Historical conundrum

According to church historians, the Pauline letters predate the Gospels, which were “complied” at a later date.

Historians accept the dating of the Christian era because the Matthean text and the Lukan text offer birth narratives that give time markers in the form of references to Roman leaders.  The Lukan narrative is accompanied by a second text, Acts, which refers to Paul and his mission.  Therefore the Pauline letters are presumed to date from the mid-1^st century.

But there are problems with this “history:”

The earliest Pauline letter dates to the late 2^nd century CE.  This dating is later than the earliest known fragment of any gospel.  Yet this, supposedly, is part of the foundation of the religion.  But assuming the hypothetical writing to have been around 55-60 CE, apparently, not one of the early letters was preserved.

Think of that. 

Scholars have argued that the references to “Christos/Chrestus” in Suetonius, Tacitus and Jesephus could not possibly have been made by Christians because those insertions refer to “Chrisus/Chrestos” and not to “our Lord.”  Yet the earliest extant Pauline letter is a fragment of Romans, and is dated to the late 2^nd, early 3^rd century.

The earliest gospel documents are fragments of John and Matthew.  They date to around the Bar Cochba revolt.

Suetonius claims that Claudius expelled the “Christians” from Rome.   Because of this reference in Suetonius’ history of Claudius, it has been presumed that there were “Christian” communities in Rome in the Claudian era.

We have no edicts from Claudius to confirm this.

If the “gospel” texts were intended to document the bar Cochba revolt, but were retrojected back to Tiberian/Claudian era to protect the survivors, it is reasonable to assume the Pauline mission occurred at the time in the aftermath of the bar Cochba revolt.

This means that the Pauline letters, if real, were not written for Roman audiences ca Tiberius/Claudius, but were written for Roman audiences ca bar Cochba.

We know of the bar Cochba revolt from Eusebius and Dio Cassius.

We have letters, orders and coinage from Bar Cochba.  Those exist.

Regarding the matter of Hadrian and the renaming of the Temple:  there is a general attempt to claim that Hadrian had tried to accommodate the Judeans, but “went back on his word” and dedicated the Temple to Jupiter instead.  I would suggest that this spin on history is an attempt at reconciling the “good emperor” Hadrian with the emperor Hadrian who nearly destroyed the population of Judea.  It is worthwhile to remember that Antinous died in 130, and that following his death, Hadrian had him deified and instituted a cult in his honor.  I would suggest that Hadrian had wanted to dedicate the Temple in Jerusalem to Antinous, that the Judean population objected to this, that to “accommodate” them and dedicate the Temple to an “older” deity, Hadrian dedicated the Temple to Jupiter.  When the Judean populace made it evident that Jupiter was not the “older” deity they had expected the Temple to be dedicated to, Hadrian responded negatively.

A table of the documents, the presumed date when they were written, and their earliest extant example looks like this:

Gospel of John           80-95 CE        125-160 CE

Gospel of Matthew    60-85 CE        150-200 CE

Gospel of  Luke          60-90 CE        175-250 CE

Gospel of Mark          60-70 CE        350 CE

Acts                             60-90 CE        250 CE

Romans                      57-58 CE        Late 2^nd or early 3^rd cen CE

Corinthians                57 CE              Late 2^nd or early 3^rd cen CE

Galatians                    44-55 CE        Late 2^nd or early 3^rd cen CE

Ephesians                  65 CE              Late 2^nd or early 3^rd cen CE

Philppians                  57-62 CE        Late 2^nd or early 3^rd cen CE

Colossians                  60 CE              Late 2^nd or early 3^rd cen CE

1 Thessalonians        50 CE              Late 2^nd or early 3^rd cen CE

2 Thessalonians        50-54 CE        300 CE

Timothy                      60-100 CE     350 CE

Titus                           60-100 CE     200 CE

Philemon                    56 CE              3^rd cen CE

From this we can see that historians’ theories that the references in Tacitus, Suetonius and Josephus must be “real” are a bit odd, because they base those theories on the lack of “reverence” that “true believers” would have demonstrated had they inserted the references themselves.  Yet those “true believers” seem not to have been very concerned with preserving the earliest copies of documents it is reasonable to assume they held in reverence.