ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the earliest of the Christian documents. It addresses communities of believers in Rome, Corinth, Galatia, Ephesus, Philippi, Saloniki, and Colossae, and also to three co-workers named Timothy, Titus and Philemon. Several passages in the Pauline Epistles show that a result of his conversion the author acquired an intense and earnest conviction that Jesus had in fact risen from the dead, and Paul believed that the Christ, having once experienced death and resurrection in the person of Jesus, had thereby conquered death, and that all those who receive Christ into their hearts similarly acquire immortality. One feature which specially distinguishes Paul from other early theological writers is his comparative readiness to give reasons for his assertions. Paul implies that for the follower of Jesus there is no real difference between Jew and Greek, between barbarian and Scythian, between bond and free, but Christ is everything and everywhere.
