Neither.
Christianity/Catholicism was founded by Jesus Christ on the Apostles, the first Bishops.
It's nearly certain, though, that there would be no Christianity without Paul's efforts.
I thought Ron Paul invented AquaBuddha.
Both.
Christianity as we know it today is largely the creation of Paul. At the same time, in the words of Thomas Jefferson in his ‘Letter to William Short’ of 13 April, 1820:
“Of this band of dupes and impostors, Paul was the great Coryphaeus, and firm corrupter of the doctrines of Jesus. These palpable interpolations and falsifications of his doctrines led me to try to sift them apart.”
Or to quote Soren Kirkegaard,
“In the teachings of Christ, religion is completely present tense: Jesus is the prototype and our task is to imitate him, become a disciple. But then through Paul came a basic alteration. Paul draws attention away from imitating Christ and fixes attention on the death of Christ The Atoner. What Martin Luther, in his reformation, failed to realize is that even before Catholicism, Christianity had become degenerate at the hands of Paul. Paul made Christianity the religion of Paul, not of Christ. Paul threw the Christianity of Christ away, completely turning it upside down, making it just the opposite of the original proclamation of Christ.”
So yes, both. It would be an interesting “What If” of history if Paul hadn’t come along - what shape would Christianity have taken? Paul was certainly the great popularizer of Christianity, but if his own theological interpretations are removed wholesale from Christianity (the Pauline Epistles, etc.) we’d likely have something that looks a like Thomas Jefferson’s edit of the Bible.
Did Paul invent or hijack Christianity?
_______________________________________
I’m a deacon in my Church. Been a committed Christian for over 50 years. But only recently did I learn that some believe Paul did indeed “hijack” the Gospel.
For instance. The Great Commission instructing us to baptize?
Doesn’t apply any more since Paul’s commission over rode that.
Is the Founder of the Christian Religion Paul of Tarsus or Jesus of Nazareth?
Evidence for God ^ | 02/24/2014 | Rich Deem
Posted on Monday, February 24, 2014 4:10:01 PM by SeekAndFind
The Rabbi Saul from Tarsus, having had his moment of Divine clarity handed to him in spades, did NOT ‘invent’ Christianity, nor did he ‘hijack’ that belief.
Before that moment, he was the zealot pursuer accuser of Christians, which means he had foreknowledge of their beliefs, activities, and demeanor, i.e., “he was previously exposed to it”.
His moment ‘on the road’, brought to mind, all that he had witnessed, and made it ‘his to own’, as we say, today.
Therefore, with his knowledge of the Talmud, the Ta’anach, the Torah, he was Divinely directed to bring those teachings that reinforce, and more deeply expound, ‘the teachings of the Master’. (ref: ‘I am but a slave’).
His ‘letters’ go to churches of future linkpins, in Revelations. His ‘letters’ go to those churches, that have formed from the local Pagan/Roman communities, and have had no ‘direct exposure to Jesus’, as well.
(How would YOU manage, were you to be set as a ‘remote office of one’, with no manuals or corporate directives, and only the ‘breakroom information brokers’ knowledge, to go on? No data systems, just a pen, ink, and paper, with an occasional speaking arrangement? And, as time went by, the DHS is after your head.)
A few years back, a handful of FRoman Catholics made the same accusation. All women. What is it about the Apostle Paul that (some) women don't like?
Acts 15 shows the apostles commissioned Paul and gave him authority:
Then the apostles and elders, with the whole church, decided to choose some of their own men and send them to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas. They chose Judas (called Barsabbas) and Silas, men who were leaders among the believers. 23 With them they sent the following letter:
The apostles and elders, your brothers,
The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Paul was a great human manifestation, perhaps the greatest, of the Holy Spirit.
Or perhaps it is better said that the that the Holy Spirit manifested itself in him in a most powerful and unique way.
Hitler said he hijacked it
Robbing Peter to pay Paul?
Simply put, if Paul had no personal connection with Jesus, then neither does anyone else living today.
Christianity is the result of a covenant between the Godhead planned out before the foundation of the world was ever laid. The Bible, indeed all of history, is an unfolding, revelation, of that plan.
Paul bothers me sometimes. His writing can be convoluted and frustrating to read.
But a guy who writes :
“Love is patient and kind. It is not jealous or boastful..etc., ....” (paraphrase, sorry).
That’s a guy filled with the Holy Spirit.
That’s a guy following the Way.
Paul’s not a highjacker.
Hm... this kind of glosses over the first and most important point: Paul never met Jesus while Jesus was alive. He claims Jesus spoke to him after death. Now, we don’t fall for Muhammed’s claims of Gods and angels talking to him, why do Christians fall for Paul’s claims?
1 Then fourteen years after I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, and took Titus with me also.
2 And I went up by revelation, and communicated unto them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but privately to them which were of reputation, lest by any means I should run, or had run, in vain.
3 But neither Titus, who was with me, being a Greek, was compelled to be circumcised:
4 And that because of false brethren unawares brought in, who came in privily to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage:
5 To whom we gave place by subjection, no, not for an hour; that the truth of the gospel might continue with you.
6 But of these who seemed to be somewhat, (whatsoever they were, it maketh no matter to me: God accepteth no man’s person:) for they who seemed to be somewhat in conference added nothing to me:
7 But contrariwise, when they saw that the gospel of the uncircumcision was committed unto me, as the gospel of the circumcision was unto Peter;
8 (For he that wrought effectually in Peter to the apostleship of the circumcision, the same was mighty in me toward the Gentiles:)
9 And when James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given unto me, they gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship; that we should go unto the heathen, and they unto the circumcision.
11 But when Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed.
12 For before that certain came from James, he did eat with the Gentiles: but when they were come, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing them which were of the circumcision.
13 And the other Jews dissembled likewise with him; insomuch that Barnabas also was carried away with their dissimulation.
Anyone who thinks Paul hijacked Christianity doesn’t believe in the difference between Jew and Gentile, and may believe that Paul has hijacked their own form of Christianity, not God’s.