Where do you find Paul's definition of the gospel?

Answer 1

A:Paul used the word 'gospel' in his epistles long before the first book of the gospel genre was written, and so his epistles are the oldest references we have to a concept of gospel, or 'good news'.

Paul stated that when he began to preach, he did not confer with flesh and blood to learn the details of his new religion. Instead, he taught what was revealed to him by Jesus Christ alone, as in Galatians 1:11-12:

But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel that was preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ.

This explains why Paul seems to have known nothing of the life and crucifixion of Jesus, and even seems unaware that he had lived and died in the quite recent past.

Later, Paul went to Jerusalem to communicate to the brethren that gospel that he taught among the Gentiles, because he did not know whether the gospel he taught accorded with that of the Jerusalem church, Galations 2:2:

And I went up by revelation, and communicated unto them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but privily to them which were of reputation, lest by any means I should run , or had run, in vain.

Paul may have sought an exchange of beliefs with the leaders of the Jerusalem Church, because of other missionaries who were turning up in his churches, preaching 'another Jesus' or 'another gospel' (2 Corinthian 11:4, Galatians 1:6-8). Paul even had to defend his version of Christianity from unnamed rivals who visited his Christian communities and spread what he regarded as false Christianity (For example, Galatians 1:6-7,2:4; 2 Corinthians 11:4-13). Whatever gospel Paul preached, it would seem to have been so different from that of James, John and Peter that he needed to discuss it with them. In spite of being just a few short years after the traditional date of the crucifixion, it was far from the only gospel on offer.

Paul does tell us that his understanding of the resurrection of Jesus was greatly different from that which was later recorded in the four New Testament gospels. At 1Corinthians 15:3-8, Paul said that Jesus died and was buried, rose again according to the scriptures, then was seen by Cephas, then the twelve, then by more than 500, most of whom were still alive, then by James and all the apostles, and finally by himself. Not only does this account differ in several important ways from the accounts that would later form part of the four New Testament gospels, but Paul implied that the appearances were all of the same nature. There is no suggestion that any of the appearances to Cephas, the twelve, James or the apostles were somehow more real than the spiritual appearance he experienced. He only deferred because he was the last to see Jesus and because he had been guilty of persecuting Christians.

G A Wells says that Philippians 2:5-11 is widely agreed to be a pre-Pauline hymn, except for the reference to the cross, which breaks the metrical structure of the hymn and must have been a later insertion. The hymn tells of the descent and ascent of Jesus in a manner that seems to preclude a human birth or physical existence. Verse 2:6 is interesting: 'Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God'. The hymn sees Jesus as being in the form of God and wanting to be equal with God. This hymn and Paul's material on the resurrection of Jesus together suggest that, for Paul, Jesus lived in the heavenly realm, not here on earth - a view that seems consistent with the book known as the Epistle to the Hebrews.

Many of Paul's contemporaries believed that there were seven heavens, physically one above the other, with God at the very top. The lowest heaven was the sphere of the flesh, between the earth and the moon. If someone was written of as 'in the flesh', the cautious scholar will try to establish whether this means the person lived physically on earth or inhabited the realm of the flesh. When Paul wrote that he knew a man caught up in the third heaven, although he could not tell if the man was spiritual or in the body (2 Corinthians 12:2), this is evidence that he also believed in the celestial spheres. It is even possible that Paul was a Gnostic and was speaking of initiates (spiritual) and those who do not know (in the body - natural or innocent and gullible, not spiritual). If indeed Paul was a Gnostic, we would be able to infer much more about his gospel from the writings of the later Gnostics.
In his epistles, he never claimed that his authority had come from disciples who had received their own authority from Jesus himself, as would be implied by the Acts of the Apostles. We can only piece together fragments of the gospel he taught, and these fragments differ from the gospel we learn from the Books of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.