First there is no mention that Paul told them to check the scriptures. Second, it is reasonable to assume that only the rabbis did.
On the first count we have this a few verses earlier:
Acts 17:1-4 : 1 When they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a Jewish synagogue. 2 As his custom was, Paul went into the synagogue, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures, 3 explaining and proving that the Christ had to suffer and rise from the dead. "This Jesus I am proclaiming to you is the Christ," he said.
Paul's habit was to reason from the scriptures. It is reasonably inferrable that Paul approved of what the Bereans did and even invited them to. It would not make sense if he didn't since he was reasoning from the scriptures to proclaim Christ. On the second count it is unknowable if only rabbis made the comparisons. We aren't told. What difference would that make anyway?
Third, it says that "[m]any believed" which also means that many didn't. And the scripture could not be the reason, both believers and nonbelievers consulted the scriptures.
It is the Holy Spirit who opens eyes and ears to accept the Scriptures. The fact that non-believers read the scriptures is irrelevant to the factual truth of them.
Fourth, what Paul was telling them was that, based on the Old Testament Jesus was the Christ.
Paul preached Christ crucified and raised from the dead, and he used the OT to back him up. I'm sure there were plenty of Jews (and Gentiles) who were surprised at this.
Fifth, and most importantly, if that were the case, then we wouldn't need the New Testament at all! We could just use the Old Testament and be "Christians!"
The NT explains the New Covenant as is needed. The OT was sufficient for faith, as evidenced by the OT righteous. Both the NT and OT are needed for Christianity.
And, sixth, last but not least, Paul really does not treat Jesus as God but as someone God raised, someone lesser than the Father, the only God as far as Paul is concerned.
I could not possibly disagree more. If what you say is true, wouldn't all the Apostolic successors of Paul have to wiped from the rolls? :) Or, did those who came hundreds of years later know what Paul meant in his writings better than he did? It would seem that would have to be the claim.
It is not reasonable since the Old Testament is not a clear prophesy, but an implied prophesy, just as Matthew 16:18 is not a clear commission of the Pope to all Christians, but only to those who want to see it that way. We don't know what Paul was telling the Jews in Thessaloniki and Berea, but whatever it was, the Bible claimed it converted some Jews and some Greeks (what were the Greeks doing in the synagogues; did the rabbis allow them also check the Old Testament?!?)
Bible interpretation was not given to the observant Jews but to rabbis (teachers). If the rabbis in Israel rejected Christianity, why would they be more inclined to accept it in Greece or elsewhere? Especially if Paul also included his "the law doesn't count" sermon!
Then preaching and arguments are irrelevant. This also doesn't fit in with the Pentecostal conversion of the "multitudes." There was very little "scripture" in what the Christians preached, FK; they healed the "sick" (demon-possessed) to establish "credibility" (in another words, gaining authority through magic) and they preached the coming of the kingdom of heaven and the need to repent, to sell what they owned and distribute to the poor, etc., because they were an apocalyptic sect expecting the end of the world to come within their lifetime.
That was not what Judaism taught about the coming of the messiah. How could they justify that with scriptures (and which scriptures) when the NT wasn't written yet?
Where is Christ crucified and resurrected in the Old Testament? Isaiah 53? That is not how Judaism interpreted the Suffering Servant because the same Suffering Servant is mentioned elsewhere in Isaiah as Israel.
You can just as easily use the same OT to refute what Paul was saying. Using the same OT, the Jews make a point that Christ does not fit the requirements of the messiah found in the specific sections of the Tanakh, except for one (being Jewish).
But don't you think, at least as a telltale, a Man who was crucified and then resurrected would have been notorious in the marketplace, if not in religious circles, so close to Palestine?
Do you think the word of mouth would not have brought to their attention that this Man was performing unheard-of miracles? Some 25 years after Christ, no one in Greek-speaking Anatolia and mainland seems to have heart of Jesus who walks on water and feeds multitudes with five loaves of bread and five fish, and who heals the blind and brings people back to life. I find that very curious.
By all accounts the immediate area surrounding Palestine never even heard of such a Man, not even the Jews in Diaspora who were in contact with Israel. Besides, Israel did not exist in a vacuum; Greek merchants regularly visited the land and they would have surely reported on rumors of such inordinary events.
In some ways, the Bible stories are really extremely naïve, as much as they are fantastic, when you think about it.
I disagree completely. New Testament is all you need to have Christianity. You could never be a Christian based on the Old Testament alone. The Old Testament supplements the New Testament but is is clear that the basis and the seed of Christian religion is the New Testament alone.
Kosta: Paul really does not treat Jesus as God but as someone God raised, someone lesser than the Father, the only God as far as Paul is concerned
FK: I could not possibly disagree more
Paul goes as far as explicitly stating that the only God known to him is the Father. The Father is the only God he ever refers to as "God" (and so does the Creed for that matter). There is no co-equality of the Son, let alone the Spirit, in Pauline theology (or for that matter in the Creed if you think about it—homoousia, same essence, i.e. divinity, is not ranking). He persistently uses the passive perfect tense when referring to Jesus' raising (i.e. "he was raised," not "he rose") and often complements this, so there is never any confusion, with "by God" (i.e. the Father).
No, because, as the Creed shows, Pauline verses are subtly "modified" in the Creed. The bulk of Pauline teaching remains the foundation of the church, as the one who built the Church.
Or, did those who came hundreds of years later know what Paul meant in his writings better than he did? It would seem that would have to be the claim
Paul is a pastoral guide not a divine revelation. What he taught is good advice but the backbone of the theology are the Gospels. Thus, Pauline teaching must be "squeezed" to agree with the Gospels and not the other way around. If there is something that does not agree with the orthodox faith based on the Gospels, it is modified or rejected or, more often, simply ignored,