The continuing stream of hypotheses with regard to the Corinthian opposition to Paul will serve as a reminder that this opposition constitutes one of the crucial questions for the understanding of the New Testament and the origins of Christianity. It is not too much to say that a full understanding both of New Testament history and of New Testament theology waits on the right answering of this question. We can see pretty clearly that the development of Christianity in the first three decades after the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus moved about two poles: on the one hand, the church of Jerusalem, some at least of whose leaders could probably look back to their association with Jesus during his ministry in Palestine, and, on the other, Paul, apostle as he himself but by no means all his contemporaries believed him to be, and the churches he founded in the non-Jewish world. How were these two groups related to each other? Did they act in concert or in opposition? These alternatives are far too simply put, and fail to do justice to the complexity of the facts; but the facts to which justice must be done include the data of II Corinthians, where Paul appears to be confronted by a rival apostolate.

Die folgende Interpretation der Makarismen der Bergpredigt, d. h. des Abschnittes Mt. v. 3–12 (par. Lk. vi. 20–3 ), setzt die Zwei-Quellen-Theorie voraus. Danach benutzten die Verfasser des ersten und des dritten Evangeliums, die wir — ohne mit diesen Namen historische Reminiszenzen verbinden zu wollen — im Einklang mit der Tradition Matthäus und Lukas nennen werden, als schriftliche Vorlage nicht nur das zweite Evangelium als die (soweit uns bekannt ist) älteste Evangelienschrift, sondern sie verwendeten darüber hinaus mindestens eine zweite größere literarische Quelle, die sog. Logiensammlung (abgekürzt = Q).

A major impetus for investigating Christian origins from the viewpoint of unity and diversity has been provided recently by the publication of a second edition of Walter Bauer's monograph, Rechtgläubigkeit und Ketzerei im ältesten Christentum. When this book first appeared, in 1934, its importance was hardly recognized. But this second edition coincides with a growing awareness of the significance of Bauer's thesis, especially in the light of the Nag Hammadi discoveries, and also with a fast-developing literature on the whole subject of the relation between orthodoxy and heresy in the early church.

If we ask the question, ‘Did Paul know Jesus?’, we find that it is not so simple because of the ambiguities of the word ‘know’. Some other expression would make for clarity, e.g. ‘Did Paul have any contact or relationship with Jesus?’, or, even more pointedly, ‘Did Paul see Him, go further and listen to Him, and still further and speak with Him?’ ‘Know’ can mean, ‘know Him by sight’, ‘have a slight contact with Him’, ‘have close relations with Him’; ‘know about Him’ from others; and, finally, ‘form a judgement about Him’ or ‘understand Him’. Moreover, again and again when this question is raised in its simple form the ambiguous II Cor. v. 16 is invoked.

The question of development in Paul's eschatology has long been debated. It is held, on the one hand, that his doctrine of the end underwent a gradual transformation: Paul's earlier works express belief in the imminent eschaton, and construe the future in terms of apocalyptic notions of the resurrection; his later writings are sensitive to the delay of the parousia and describe life after death in the language of Hellenistic anthropology. On the other hand, it is argued that Paul's eschatology has not undergone major modification: Paul never abandoned his conviction that the end was at hand nor his essentially Jewish understanding of the resurrection.