Whether someone laid out the evidence first or the other way around is beyond our answering, since we weren’t there.
What we can do is take the evidence, analyze it, and then come up with our biblical interpretation. Adjusting that interpretation to fit our preconception rather than simply dealing with what’s there is the type of eisegesis that I’m most familiar with...after the fact rather than before the fact. Before the fact is really hard to pin down.
“Whether someone laid out the evidence first or the other way around is beyond our answering, since we weren’t there.”
There is no record in Holy Writ of any Christian praying to a departed saint.
No commands to pray to departed saints.
No exhortation to pray to departed saints - or angels either.
No non-Biblical, but Christian writings during the first 100 years of the Church of praying to departed saints.
No secular writings of the era reporting that Christians practiced this.
No sacred art depicting such a practice.
No secular art depicting such a practice.
It is a total argument from silence until you see pagan practices appear between 100-200 ad.
So, no, it is not beyond our answering, if we can read Scripture and history.