Did Paul explain scripture or add to scripture?

We know God chose Paul as an apostle and breathed His words into Paul. We can believe all Paul wrote as coming from the Lord Himself. But we need to decide if that word was explaining scripture or adding to scripture.

Christ told us that what He did was not adding or taking away from scripture, but it was fulfilling scripture. If Paul taught something new, then Paul would be greater than Christ.

The Bereans tested Paul by whether he agreed with scripture or not. Acts 17:11 “Now the Berean Jews were of more noble character than those in Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.”

Much of Paul’s writings were repeats of what the old testament said, he felt it explained what he said.

Did Paul add something new that God was adding to scripture?

He explained it. The first 49 years of my life, I can honestly say that I had no clue as to what Paul was going on about. Really, I didn't. It wasn't until I began to understand Circumcision of the Heart that his teachings made any sense. And of course, they did, for I actually studied the Old Testament, and linked it directly to the New Testament, through Circumcision of Heart.

Beautiful. This quite of yours I thought was particularly interesting:

"OT quotes account for about 30% of the NT. "

That's some deep, deep study to figure that out. Wow.

A non sequiter. If Jesus gave Paul new insight, it still came from Jesus, making Jesus still greater than Paul.

Where did Jesus teach this?…
1 Corinthians 15:51-52 ESV
[51] Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, [52] in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed.

Still, it doesn’t follow just because Paul taught that which Jesus did not mention doesn’t make Paul greater, it just makes Paul a faithful steward of the mysteries entrusted to him.

Paul was inspired by God to write his epistles, which are part of the canon.

In the OT, no one understood who the Messiah would be. Paul was a messenger from God, he explained much, especially who Jesus was, and how he came to die for us!

He wrote much that was totally new, as the other inspired writers of the Bible did in their books.

The OT had one major theme. That was to prophecy about God including over 600 prophecies about the Messiah. The law was only a foreshadow of Jesus' first coming.

I preached. Sermon from Gal 3 last Sunday. Here are some of the verses I used, to talk about how going back to the law leaves you a slave to the law! Works do NOT save.

"We ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners; 16 yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified." Gal 3:15-16

"For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery." Gal 5:1

When you submit yourself to the law, you become a slave to it, Paul says here!

"You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace. 5 For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness." Gal 5:4-5

"For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Gal 5:14

"As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, 2 in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. 3 All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh[a] and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. 4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. 6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7 in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. 8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." Eph 2:1-10

So to answer your question, Blik, Paul neither added nor explained Scripture. Instead, he was inspired by God to write down the words God told him, including that when you try and obey the law, you have thrown yourself into the slavery of the Jews. You you cannot follow the OT, or the law, and Christ at the same time.

Are you for Christ? Or have you been trapped by the bondage of the law!?

You are a Judaiser, just like the people in Galatia were in the church there. Did you know Galatians was the only church Paul did not praise or commend? They were so far from true Christianity, Paul needed to put them straight, and bypass the niceties! Stop trying to convince us to embrace the bondage of the Jewish law in the OT.

You say that much of what Paul wrote is new. I say what Paul wrote is explaining God as the old testament tells us of God and Christ fulfilled all the old testament said of Him.

What is the new message you say Paul gave us?

The huge difference between the new and old testament is that the old testament tells of God with God's finger writing it in stone and literal history and the new testament writing of God in our hearts. It is not changing anything but adding that we should always add love to the message.

Scripture tells us God is love. Scripture tells us God never changes. If God is love in the new testament, then scripture lets us know God is love in the old testament.

Sorry, I forgot to mention that your logic is poor! Jesus is greater than everyone, because he is God. No one can exceed him!

Every single word Paul wrote was the inspiration of the Holy Spirit! In other words, Paul was the obedient servant of God, who wrote down what God wanted to say! Paul didn't make up all these new things at all. He just listened and wrote what Christ told him to say. I'm so sorry you live in such slavery and bondage, and come up with such literally half baked ideas!

God is sovereign and in control. God was behind every word written in the Bible, from Moses to Paul! No, Paul could never be better than Jesus, and he would say you were a Judaizing legalistic, pulling people away from the freedom of following Christ and back to the bondage of the OT law!

I think the theme of both the old and new testament is exactly the same, the theme is salvation for us. The old testament is all a shadow of Christ. As an example, we learn of how we, as the temple, is the temple through Christ. God's spirit was in the Ark of the Covenant in the earthly temple, in the temple that we are we accept God in our inner chamber, in our heart.

The reality of the entire old testament is the reality of the Lord in Christ. When we understand the old testament's explanation of Christ, it gives us an understanding of God and His ways. God's main purpose for us to to live with Him in eternity. That is the theme of scripture.

I agree, there is absolutely no question that Christ is greater than Paul. Also that Paul spoke as God directed Him, we can trust Paul completely. We know Christ changed mothing, He fulfilled for Christ told us so. If Christ did not change anything and Paul was lesser than Christ, then Paul certainly could not add anything new to God. Paul explained what was already true.

Paul add something new, Paul is not a hard hearted Jew

Don't you think that Blik was referring to "new" things outside of the direction and guidance of Christ? Blik isn't dumb.

Paul preached the Gospel of Christ (Romans 15:14-22) so there is a lot of old testament scripture prophecy that can be tied directly to preaching who Christ is.

Look at Hebrews (though I personally am not sure Paul actually wrote Hebrews, but it isn't totally impossible) and look at the story of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch. The Ethiopian eunuch was reading Isaiah and from that point Philip revealed the Gospel of Christ to him (Acts 8:26-40) using old testament scripture.

Jesus talked about the resurrection (John 5:28-29) and returning to gather His elect (Matthew 24:29-31.) Paul expounds on those doctrines in numerous places such as 1 Corinthians 15 and spots in 1 & 2 Thessalonians.

A lot of what Paul taught were new revelations from God, but I don't think he ever created entirely new doctrines, rather built upon an existing foundation of the doctrine he found in the OT or the words of Jesus.

Were they new revelations? Or, was Paul, perhaps chosen by God because of his knowledge and experiences, to expound upon the teachings of Christ? Peter doesn't seem to teach or explain the Core Doctrine of Circumcised Hearts . . . at . . . all. But there is no doubt that he was fully aware of it. As I have said before, these facts such as about Peter not teaching Circumcised Hearts, is one of the ways that our incredibly Powerful God kept His Gospel hidden from the masses.

Ephesians 3:7-9 NLT - "By God's grace and mighty power, I have been given the privilege of serving him by spreading this Good News. 8 Though I am the least deserving of all God's people, he graciously gave me the privilege of telling the Gentiles about the endless treasures available to them in Christ. 9 I was chosen to explain to everyone this mysterious plan that God, the Creator of all things, had kept secret from the beginning."

Eph 3:1-13 - Eph 2:10-16 - Colossians 2:9-15.

Those passage sets, above, discuss the most unique part of Paul's teachings. And as Paul says, he was chosen to "explain" . . . not give New teachings, but explain existing teachings. Paul was given the ability to understand the Scriptures in a way that only one can unless their Heart had been Enabled to do so.

Christ changed everything.

That's why the Jews hated Him and wanted Him dead.


Paul expounds on the changes that Christ made.

I can agree with that. The way I see it is that they actually are new in the sense that the way they were explained had never been seen before, making them new revelations in my view.

For example, can we get the same exhaustive breakdown of core Christian theology from reading any of the gospels that we can from reading Romans? That's what I mean.

Paul went to great lengths to answer questions and summarize concepts that are not summarized in the gospels or old testament. In my view, Romans is Paul's best breakdown of Christian theology.

Paul had the gift of teaching from God. Possibly Paul had all of the spiritual gifts.

Nah. The Jews had no logical, reasonable, rational reason to hate Christ. They hated Jesus because "they do not know what they are doing." Jesus, Stephen, and Paul (the three) all spoke those words about those who are not saved. But more, Paul tells us what the root problem was (thanks to the NLT for helping us to understand more easily):

Romans 11:7-8 NLT - "So this is the situation: Most of the people of Israel have not found the favor of God they are looking for so earnestly. A few have--the ones God has chosen--but the hearts of the rest were hardened. 8 As the Scriptures say, "God has put them into a deep sleep. To this day he has shut their eyes so they do not see, and closed their ears so they do not hear."

That's why they hated Christ . . . this is at the Core of God's Eternal Plan. It is amazing to be able to see this plan all throughout Scripture . . . and it is.

I totally hear what you're saying and what you're saying is both reasonable and logical. I like it.

Why do "we need to decide" this?

He told you this already. It was two sentences away:

"If Paul taught something new, then Paul would be greater than Christ."