Several times Jesus warned of a wolf or wolves, saying that false prophets will come as wolves dressed in sheep's clothing. This means they will claim to be followers of Jesus, but inwardly [they] are ravening wolves - "Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly are ravening wolves". (Matt. 7:15.) Again, Jesus warns true Jesusians that they are at risk from these so-called Jesusians who are ravening wolves. "Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves". (Matt. 10:16). Jesusian leaders who do not care for the flock will leave the average Jesusian at the mercy of these ravening wolves. Jesus explains: "He that is a hireling, and not a shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, beholdeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth, and the wolf snatcheth them, and scattereth them: (John 10:12). "He fleeth because he is a hireling, and careth not for the sheep. (John 10:13)(ASV)"
Who was Jesus warning the people of His day about? With the benefit of hindsight, we in the 21st century should be able to identify this person or persons by looking at the writings of the early church leaders and teachers, and the recorded history of that time, to see who they identified as the ravening wolves, whose teachings they subsequently rejected. Before we do, and to assist us in identifying these wolves, we need to look into the writings of the Old Testament prophets as Jesus often did, to see if their identity is revealed there. Whenever Jesus taught, in many instances he used imagery that was used and explained by the Old Testament prophets, in order for his listeners to get the true meaning behind what He was saying. Such appears to be the case here, as there are two prophesies in the OT who make reference to this rather unique, descriptive phrase, "ravening wolves" that Jesus used.
The first is a prophecy in the book of Genesis that the tribe of Benjamin would produce just such a “ravening wolf" in the "Latter Days". In context, we see that in fact there are two prophesies - one about the Messiah from the tribe of Judah, and another about a "wolf" from the Tribe of Benjamin would first kill then later scatter the flock in the "latter days".
In Genesis 49, Jacob, also known as Israel, utters a prophecy over his sons relating to these "latter days". In this prophecy, Jacob identifies a role that each son's tribe will play in the "latter days". The passage begins: "And Jacob called unto his sons, and said: gather yourselves together, that I may tell you that which shall befall you in the latter days. (Gen 49:1) Jacob's prophecy about his son Judah and the tribe of Judah is a clear Messianic prophecy. "The sceptre shall not depart from Judah [i.e., the right to rule belongs to this tribe], Nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, Until Shiloh come: And unto him shall the obedience of the peoples be. (Gen 49:10) Binding his foal unto the vine, And his ass’s colt unto the choice vine; He hath washed his garments in wine, And his vesture in the blood of grapes. (Gen 49:11) His eyes shall be red with wine, And his teeth white with milk." (Gen 49:12) (ASV)
The root word for Shiloh comes from Shalom, meaning peace. Shiloh means one who brings peace. Shiloh comes holding the sceptre of Judah. Shilo thus is a prince of peace. This passage therefore clearly depicts Messiah, the Prince of Peace, with his garments bathed in the blood of grapes. All obedience will be owed him. The Genesis-Shiloh Messiah is then presented in similar imagery as the Lamb of God in the Book of Revelation. (Rev. 19:13 “garment sprin- kled with blood”.) Ancient Jewish scholars read this Genesis passage to be a Messianic prophecy. In all three Rabbinic Targums, the Hebrew scholars taught Shiloh was the name for Messiah. This was also repeated by many ancient Jewish writers. (Gill, Gen. 49:10.)
From the prophesy over Judah we can clearly identify the period that, in the Old Testament, is referred to for the first time here as "the Latter Days" as being around the time of Jesus, since he prophesies The Messiah was the appear during these "Latter Days". Ancient Jewish scholars read the "Latter Days" of this Genesis passage as being the Latter Days of the nation of twelve tribes. They believe those "latter days" concluded with the fall of Massada in AD 73. Any distinguishable tribe of Benjamin disappeared as a result of the Roman invasions of that time. The prophecy about Benjamin is therefore no longer capable of being fulfilled, therefore it must have been fulfilled around the time of Jesus, but no later than AD 73.
Let’s turn now to Jacob’s over the Benjamin in relation to the “latter days” when Shiloh comes, to see if we can identify this "ravening wolf", not forgetting that Jesus himself had also confirmed Jacob's prophesy by warning of his soon-coming appearance. Here we read of the imagery of a ravening wolf. "Benjamin is a wolf that raveneth: In the morning he shall devour the prey, And at even[ing] he shall divide the spoil." (Gen 49:27) (ASV). Let’s analyze this verse - for there is a time-sequence to the ravening wolf’s activity. In the morning, he devours the prey. This means he kills his prey early on. In the evening, he takes the spoils left over after killing the prey. The significance of this will be revealed later.
The early Jesusian church was not only aware of these prophesies, they aligned it with the warning Jesus gave in Matthew 10 about a "Ravening wolf" who would snatch members of the flock and scatter them, and identified this wolf as the person we today refer to as the Apostle Paul. An early church writer, Hippolytus (200s A.D.), whose documentation of the church in the first and second centuries gives rare insight into the state of the early church, its beliefs and doctrines, identified Paul as the Benjaminite "ravening wolf".
Here is the quote from Hippolytus (estimated to be written 205 A.D.) wherein he saw God prophesying of Paul in Genesis 49:27: ‘Benjamin is a devouring wolf. In the morning, he will devour the prey, and at night he will apportion the food.’ This thoroughly fits Paul, who was of the tribe of Benjamin. For when he was young, he was a ravaging wolf. However, when he believed, he ‘apportioned the food.’ (Hippolytus, W 5.168.). The second part about ‘dividing the spoil’ was interpreted by Hippolytus to mean Paul became involved in chartity work. This spin by Hippolytus on dividing the spoil as a good deed was wishful thinking. This could be because Hippolytus was reccomending that Paul's epistles be included as a supplement to what would become the New Testament, even though he did not believe them to be God inspired because they contained doctrine, particularly on salvation, that conflicted with what both Jesus and the Roman Church taught. Dividing the spoil has always meant plundered and does not have a positive connotation. God instead was sending a warning of the evil that would be done by this Benjamite, not the good.
This and other historical writings of the 1st and 2nd centuries demonstrate two things: (a) early Jesusians were more familiar than ourselves with the Shiloh Messianic prophecy in Genesis 49:10- 12; (b) they were on the lookout for the person who fulfilled th Benjaminite wolf prophesy, and identified that person as Paul.
So was Paul of the Tribe of Benjamin? Paul tells us in Romans 11:1, “For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.” Paul repeats this in Philippians 3:5, saying he is “of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin.” The Ebionites of Paul's day charge that Paul was not a true Jew. Then could he still be a Benjamite? Yes, Paul could be a descendant of a tribe without being a true Jew. For example, if one of Paul’s grandparents were a Benjamite, then he can be of the tribe but not a true Jew. As Hippolytus records, the early church did think this was a prophecy about Paul. Somehow modern Jesusians are sadly generally unaware of this prophecy and its interpretation by those who believe they witnessed it coming to pass.
So, was Hippolytus right? On what were his beliefs grounded? When analyzed, we can see many metaphorical similarities to Paul. In his youth Paul starts as a killer of members the flock or as one who approves the killing of Jesusians, as the prophesy fortells. (Acts 7:58; 8:1-3, 9:1.) In early Jesusian writings, Paul is the only person identified as doing this. However, some 20 years later, Paul claims a right of division among his earlier prey - he exclusively recruits Gentiles as Jesusians while the twelve apostles supposedly would exclusively recruit Jews. (Galatians 2:9.) This appears to fulfil the prophesy of the wolf "dividing the spoil" in the evening (latter years) of his life.
But was this division of the Jew and Gentile Jesusians consensual from the twelve, as Paul states in Galatians 2:? "and when they perceived the grace that was given unto me, James and Cephas and John, they who were reputed to be pillars, gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship, that we should go unto the Gentiles, and they unto the circumcision." If Paul is telling the truth, it means the twelve apostles were willing to violate the Holy Spirit’s guidance to the twelve that Peter was the Apostle to the Gentiles, as is clearly stated in Acts 15:7. The Holy Spirit had already showed the twelve that Peter (not Paul) was the Apostle to the Gentiles. At the Jerusalem Council, Peter gets up and says he is the Apostle to the Gentiles (Acts 15:7): "And when there had been much disputing, Peter rose up, and said unto them, Men and brethren, ye know how that a good while ago God made choice among us, that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the word of the gospel, and believe." Paul was among those in attendance, and didn't dispute Peter's claim.
Peter’s statement in Acts 15:7 means God had spoken to him about his task to preach to Gentiles. We even have evidence what that included. God showed Peter visions of the unclean food so he would know to reach the Gentiles. As a result, Peter had converted Cornelius in Acts chapter 10. If Peter sincerely believed “God made choice among us that” he was the apostle to the Gentiles in Acts 15:7, why would Peter later give this mission up to Paul? Jesus’ Yet, Paul in Paul’s Admission of Parting Ways With the Apostles in Galatians 2:9 clearly says Peter agreed Paul would go to the Gentiles and “they [i.e., Peter & the Jerusalem leaders] unto the circumcision [i.e., Jews].”
To believe Paul, you have to believe God would change His mind who was to go to the Gentiles. Yet, for what purpose? Wouldn’t two be better than one? Why would God cut out Peter entirely? Furthermore, why would Peter diminish this Gentile ministry among the twelve that he initiated with Cornelius? Why would he put Paul alone as the leader to convert Gentiles when the Holy Spirit had declared it as Peter's task? Moreover, there were Gentiles right in Jerusalem. How could the apostles sensibly divide up their mission field on the basis of Gentile and Jew?
The answer to all these paradoxes is quite obvious. Paul is putting a good spin on a latter day division between himself and the home church. By claiming in a letter to Gentiles that he was still authorized to evangelize to them, they would have had no reason not to believe him. Now listen to John’s evaluation of what this really meant: "These people came from our own group, yet they were not part of us. If they had been part of us, they would have stayed with us. But they left, which proves that they did not belong to our group. (1 John 2:19 ASV)
Jesus said we would know the false prophets who are ravening wolves in sheep’s clothing by their “fruits.” (Matt. 7:16.) Are these fruits described elsewhere in Scripture so you could not possibly mistake who are the wolves in sheep’s clothing? Earlier I said there were two Old Testament prophetic references to "ravenous wolves". We've looked at the one in Genesis, now we'll look at the second, in Ezekiel, for it is here that the "fruits" by which the wolves can be identified are detailed. It would seem that God made a highly specific description of the teachings of the ravening wolves so we would “know them by their fruits.”
Ezekiel described the time of the ravening wolves in an uncanny parallel to Paulinism: "Her priests have done violence to my law, and have profaned my holy things: they have made no distinction between the holy and the common, neither have they caused men to discern between the unclean and the clean, and have hid their eyes from my sabbaths, and I am profaned among them. (Eze 22:26) Her princes in the midst thereof are like wolves ravening the prey, to shed blood, and to destroy souls, that they may get dishonest gain. (Eze 22:27)
And her prophets have daubed for them with untempered mortar, seeing false visions, and divining lies unto them, saying, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, when Jehovah hath not spoken. (Eze 22:28) The people of the land have used oppression, and exercised robbery; yea, they have vexed the poor and needy, and have oppressed the sojourner wrongfully. (Eze 22:29) And I sought for a man among them, that should build up the wall, and stand in the gap before me for the land, that I should not destroy it; but I found none. (Eze 22:30)(ASV)
The picture Ezekiel paints in chapter 22 is startling in its parallel to Paul and Pauline Jesusianity. It fits Paul like a glove; what Ezekiel identifies as the wolf's fruits are the very things Paul taught as doctrine received directly by him from The Lord. These teachings encouraged Jesusians to disregard the true Sabbath and abandon the Law (we are not underr law, but grace), leading some to dismiss the teachings of Jesus as belonging to a by-gone dispensation, and instead follow Paul because he claims a vision, and boldly claimed to speak in the Lord’s name.
Let us now look point by point at the parallels between Ezekiel's wolves and Paul.
1. A leader in the people's eyes who claims to be a prophet speaking on God's behalf: The first thing we learn from Ezekiel is that the ravening wolves are called princes (leaders) in the people’s eyes. Paul was constantly demanding that people should obey his teaching as he had received it "from the Lord" and that he was not lying. Ezekiel they says they have false visions. Paul claimed visions of Jesus. (Acts chapters. 9, 22, 26.) Based on these visions, Paul instisted his teachings were the words of the Lord. (E.g., 1 Cor. 14:37; 1 Tim. 2:11; 1 Cor. 2:13; 1 Thess.4:1-2,8; 1 Thess. 2:13; Eph. 4:17. cf. 1 Cor. 7:25, 40.).
2. Teaching that the Law Has Been Done Away With: Paul’s view that the Law is entirely abrogated is well-established. (2 Cor. 2:14; Gal. 5:1; Rom. 10:4; 2 Cor. 3:7; Gal. 5:1; Col. 2:14-17; Rom. 3:27; Rom. 4:15; 2 Cor. 3:9; Gal. 2:16; Gal. 3:21; Col. 2:14.). Paul taught that Jews are released from the Law if they follow Jesus instead, because Jesus has set them free from the Law which is death and bondage. He taught the Law was given by angels who are no gods, and asked ‘why would anyone anyway want to submit to the weak and beggarly angels who are no gods? Rom. 14:5; Col. 2:14-16. He threatened that anyone, even if it was an angel from heaven, should preach a gospel other than that which he preached, "let him be accursed." (Gal 1:8) On the authority of the revelations he says he received from Jesus, the Law was abrogated, abolished, done away with, nailed to a cross; contradicting what Jesus had told his disciples that the Law will not be done away with until Heaven and Earth passes away.
3. Teaching to disregard the Sabbath: Paul’s view that we are free to ignore the Saturday Sabbath or any Sabbath-principle is undeniable. (Rom. 14:5; Col. 2:14-16.) Paul taught the Sabbath rule was a shadow of things to come, and no one can any longer judge another on failure to keep the Sabbath. (Romans 14:21;1 Corinthians 8:4- 13; 1 Cor. 10:19- 29; 1 Tim 4:4.) This view defies Jesus' teaching that not one speck of the law would become obsolete until Heaven and Earth pass away. Paul’s followers could be said to have behaved like Jeroboam who offended God by moving God’s set day to a “day he invented in his heart.” (1 Kings 12:33 RV.)
4. Teaching it is fine to eat food offered to idols: Paul’s view that we are free to eat any food we like, including eat meat sacrificed to idols, is likewise plain. (1 Tim. 4:4, ‘all food is clean’; Romans 4:2.) Paul taught we only refrain from eating idol meat when others are encouraged to do what they believe is wrong even though we know such food is clean. (Romans 14:21;1 Corinthians 8:4-13, and 1 Corinthians 10:19-29.) Some claim Jesus taught all kosher food laws in the Law of Moses are abrogated. They base this on the account in Mark 7:2 et seq. However, it is a misreading to say Jesus abrogated the laws of kosher foods. First, Jesus is discussing the Rabbinic tradition that food was unclean if you did not ritually wash your hands first. (Mark 7:2,4, 5.) Jesus’ disciples ate without ritual washing of their hands. Jesus’ point then is to show the Pharisees that they make up rules that (a) are not in the God given law and (b) which make of none effect what the God given law does teach. (Mark 7:7- 13.) Jesus so far is tightening the reigns of the Law, not loosening them.
Then Jesus says “nothing without the man that goes into him can defile him.” (Mark 7:15; cf. Matt. 15:11.) What Jesus is saying is that food laws, even the valid kosher laws, are health rules of what is “clean” and “unclean.” They are not rules that, if violated, make you a sinner. Jesus was trying to give the rationale of God behind the food laws so we would know how to interpret them. The food laws are good for your health, not laws that, if violated, make you a sinner.
Thus, a Rabbinic rule on handwashing, even if valid, could not taint you morally if you happen to violate it. While Jesus’ disciples ignored the hand-washing rule for clean foods created by Rabbis, his disciples always ate kosher. In Acts 10:14, when Peter in a dream is presented non-kosher foods to eat, “Peter said, Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common and unclean.” Peter was reminding the Lord that he had not erred from eating kosher, inferring that was Jesus' expectation of him. The dream was simply God’s message to Peter to regard Gentiles as clean and disregard the Rabbinic teaching that Gentiles were unclean. There is not the slightest hint the food laws were abrogated. If either Jesus or Peter had taught against the food laws, then they are implicated as apostates under Deut. 13:1-5. One must tread carefully if trying to prove Jesus or his true apostles abrogated any portion of the Law given Moses - a Law “eternal for all generations.” (Ex. 27:21.)
5. Vexing the poor: Did Paul give instructions to Jesusians to vex the poor? Not directly, however some believe the following quote vexes the poor with a criteria for assistance never found in the Hebrew Scriptures. "For even when we were with you, this we commanded you, If any will not work, neither let him eat." (2Th 3:10) (ASV) How many Jesusians have resisted giving food to a poor person simply because they are unemployed because they believed the person did not show a willingness to work, based on Paul's statement in 2Th 3:10? This work requirement sometimes will stall the urgent help that a poor person has for food. Nowhere in Hebrew Scripture is there any such barrier to God’s command that we are to feed the poor.
Exodus 23:11 says “but the seventh year thou shalt let it [your land] rest and lie fallow; that the poor of thy people may eat: and what they leave the beast of the field shall eat.” The field owner was also not supposed to glean the field in ordinary harvests but leave the “fallen fruit” for the “poor and sojourner.” (Lev. 19:10.) Thus, scripture always depicts food being provided to the poor without any requirement to work for the food they picked up from the orchard. Thus, Paul’s principle that if any will not work, neither let him eat has served as a punitive vexation on poor people by Jesusians who follow Paul’s dictum. (Many Jesusians, of course, do not follow Paul’s dictum, and follow instead the Bible’s rule of open-handed provision of food to the poor.)
Alternatively, we also now realize the early church at Jerusalem was known as the Poor which would be, as an Hebraism, the name Ebionites. Paul was definitely a vexing problem to The Ebionites - The Poor of Jersusalem, as the book of Acts and Paul himself constantly shows in his Epistles. Perhaps that is what vexing the poor means.
6. Opressing The Foreigner: Ezekiel includes oppressing the foreigner among the wolves' deeds. Did Paul and his followers do that too? Yes, to two distinct peoples:
a. The Ctretans: By Paul saying all people born in Crete are liars, he forever slurred a whole nation of people. To be born a Cretan became synonymous with being born a liar, thanks to Paul. This is what Paul wrote: "One of themselves, a prophet of their own said, 'Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons'. This testimony is true." (Titus 1:12).
b. The Jews: Besides slandering all Cretans, Paul in another passage also slandered all Jews. He first labelled them as foreigners and then said they are enemies of all mankind. Let’s review this with care. One might at first think Jews cannot be viewed as foreigners in Judea. However, Paul in Galatians chapter 4 redefines Jews as foreigners in Judea. How did he do this? Paul taught that the Jews of Jerusalem no longer correspond to the sons of Abraham and Sarah. Instead they are now seen as Ishmael—the son of Abraham and Hagar. (Gal. 4:22-31.) He then says, “cast out the hand-maiden.” This means Hagar and her children. In effect, Paul is saying the Jews in Jerusalem no longer hold the rightful position as owners of the land of Israel. They are Ishmaelites and foreigners to the covenant promise that gives them the right to the Land of Israel.
After labelling Jews, in effect, as foreigners in Israel, Paul then denigrates their entire race: “the Jews ... both killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and also drove us out. They displease God and are the enemies of the whole human race.” (1 Thessalonians 2:14-16.) The Greek in this verse interprets as saying Jews oppose face-to-face every human being on earth. The various versions hold the essential meaning intact: "Jews...who killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and have persecuted us. They are displeasing to God and are the enemies of all people ... (1Th 2:14-15)(ISV) Jews ... both killed the Lord Jesus, and their own prophets, and have persecuted us; and they please not God, and are contrary to all men: (1Th 2:14-15)(KJV).
According to James, a different group is responsible for the death of Jesus: “Go now, ye rich men, weep and howl for the miseries that shall come upon you ... Ye have condemned and killed the just [one]; and he doth not resist you.” (James 5:5-6.) Regardless of Paul’s accuracy on who killed Jesus, Paul redefines Jews to be foreigners in Judea, equivalent to Ishmaelite sons of Hagar. He then denigrates Jews - the people God referred to as his own people - as the enemies of the entire human race. Jesus taught we were to love our enemies, but the sentiment being expressed here is quite the opposite - Paul is inciting us to loathe them because they are the enemy of all the peoples of the world.
Paul’s words of denigration of the Jews later inspired Martin Luther in Germany to promulgate a doctrine of harassment of the Jewish people who were treated as foreigners in Germany. The renown scholar, William Shirer, in his classic 1400 page tome The Rise and the Fall of the Third Reich (1960) at 236 explains what Martin Luther did. Shirer writes: "It is difficult to understand the behavior of most German Protestants in the first Nazi years unless one is aware of two things: their history and the influence of Martin Luther. [At this point, Shirer writes in a footnote “To avoid any misunderstanding, it might be well to point out here that the author is a Protestant.”] The great founder of Protestantism was both a passionate anti-Semite and a ferocious believer in absolute obedience to political authority. He wanted Germany rid of the Jews and when they were sent away he advised that they be deprived of “All their cash and jewels and silver and gold” and furthermore, “that their synagogues or schools be set on fire, that their houses be broken up and destroyed ... and that they be put under a roof or stable, like the gypsies ... in misery and captivity as they incessantly lament and complain to God about us”.
Paul’s words about Jews, when taken literally by his pupil Martin Luther, bore their inevitable fruit: the oppression of the God’s special people - the Jews - who became foreigners in the land of their birth. Luther's masterplan for a Jew-free Europe was applied literally four centuries later by Hitler, Goering, and Himmler. In his book, Mein Kampf, Hitler credits Luther and The Bible as the inspiration for his plan to eradicate the Jewish people.
Thus, we can see how the Ezekiel description of ravening wolves fits precisely Paul and his followers. In addition to the Benjamite prophecy, it seems likely Jesus in Luke 21:8 additionally prophesied about Paul. Jesus warned the people of his time to beware of the one who would come among them and lead them astray. This deceiver would be a Jesusian preacher (“[he] will come in my name”) who would claim to speak on behalf of Jesus himself, and tell them the “time is at hand.” Those very words are in Paul’s mouth in Romans 13:12, where he warns that “the day is at hand.” The prophecy of a “time” is inclusive of the word day. Thus, Paul’s phrase matches Jesus’ prophecy exactly. Jesus said this would identify the one who would come in His name to “lead [you] astray" and warned them, “do not go after them." According to both the Book of Revelation (in Jesus' letter to the church at Ephesus) and Paul's letters, many first century Jesusians heeded the warning and rejected Paul's teaching. The Ephesians even put Paul on trial and found him guilty of teaching false doctrine and lying (Rev 2:2).
Early church historians like Hippolytus confirm what is revealed between the lines of the books of the New Testament, that Paul was seen by many in the early church as the "ravening wolf" warned about in the prophesies of Israel, Ezekiel and Jesus. A study of church history shows that much of Paul's doctine, such as salvation by grace rather than fulfillment of God's law, was never adopted by the early church (it is still rejected by the Roman Catholic church), and in fact it was never accepted by Jesusianity at large until Martin Luther re-introduced Paul's doctrines in the 14th Century. These doctrines, rather than what Jesus taught in relation to the Law, would be adopted by the Protestant Church and are still adhered to by the majority of Protestant churches, even to this day.
Let’s now pull all these Biblical references together, and see if the Bible identifies Paul as the Benjamite wolf.
The first warning of ravenous wolves occurs in Genesis 49:27 - In latter days, Benjamin shall be a “ravening wolf.” In his youth, the wolf will kill sheep in the flock. In his later years, the wolf from Benjamin’s tribe will “divide the spoil” i.e., plunder and divide its prey.
Jesus warns in Matt. 7:15 that “ravening wolves” will appear as among the flock “sheep,” i.e., they claim to be Jesusians.
Ezekiel defines the wolf's characteristics in Ezek. 22:26-32. Ezekiel says the “ravening wolves” will come who do “violence to the Law,” and who teach the people to “hide their eyes from the Sabbath,” and to no longer discern clean food from impure food, etc. These wolves are associated with those who “have false visions” and “divine” lies in the Lord’s name. Jesus further prophesied the time of the ravening wolves would involve false prophets who would claim visions but they would be divining lies; these wolves would do violence to the Law, teaching it was permissible to disregard Sabbath and to disregard the food laws on unclean food - all of which are the doctrines taught in the post- conversion letters of Paul.
Paul is of the tribe of Benjamin ( Rom. 11:1 Phil. 3:5). Paul killed Jesusians in his youth; he later divided the church along Gentile-Jew lines, reserving for himself the right to recruit Gentiles, claiming the Jerusalem church relinquished the Gentile-mission exclusively to Paul.
Never once did Jesus teach that salvation comes only through a confession of faith in him as Paul taught, or in believing that His righteousness would make up for any lack of righteousness in us, which is the essence of Paul's gospel. In Matthew 7:21-23, Jesus described the self-deception that comes from a mere verbal profession of faith as Paul taught. Jesus made strong demands of those who desired to enter the kingdom that can be summed up in one word: righteousness [Matt. 5:20, your righteousness must exceed that of the Pharisees]. He constantly taught that our deeds (works) one towards another determine our righteousness in God's eyes.
Jesus said our forgiveness by God depends on whether or not we forgive others. He made no mention of forgiveness coming as a result of him paying the price for sin. He never said or even inferred that anyone whose righteousness is as filthy rags can be accepted by God by being clothed in His righteousness. That is only found in the Paul's gospel. Rather, he said, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God."
When Paul's teachings are analysed and this mass of evidence is assembled, Paul is the only person in church history who fits the description of the ravening wolf in its entirety - a Benjaminite who, during the "latter days" of the nation of Isreal, would kill the sheep of the flock in his youth, and then in later life divide the flock, which the New Testament records is exactly what Paul did when he separated us Gentiles from the mother-church. Yet in spite of the warnings, and the actions of 1st century churches like Ephesus (Rev 2:2) who recognised the wolf in sheep's clothing and rejected him and his teachings (for which they received a special commendation by God), the modern day church continues to follow Paul and remain a victim of Satan's master stroke to derail the church and make it ineffective in winning the lost for Jesus.
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