43 PLEASING GOD PLEASING PEOPLE ? OR These conclusions, however, fail to follow Paul’s line of reasoning in chap. 1. Paul argues that he received the gospel from God by showing that he did not learn it from the apostles. Therefore, his evidence must include a record of any visit to Jerusalem. But when Paul adduced witnesses to the fact that he was preaching the gospel to Gentiles while unknown by sight in Judea in 1,22-24, he finished his proof that he had not gone to the apostles for his message. An event that occurred more than a decade after he began preaching the gospel (2,1) is irrelevant to an argument about his reception of the gospel. He now needs to verify that he did not change the message later, and for that he no longer needs to relate every trip to Jerusalem or meeting with an apostle. ¶Epeita in 2,1 need not indicate the next consecutive movement but the next relevant movement 48. Even in 1,21 it was not epeita but Paul’s ¶ argument that required a Gentile region as his immediate destination after Jerusalem: he wanted to show that he promptly left Jewish territory (1,22). In 2,1 epeita does not lock Paul in Syria ¶ and Cilicia during the years between his visits to Jerusalem in 1,18 and 2,1; it simply introduces a trip he made some years after he entered the two regions, a trip that will pertain to his current argument. With little introduction beyond a time gap and the names of his traveling companions, Paul begins chap. 2 with his motivation for attending the Council. If William Walker, Jr. is correct in understanding the grammar of 2,1-5, Paul gives two reasons: God’s revelation (v. 2) and the presence of false brethren (v. 4) 49. Even if HALL , “Rhetorical Effect”, 315; SANDERS, “Paul’s Autobiographical Statements ”, 340, for the view that Paul was in error. For example, in 1 Cor 15,5-8 Paul writes of Jesus’ resurrection 48 appearances. Verse 5 says that Jesus was seen of Cephas and then of the twelve. Verse 6 adds that then (epeita) over 500 saw him and v. 7 that then (epeita) ¶ ¶ James and then all the apostles saw him. Last of all (v. 8) Paul saw him. If we read epeita in vv. 6-7 as giving a complete account of Christ’s resurrection ¶ appearances from the time Peter saw him in v. 5 to the time all the apostles saw him in v. 7, we find that Paul omitted, for example, the two men on the road to Emmaus and other people gathered with the apostles, which Paul’s traveling companion records in Luke 24, esp. vv. 13-15.33-36. Paul, however, is neither dishonest nor mistaken — he simply does not need to include every witness to make his point — and he uses epeita to indicate order, not completeness. ¶ W.O. WALKER, JR., “Why Paul Went to Jerusalem: The Interpretation of 49 Galatians 2:1-5”, CBQ 54 (1992) 505-510, understands de kata in v. 2 to ù ¥