How did Paul become an evangelist?

Answer 1

Saul of Tarsus was a Pharisee who persecuted Christians. Saul had a vision where Jesus was asking him why he was persecuting him (Jesus). Saul was struck blind, and then Jesus told him (Saul/Paul) where he could be healed. Saul became the Christian St. Paul after that.

--from Acts of the Apostles

Answer 2

A:Paul himself does not say what led to his conversion, except that God called him to be the apostle to the Gentiles, after which he went first to Arabia and then back to Damascus. He says that he received the gospel from no man, but by revelation.

On the other hand, Acts of the Apostles, written some decades after his death, gives a very vivid account of Paul's conversion. Acts provides three parallel but different miraculous stories in which Jesus appeared to Paul on the road to Damascus. In each story there was a blinding light, which appeared only to Paul in the version at Acts 9:3-8 and probably at Acts 26.13-19, but appeared to both Paul and his men at Acts 22:6-11 (although only Paul was blinded). Paul alone heard a voice from heaven at Acts 22:6-11 and probably at Acts 26.13-19, but both Paul and his men heard the voice at Acts 9:3-8. Each of these stories says that the voice from heaven said it was Jesus, and as a result Paul was taken, helpless and blind, to Damascus where his blindness was miraculously cured and he was taught the gospel.

The three accounts in Acts actually appear to have been based on the ancient play of Euripedes called the Bacchae. This alone would be enough to cast serious doubts on the explanation in Acts and lead to accepting Paul's own sketchy account as the only genuine information we have.

Answer 3

He was a persecutor of the Christian Church. On a journey to Damascus to arrest some Christians, Paul had a vision of the resurrected Jesus. The vision so affected him that he became a disciple of Jesus there and then.

Answer 4

A:Christians believe that Jesus appeared to Paul on the road to Damascus and that as a result of that experience, he converted and became an evangelist.

Paul himself provides very little information about how he came to believe that he was called to be the apostle to the gentiles. He never mentions any divine vision that led to his conversion; in fact his epistles seem to have ruled this out. In his Epistle to the Galatians, Paul said that after his conversion, he travelled to Arabia, and only then went to Damascus (bypassing Jerusalem), then Jerusalem, Syria and Cilicia, and, after a period of fourteen years, back to Jerusalem (Galatians 1:17-2:1). On this evidence, we could reasonably say that Jesus did not meet Paul on the road to Damascus, at least not at the time of his conversion.

Acts of the Apostles, written decades after his death, provides a miraculous explanation, with three parallel but different stories in which Jesus appeared to Paul on the road to Damascus. In each account there was a blinding light, which appeared only to Paul in the version at Acts 9:3-8 and probably at Acts 26.13-19, but appeared to both Paul and his men at Acts 22:6-11. Paul alone heard a voice from heaven at Acts 22:6-11 and probably at Acts 26.13-19, but both Paul and his men heard the voice at Acts 9:3-8. Each of these stories says that the voice from heaven said it was Jesus, and from this one could believe that Paul did accept that it was really Jesus. Nevertheless, the differences in the three accounts could lead one to assume that Paul's own contemporary account is the only really reliable one and that the miraculous conversion on the Road to Damascus probably did not happen.

The account of Paul's conversion in Acts chapter 25 actually appears to have been based on the ancient play of Euripedes called the Bacchae. This alone would be enough to cast serious doubts on the explanation in Acts, of Paul's conversion and subsequent dedication of his life to evangelism.

The best we can say is that Paul probably came to admire the Christians he was persecuting and that he began to believe in their mission.

Answer 5

I think that Jesus appeared to him and asked why Paul (then Saul) was persecuting him. Paul/Saul was struck temporarily blind, then converted Christian.

Answer 6

St Paul had a vision of Jesus on the road to Damascus (where he was traveling to persecute Christians). This vision left him temporally blind and converted him to Christianity.

Answer 7

Paul was struck blind for three days , after god spoke to him on the way to Damascus.