Curiosities in Paul

I have been reading through the seven Pauline Epistles in roughly the order they were written, looking into some of manuscript and textual issues for each letter and trying to approach them with "fresh eyes," as it were. A few things have stood out as unexpected or previously unnoticed.

1 Thessalonians and Galatians

Paul's Account of Jesus: Paul's Jesus does not appear to be very human. Paul doesn't talk about Jesus as though he was ever walking about on earth. He does not talk about Jesus ever doing anything on earth, and he does not mention him teaching anything to people (other than directly, through visions). Similarly, Paul frequently talks about how Jesus will soon appear, but this is never a second coming, a coming back or return. At the beginning of Galatians, Paul says that he is an apostle from Jesus, but not men or a man. This seems strange if Paul presumably thinks that it is of central importance that Jesus is a human. Paul then goes on to relate how he received the gospel of Jesus Christ. Rather than say that he learned of Jesus' life, as we would expect, he instead stresses that he did not receive the gospel of Jesus Christ from any person and was never taught it. Instead, everything he knows about Jesus, he knows directly from revelation. This all strikes me as strange.

The Origin of the Law: In Galatians 3, Paul is talking about the covenant and the law. The law was a curse from which Christ liberated us, he says. By example, no one annuls a human covenant once it is ratified; likewise, the law does not annul God's original covenant. So the law was given until the child came of age to receive the covenant inheritance. So far so good. Then v19: the law "was ordained by angels through an intermediary." Paul contrasts this intermediary with God, who is one. He then continues the discussion, saying that a child with an inheritance is like a slave to his guardians and trustees until he comes of age. So also, when we were under the law, we were "slaves to the elemental spirits of the universe" (4:3) who gave the law. Then, we were "in bondage to beings that by nature are no gods," but now there is no need to "turn back again to the weak and beggarly elemental spirits, whose slaves you want to be once more" (4:8-9). This account of where the law came from surprised me.