Perean Insurgents (Josephus, BJ 2.4.2) all from the
time of Archelaus. Barabbas (Mark 15.7.11, 15; Matt. 27.16ff, 2022, 26; Luke 23.18ff, 25;
John 18.40), and possibly John the Baptist in the time of Pilate (Mark 6; Matt. 14; Luke 3.19ff,
9.79, Josephus, Ant. 18.5.2). After the death of Agrippa I comes the Samaritan imposter
(Josephus, Ant. 18.4.1); Theudas (Josephus, Ant. 20.5.1; Acts 5.36; Origen, Celsus 1.57.6.11;
Eusebius, HE 2.2), Eleazar b. Dinai (Josephus, Ant. 20.1.1; 8.5; BJ 2.12.4), Amram (Josephus,
Ant. 20.1.1), Hanibas (Josephus, Ant. 20.1.1), Jacob and Simon, sons of Judas the Galilean
(Josephus, Ant. 20.5.2), the Egyptian Jew (Josephus, Ant. 20.8.6; BJ 2.13.5; Acts 21.38); the
wilderness imposter (Josephus, Ant. 20.8.10), Costobarus (Josephus, Ant. 20.9.4,) Salus
(Josephus, Ant 20.9.4), Menachem, (Josephus, BJ 2.17.8), and John of Gischala (Josephus, BJ
2.21; 4.3.13ff; 7.1; 7.8.1) See E.E. Jensen, The First Century Controversy Over Jesus as a
Revolutionary Figure, JBL 60 (1941) pp.261 72. See M. Hengel, The Zealots (Edinburgh:
T&T Clark, 1989) pp.22936 on false prophets.
43. The prediction of Jesus imminent return has been proven to be false, since technically it was
valid for the generation in which it was written only. Sanders describes how, when Jesus second
coming did not occur during Pauls lifetime, Paul gradually changed this prophecy and put it in
the background of his message. According to Sanders, the author of Acts then probably
rewrote Peters speech about this subject to suit his own purposes. E.P. Sanders, Paulus p.35.
44. B.D. Ehrman, The New Testament. A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings.
Second Edition (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000) p.61. See also: T. Freke and
P. Gandy, The Jesus Mysteries. Was the Original Jesus A Pagan God? (London: Thorsons,
1999) p.60. The Pauline portrait of Jesus in the Gospels resembles that of a typical mythical
Hellenistic god-man who had died for the sins of mankind, for example in the cult around
Herakles in Sauls hometown of Tarsus.
45. R.M. Sheldon, The Ancient Imperative, International Journal of Intelligence and Counter-
intelligence p.313.
46. R.M. Sheldon, The Ancient Imperative p.303. In this case, it was Labienus, a Roman
ambassador fighting on the side of the Parthians, who shot these pamphlets into the Roman
camp at the city of Apamea in Syria in 40 BC.
47. R.M. Sheldon, Jesus as Security Risk p.22.
48. R.M. Sheldon, The Ancient Imperative p.309.
49. R.M. Sheldon, The Ancient Imperative, p.310.
50. R.M. Sheldon, The Ancient Imperative p.309.
51. It is important to note that Acts, written much later by Luke, sketches a different portrait of
Pauls post-conversion life than Paul himself, especially when it comes to his travels. Some
scholars therefore think the book of Acts should not be taken seriously as historiography at all,
since Pauls own memory would be more reliable than the memory or hearsay that Luke based
himself upon assuming he did not wilfully imagine certain events. However, since Acts has
had such a tremendous impact on the way people have come to look at the apostle Paul, it is
well worth pointing out the way it can also be read as a cover story, covering up Pauls
strikingly good relationship with various Roman government and military officials. This
remarkably good relationship did not escape the attention of his contemporaries, after all, since
they plotted to kill him on various occasions. Besides, his letters explicitly mention a good
relationship with the Roman government several times.
52. It is doubtful to begin with whether 470 soldiers would be necessary to prevent one mans
escape. This large deployment of troops rather seems to point to another task, namely to shield
Paul against a sizeable outside threat.
53. On his length of stay in Caesarea, see Den Heyer, Paulus p.61.
54. Since Paul was allowed to write at least two letters in prison, it can safely be assumed that this
particular imprisonment in Caesarea did not put a stop to his preaching activities either.
Moreover, a little later he was again allowed to spread his message, this time while living under
Roman military guard in Rome.
55. Estimate of date in: E.P. Sanders, Paulus p.16. F.F. Bruce estimates the date as 33 CE,
G. Luedeman as 30 CE, and C. Roetzel at 34 CE (all listed in C. Roetzel, Paul p.181).
56. The Romans in general were not awed by Jewish religion, as the New Testament wants the
reader to believe, but had developed a tolerance for it that only stopped short at outright
subversion, or refusal to pay respect to Roman gods, which could also be interpreted as
subversion. (B.D. Ehrman, The New Testament p.28.).
57. Fik Meijer, Paulus Zeereis Naar Rome (Amsterdam: Athenaeum Polak&Van Gennep, 2000)
p.191.
58. Acts 28:28.
59. R. Eisenman, James, The Brother of Jesus pp.52429 who even connects Paul to the Saulus
mentioned by Josephus, Antiquities who provided Nero with a final intelligence report on the
events in Palestine before the outbreak of the Great Jewish War.
60. Acts 15: 2428.
61. Acts ends on 62 CE with Paul under house arrest in Rome 28: 3031. It mentions nothing
about Pauls death. Early Christian sources re-write the ending. Some say he was beheaded,
probably by Nero. See The Epistle of Clement To the Corinthians 5 (attributed to Clement of
Rome); Tertullian, Haer. 36, and Eusebius, History of the Church 2.25.5 and 3.1.2.
62. It should be noted that Romans 13 is a much discussed passage and has presented many
exegetical problems. Some scholars reject the passage as a non-Pauline interpolation into the
letter. For a discussion of the state of the question, see N. Elliott, Romans 13:17 in the
Context of Imperial Propaganda, in: Paul and Empire pp.184204.
63. Except for Jewish authority, to which Paul refused to submit himself.
64. There are authors who believe Pauls theology had a very critical and concrete objections to the
dominant political ideology of the Principate. See D. Georgi (ed.), in Paul and Empire. Religion
and Power in Roman Imperial Society (Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International, 1997)
pp.148 57, esp. p.148.
65. J.D.G Dunn, The Theology Of Paul The Apostle (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1998) p.679.
66. R.M. Sheldon, Jesus, as Security Risk p.23.

Documents - MX Operation Messiah Did Christianity Start As A Roman Psychological Counterinsurgency

Hochgeladen von

Dokumentinformationen

Originalbeschreibung:

Originaltitel

Copyright

Verfügbare Formate

Dieses Dokument teilen

Dokument teilen oder einbetten

Freigabeoptionen

Stufen Sie dieses Dokument als nützlich ein?

Sind diese Inhalte unangemessen?

Copyright:

Verfügbare Formate

Documents - MX Operation Messiah Did Christianity Start As A Roman Psychological Counterinsurgency

Hochgeladen von

Copyright:

Verfügbare Formate

This article was downloaded by: [Universitat Politcnica de Valncia]

On: 29 October 2014, At: 01:17

Small Wars & Insurgencies

Operation Messiah: Did Christianity Start as a Roman

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09592310500079940

PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE

Operation Messiah: Did

Correspondence Email: t.voskuilen@planet.nl

the ranks of the government on his way to an operation in Damascus.

(2) We do not know what Sauls reputation was like concerning

caused by a medical condition, a true divine revelation, or whether he

A Brief History of Distrust

without tension. The Jewish military officer-turned-historian, Flavius

The Execution of Jesus

for political dissidents and performed only by the Romans to deter

Saul of Tarsus Persecutor

Romans to keep order, functioning as a chief of police. A second

a theological warrior, as Calvin Roetzel calls him, but possibly in a

In Pauls own letters, there is no account of his conversion, which is

Acts gives us no information about the activities that Sauls fellow

their colleague was spreading his own version of a messianist message,

be the only plausible rational explanation for the passive behaviour of

joined. However, during the following years, Paul was to be in frequent

Here the book of Acts starts giving us a distorted view of the

only possible Messiah during those times. From the lengthy

Roman Psychological Warfare

(1) Psychological warfare. The Romans were known to use pamphlets,

Paul and the Romans Post-Conversion

After the events surrounding his conversion in Damascus and the

asked permission to speak to the rowdy crowd, a permission he received.

deserted police officer who, in a highly volatile region of the empire,

the regime subversive Paul lived under in Rome turned out to be

seems unlikely that they would suddenly decide to martyr him, as

Paul wrote this passage to the movement in Rome, referring to the

of non-Jews, for example Romans, into that persecuted movement.

These passages may very well have been an over-confident agents

The Nature of Proof

group of (potential) insurgents, stirred up their ranks, established a line

24. J.S. Spong, Rescuing the Bible p.119.

Das könnte Ihnen auch gefallen