Toto:

Alas, your claim of scholarly consensus is as amazing as your earlier post. I could cite the majority of scholars who believe that Jesus did exist and that Paul argued such. These are not conservatives I am discussing. The "liberals" you cite are not the scholarly consensus on the point of Jesus existing in history. But in the end this debate over who votes how is not relevant, except for the data one uses to make that call. Let's look at the data.

The conflict Paul had with other Christian leaders out of Judaism dealt with circumcision and issues of the law, not with who Jesus was. According to Galatians and his own testimony, they were agreed on these points. By the way, who else would the pillars be but James and the one we know as Cephas (=Peter)? As for your claim Paul would not respond this way to them, if he thought a central theological principle of the faith were involved he would engage them, just as he says he did. We know Paul had convictions and stood up for them to anyone. They did discuss such matters.

The debates of the second century with Jews you note are part of a tradition stream we can also trace in Judaism to the Talmud (not just in Christianity). Now, if Jesus had never existed why did not the Jews simply argue the person of Jesus was a fabrication. That was never done and the Josephus text indicates otherwise.

As for your attempt to distinguish the brother of the Lord from Jesus (of Nazareth) in Paul, how is that possible when he calls the Lord the Lord Jesus Christ as often as Paul does? Who else would this be? Your claim he is the Lord God ignores the post about a connection to the house of David I already noted in another posted response from today (that text is from Rom 1:2-4).

dlb