Paul of Tarsus שאול התרסי
The man who made Christianity a religion of gentiles
No years. His birth around 5 CE, his death around 64–67 (3765 → 3824–3827 AM), and both are "around".
Why this matters for Jewish and not only Christian history: before him the new faith was a Jewish sect whose internal dispute was over who the Messiah was. After him it is a separate religion with a separate law, and its claim is to have replaced Israel. From this come fifteen hundred years of European legislation about Jews, the disputations, the accusations and the pogroms; and from this too comes the peculiar place of the Hebrew text in Christian scholarship.
He is also the only man known to have studied under Rabban Gamliel the Elder, and that is the only external testimony about the school of the house of Hillel in the first century. Scholars constantly try to read him as a source for the Jewish law of his day, and disagree about everything.
Related
Sources
Documents of the period
- Acts 22:3 — “at the feet of Gamaliel” — the only external testimony about his teacher
Basis: documents and evidence.