My observation was not to claim alignments with Putin are all of a piece or of a party.

Gerhard Schröder is now getting a lot of criticism for his support. As a promoter of a certain kind of economy, his close connection to Putin is no longer connected to what centrists policies will be in the future.

The interests of national identity politics is not bound by the same language of win-win markets. You call them 'fringe' but they represent divisions that have been underway for some time. Russia itself is divided in that way.

My question is where will that kind of language go now that the level of violence in Ukraine has overturned the notion it is only an argument at a soirée.

In regard to the EU, it will be interesting to see how the Far Right parties will respond to the attack upon Ukraine. There has been support for Putin from them for the last ten years or so. As Foreign Policy article puts it:

Calling the West’s response to the love affair between Putin and the far right an overreaction greatly underestimates the extent to which the Kremlin and its state-controlled media use support of European politicians to legitimize Moscow’s explicitly anti-western foreign policy agenda: far-right politicians not only vote for pro-Kremlin policies in the EU parliament, they also take part in election observation missions — most notably the referendum for the annexation of Crimea and the “elections” in Ukraine’s Russian-controlled “people’s republics.” The Russian media uses these events and far-right leaders’ visits to Moscow to tout European support for Putin. Even Le Pen was an unknown in Russia until the Ukraine crisis and her outspoken public support for Putin. Now she is paraded as proof that there is some support for Putin’s policies in Europe. — Alina Polyakova

Seeing/Hearing them this week:

Yes, the message about neo-Nazis is not a reference to antisemitism. Putin's version of national identity is more along the lines of the Falangists in Spain than a celebration of Stalin's atheistic republic. Putin has much support within the Russian Orthodox Church. It is more of a civil war in the fashion of Franco than a model of an imperium.

In that sense, maybe it is more like the American Civil War than the conflicts which have consumed that area of the globe for time out of mind.

We cannot witness what other people are 'absolutely certain' about. We can witness what is excluded on the authority of such certainty. Paul's vision excluded other views as a denial of his truth. That is different from simply saying other people don't get it. it is the spirit of that sort of condemnation that has called forth Christianity's darkest aspect.
For myself, the instruction to not judge so as not to be judged is a lesson that does not fit with this view. It is a proposition of physics more than an article of belief.

For Zelensky to demand a no-fly zone isn't fruitful. It really won't happen and everybody ought to know it. — ssu

I am not sure it is without fruits. Everybody knows it won't happen because of the whole WW3 thing.

On the other hand, In addition to pressing for as much assistance as possible short of that, it is saying the ground forces are toast without Russia air support. In that respect, the impending decision to bombard cities into submission is an admission that the mission, as purported, is a failure

He acted on his own authority when he represented himself as an apostle and direct witness of Jesus. The communities he formed were based upon this role in them. So, in that sense, he spoke with the authority referred to in Matthew in reference to Jesus at the end of the Sermon of the Mount:

And when Jesus finished these sayings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he taught them as one who had authority, and not as their scribes — Matthew, 7:28, RSV

So, when you say, " The content of one's convictions seems to be secondary to the absolute certainty of those convictions" it seems to me that what is claimed matters. What is being asked from others seems to be central to the differences.

The desire to be an effective agent is present before and after the conversion. How that agency is understood is sharply different between the two conditions:

For I through the law died to the law, that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God; for if justification were through the law, then Christ died to no purpose. — Paul, Galatians 2:19, RSV

The mantle of authority taken here is not only directed to his speaking for the Son of God as an apostle but to the right to speak of himself as the last Jew. What he surrenders, all others should too. Perhaps in that latter sense of conviction, that he is truly what a Jew should be, it could be said the 'conviction' is the same.

I think it is too soon to tell.
Russia in Grozny and Syria has shown what they are capable of.

I have half agreed with Bacevich on many issues over the years but will gladly help him kick Friedman's kneecaps this time around. Condemnation of the invasion does not require ignoring:

"This intellectual framing according to which events occurring in proximity to the Rhine and the Danube possess greater inherent importance than events near the Tigris or the Nile dates from the age of Western imperialism. — Bacevich

Do you really not see that saying "you boys" is ad hominem?

You have already admitted you have not explored the texts beyond the interests of your creed. The historical is only what you believe it to be. That is not a contribution in a conversation about the history of Jesus.

I will leave you with the last word.

I pointed out to you boys. — Joe Mello

By their fruits, you will know them.

Exactly... That is ironically debating in bad faith — schopenhauer1

It is ironic. Another irony is that your review of the texts supports the following observation made by JM:

And the greatest thing that influenced Paul’s writing was that he had a special direct revelation of Jesus. From that moment on he wrote with the same authority Jesus spoke with. — Joe Mello

It is not only that Pau's words don't match what Jesus said about the law, Paul describes the centuries of life under it as a bondage that Jews had to suffer for the sake of "justifying the Gentiles by faith" in the Letter to the Galatians 3:6 ff.

It was the rejection of the idea that a people could live a lie for the sake of the truth that I began to seek for ways to understand the teaching that did not require Paul's testimony.

The alternative to your view is that the stand-off is beyond any possible bluff by any of the parties with this capacity for destruction.

It does not permit the articulation of new circumstances. it is a standing wave of the same old shit.

I took that to mean the guns have already been cocked and aimed long ago.

Having an opponent remind everybody of that is odd. 'Oh crap, I forgot I could wipe Russia off the map if I punched in the correct code.'

It is the MT Greene version of Falangist politics.

I understand that perspective. I grew up in it.

It does suggest to me that I was not wrong saying that you have no interest in a "historical" Jesus.

Hey, my comments were intelligent.
But yes, 180 Proof's was more intelligent.

In order for you to be able to discern such a shallow level of scholarship, you would need to have spent some time and effort reading the sources you believe some forum participants are ripping off.

A number of your statements lead me to think that you think there is something wrong with the historical approach altogether. That suggests you have no interest in such studies.

I hear that. Fair enough.

It is only a rejoinder if it was pointing to a primary condition influencing what was possible.
Otherwise, carry on as you like.

I don't know, it seems like the author of this article never heard about nuclear weapons.
Maybe it was a typo.

Paul certainly did, and that’s the most important point. But you won’t hear that from the modern “scholars” you’re plagiarising. — Joe Mello

What is the basis of this "plagiarizing" charge? Who is being copied here?

Yes, we don't know what will happen.
I do think that how we think about it is important.

And there is no proof whatsoever that the words and deeds of Jesus were influenced by Paul. — Joe Mello

Paul was not an actual witness of Jesus. Nor was he a contemporary. He acknowledged that in the texts we have to read about it.

If such an agreement was made on the basis that Russia otherwise would have destroyed the world, it negates the purpose of what NATO could secure as a threat to Russia. NATO is meaningless in a nuclear war. It is meaningful as a barrier to territorial expansion. It is a security agreement. To promise Russia that a certain nation could not apply for membership has no bearing on whether nations support them or not when they are attacked. Membership in NATO was meant to make the response automatic, if you will.

Russia is holding a people hostage and daring anybody to do something about it.

And who could stand as the arbiters of such a deal? There is no tribunal set up to accept promises on this basis. I would rather count on the desire to live as a countervailing force.

I think it has been taken seriously for many years.

Let me put it another way. After decades of brinkmanship and the political formations made as a consequence, what is left to do when Putin threatens us with the reality of it? Prepare more ICBMs?

If the message is that he is willing to use a strategic weapon for tactical goals, it does not change the standoff. Once you have a little bit of nuclear war, there is no limit to the response.

We do not have access to his decision tree. But the only reason other powers have been staying out of Ukraine so far is because of the presence of MAD. For Putin to wave it around like a stick is odd. It does not change the calculations of his oppositions.

I think the likelihood of nuclear deployment is small. But if Putin didn't think it would be considered even remotely as a serious threat, then why would he bother issuing it? — Janus

Because of the inexorable logic of Mutually Assured Destruction, bringing it up is equivalent to signaling a willingness to destroy oneself if it will attain a certain end.
That is what the Ukraine ambassador to the U.N. was referring to by suggesting Putin cut to the chase and shoot himself like "that guy in Berlin, you know, in 45."

You view the matter as a game of Risk. I look at it more as what justifies killing populations. A lot of states justify violence on the basis of playing a game. East, West, North, and South, whatever.

Electing to go to war can be a decision to fight an enemy who is about to kick your ass or a phantasy like Hitler dreamed.

Compared to the deadliness of Russian tactics in Syria and Chechnya, the attack on Ukraine is, so far, relatively restrained. The Russians could simply level the place, if they wished.

I am not sure about this 'friend' business.
Paul did say himself that he persecuted Christians before he did not. I characterized that as being an enforcer of the law.
I regret that making that point insulted you.
I will try to avoid doing that.

I take schopenhauer1's point that Paul must have been educated for us to have any trace of his presence.
The point I tried to make that Paul was involved in resisting Christians and then became a voice for them is right there in the text of the New Testament.
Make of that what you will.

True, the idea was not a new one.

But Paul conceived of the process as happening outside of what was happening in Judaism. The need to believe in order for the change to happen becomes integral to the vision. I don't know if there is a version of that kind of agency in 1st Century Judaism.

But it is that sense of a vanguard that Augustine amplifies in the City of God. The order of heaven has not been established yet, but the agent of change is here.

Yeah, Chuck Berry was the full package, ridiculous in his excellence. In the best possible sense.

Paul also should be recognized as departing from '2nd Temple Judaism' when he said this world would be replaced by another one. Connecting a personal conviction to a change in the grounds of our existence is different than hoping the Creator will help you overcome suffering and oppression in this one.

In that way, one can see Job as the antithesis of Paul. Certainty of righteousness is no guarantee of outcomes. Job had to fend off his 'friends' who insisted that such an algorithm was in place.

Your question is worthy; It makes me nervous to venture a reply, but I will try.

I take your point that invoking a single creator is to locate the source of evil within the creation. One big difference between the story of Genesis and Timaeus is that the Creator and Man have a direct interaction with each other that changes over time in the first story while the Craftsman of the Timaeus brings all the components of the world into the realm of Becoming and that structure does not change even though our experience within it does.

There is a myth of the age of man's innocence in Plato's Statesman. It consits of the Pilot reversing the motion of the entire cosmos when disorder threatened its existence. Time and growth go backwards in the repair sessions. Once the place is reset, time runs forward again, and the Pilot lets go of the tiller. Our age is described as such:

For men, deprived of the care of the deity who had possessed and tended us, since most of the beasts who were by nature unfriendly had grown fierce, and they themselves were feeble and unprotected, were ravaged by the beasts [274c] and were in the first ages still without resources or skill; the food which had formerly offered itself freely had failed them, and they did not yet know how to provide for themselves, because no necessity had hitherto compelled them. On all these accounts they were in great straits; and that is the reason why the gifts of the gods that are told of in the old traditions were given us with the needful information and instruction,—fire by Prometheus, the arts by Hephaestus and the goddess who is his fellow-artisan, seeds and plants by other deities.1 [274d] And from these has arisen all that constitutes human life, since, as I said a moment ago, the care of the gods had failed men and they had to direct their own lives and take care of themselves, like the whole universe, which we imitate and follow through all time, being born and living now in our present manner and in that other epoch in the other manner. — Plato, Statesman, 274b, translated by Fowler

To see our condition in that way is sharply different from the story of our relation to a Creator who can spare us from evil if he wills it. We are given the choice to follow the way of the righteous and that is the possibility of our happiness as expressed in Psalm 1. But we need more help than that to overcome what confronts us. It is in that register I hear Paul saying that he needs help in his struggle with sin. The Creator as a participant in our person.

I could say more but figure I shouldn't bring too many points forward at a time.

No argument with your description.

The story of his conversion and the subsequent interchanges with Christians in Jerusalem suggests the 'co-option" was not only a narrative made after the fact but an attempt to marginalize some people in real time.