WHAT DO YOU THINK WAS THE THORN IN PAUL'S SIDE?

Question

WHAT DO YOU THINK WAS THE THORN IN PAUL'S SIDE?

Answer 1

Capitalization is only to be used at the beginning of a sentence and proper nouns.

I will let you off with a warning. Don't let it happen again!

Answer 2

If you study it, it is clearly the afflictions that the devil made Paul go through to preach Christ. Paul was stoned, beaten, shipwrecked, whipped, imprisoned, and beheaded.

Answer 3

people who kept on accusing him of being anti-Torah and anti-Jew....

Answer 4

Paul had a chronic eye disorder, similar to glaucoma, that never responded to either prayer or medical treatment.

He refers to these difficulties a number of times, in his writings.

Probably a result of his initial encounter with Christ, on the road to Damascus.

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Answer 5

Yes, maybe that was it...the harassment of the Jews who thought he was an apostate now.  Also someone suggested he had something wrong with his eye.  He said in essence, "You would have even given me your own eye."  Well, that doesn't prove it though.

Answer 6

Hi misogyny maybe? Or his seizures? His delusions and hallucinations? His self-loathing and the expressions and repressions of that loathing?

The dude had an entire bramble patch in those kidneys.  

Answer 7

That Jesus was a Jew. Paul went out of his way to try and make everyone forget that.      +?+

Answer 8

I expect it may have been his eye sight, In the letter to the Galatians he mentions the large letters he wrote with his own hand. Since he had written longer letters, like Hebrews and Romans, and Galatians had only 6 chapters, it may have been hard to see to write properly, making it to write.

Paul seems to refer to dim eyesight when he writes the Galatians: “I bear you witness that, if it had been possible, you would have gouged out your eyes and given them to me.” This, too, may be why he added this line to them: “See with what large letters I have written you with my own hand.” (Gal. 4:15; 6:11, NW) For that reason, too, it may be that he dictated most of his letters. Poor eyesight seems to be betrayed when in the Jewish court he looked intently at the Sanhedrin and spoke back sharply to the high priest and then apologized, saying: “Brothers, I did not know he was high priest. For it is written, ‘You must not speak injuriously of a ruler of your people.’” (Acts 23:1-5, NW) At any rate, a p***y, weak pair of eyes in those days without spectacles could have been quite a handicap and hindrance to Paul at work and study. It could have irked him, making him long for its correction, and making him pray about it. An American Translation renders “thorn in the flesh” loosely as “a bitter physical affliction”.

Or it could have been the attitude of some in the Corinthian congregation.

Since Paul was here writing a letter to the Corinthians to follow up his first letter in which he deplored the disunity that had crept in among them, and the sectarian spirit that led them to follow human leaders, the “thorn” may have been their “superfine apostles”. These were not in harmony with Paul’s teaching, and they denied Paul’s apostleship. So Paul said to the congregation: “I consider that I have not in a single thing proved inferior to your superfine apostles. But even if I am unskilled in speech, I certainly am not in knowledge, but in every way we manifested it to you in all things. Now what I am doing I will still do, that I may cut off the pretext from those who are wanting a pretext for being found equal to us in the office of which they boast. For such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for Satan himself keeps transforming himself into an angel of light. It is therefore nothing great if his ministers also keep transforming themselves into ministers of righteousness. But their end shall be according to their works.”—2 Cor. 11:5, 6, 12-15,

Answer 9

even though he crucified the way of the flesh, he was still bound in it to deal with it's whims.

that is the reason jesus came in the flesh to show us that man can over come the nature that has ruled over them from Adam.

for as one man,s disobedience many were made sinners,

so of the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.

and in trying to do the right thing the will of God is most definatly a thorn in ones side.

most people read the bible and know it real well but do they actually do what it asks us to do.

so for those that forsake this life and it's allures, well i would call it a thorn in the side.