curious things about Paul

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In 1 Thess, Paul indicates that he was not on good terms with the Philippian community.

How did the letters attributed to him get collected?  Did someone put an advertisement in an Imperial paper asking for anyone with letters from Paul to send them to a particular address?

Why, if their faith was so important to them, and Paul such an influential figure, did so few letters survive?

Scholars have claimed that the Pauline letters predate the gospels.  The word euaggelion appears in 1 Thess, Galatians Philippians, 1 Cor, Romans 2 Cor.  In other words, all of the “authentic” letters of Paul refer to the euaggelion.

Philemon does not.  In Philemon, Paul was a “prisoner of Christ.”

The appearance of “gospel” suggests that the texts were in existence and were know of in “Paul”;s time. 

At least, they were in existence and in use in the time of those who redacted anti-Semitism and theology into Paul’s letters.

It is interesting that Pauline scholars note the progression of “Paul”’s theology.  It is more interesting that it never seems to have occurred to them that the change in theology reflects the different theological positions of the communities to whom the letters were addressed, which suggests that those “theological changes” were, in fact, the different theological positions of the communities redacted into the letters.