DAVID INGRAM
In the last article, I responded to the first point a Muslim raised after he approached me in a spirit of dawah, the Islamic practice of inviting others to consider Islam. That first point questioned whether Paul had any real connection to Jesus’s teachings since he never met Jesus in person before the crucifixion. Now I want to move to his second argument.
His point was that before he became known as Paul, he was called Saul, and Saul was a man who hunted down and hurt early followers of Jesus. Some were even killed because of his actions. He used this history to suggest that Paul’s past disqualifies him from being trusted as a genuine teacher of the faith.
This is worth taking seriously, so let me respond honestly.
It’s true. Saul persecuted the early church before he became Paul. The book of Acts does not hide this or soften it. Acts 8:3 says Saul was “ravaging the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison.” Acts 9:1 describes him as “breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord.” Paul himself admits this openly in his own letters. In Galatians 1:13, he writes that he “persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it.” In 1 Timothy 1:13, he calls himself “a blasphemer, persecutor, and insolent opponent.”
Here is why this history does not disqualify Paul. It actually supports the truth of what happened to him.
Paul never hides his past or tries to rewrite it to look better. A person inventing a religious story to gain followers or power would likely try to present himself with a clean record, not openly confess to being a violent persecutor of the very people he later joined. The fact that Paul repeatedly brings up his own guilt, without being forced to do so, points toward honesty rather than deception.
More importantly, Christianity does not teach that a person’s past determines whether God can use them. It teaches the opposite. The core message of the Christian faith is that all people fall short and are in need of grace, and that God’s mercy is bigger than anyone’s failures. Paul’s transformation from a violent enemy of the church into one of its most sacrifice-filled leaders is not a weakness in the story. It is one of the strongest pieces of evidence that something real happened to him on that road to Damascus. Do people typically suffer and die for a cause they know is a lie? Especially one they once fought against?
So rather than disqualifying Paul, his past actually strengthens the case that his conversion was genuine. Paul’s story is about a dramatic change from persecutor to persecuted.
By the way, though the Muslim didn’t raise this specific comparison, a stronger version of his argument might point to how Islam treats its own early opponents. Abu Jahl was a powerful leader in Mecca who fiercely opposed and persecuted Muhammad and his early followers. He is remembered in Islamic tradition as one of the clearest villains of that era. He is known as a man whose past left him with no credibility in Islamic teaching. Someone could argue that if Islam judges Abu Jahl this way because of his persecution of believers, then consistency would require Christians to view Paul with the same suspicion. Perhaps from an Islamic perspective this makes sense. But isn’t forgiveness and remission of sin why Jesus died on the Cross? Islam’s Abu Jahl died opposing the faith he persecuted, while Paul was transformed. Though Paul suffered greatly for following Jesus, he rejoiced!
This is the second point my acquaintance raised, and I hope this response shows the same respect and honesty I intend to bring to each one. In the next article, I will address his claim about the differences in how the Damascus road vision is described across different verses in Acts.
