"He met Jesus."- Paul never writes that he met Jesus. He said in his writings that he had a revealed gospel of a risen Christ that he sees from scripture as revealed by God. A long hidden mystery. Full stop.

He does not offer his followers evidence. He offers ridicule and mind games for not having God's spirit and not believing what they have heard. He says that he and everyone else who preaches about a risen Christ would be guilty of false witness of God. What does that mean? It means they would be lying about getting revealed information from God. A risen Christ is 100 percent revealed knowledge. (right now in Corinthians would be a perfect time for Paul to bring up all this "historical details in the gospels", like the temple veil, the risen dead, the rocks spiting, darkening of the day - as the power of God) and yet, he simply implores people to believe him, because he says so.

14 And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. 15 More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead.
It is a 100 percent matter of faith that Christ has been risen from the dead.

" The evidence does prove the resurrection."

- Yes, the claims have become the evidence. The fictions of the gospels and Acts are now the evidence. But the man who wrote 20k words of the NT and lived near the the theoretical historical events, never offered any of it as a reason to believe when the question of resurrection and resurrected bodies came up.

In Paul's writing he describes believers and non-believers and gives a hint as to what types of people are in his congregation.

Believers - 26 Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. - In other words, common folk. In the first century, servant classes, illiterate, no access to an education, little understanding of civics and history.

Non-Believers - 20 Where is the wise person? Where is the teacher of the law? Where is the philosopher of this age? - So along with the previous verse I quoted, we have the influential, the noble, wise men, philosophers, teachers of the law were absent from Paul's followers.

A clear line is drawn.

Thucydides a Greek historian described the common folk a few hundred years before Christ -

“So little pains do the vulgar take in the investigation of truth, accepting readily the first story that comes to hand.”

Just look at today's news. What are the common folk doing? They believe stupid stuff they read from memes on facebook, the get sucked in by charismatic men who make claims, they think evolution is false, they think global warming isn't happening....

I Know I know.... the gospels is evidence, and historians say a Jesus existed. - But like we see time and time again, some thing always fills the faith void... across the planet. I know, the universe is designed so it must have a creator... we have the catholic faith last 2000 years, boy it must mean something...

Paul's primary evidence is his road to Damascus experience. He met Jesus. Yes, may Christians still use their own personal experience. They met Jesus and that is why they know He is alive. Historical evidence actually only convinces a small percentage of people one way or they other. The evidence does prove the resurrection. Still GK Chesterton says we are not really convinces of Catholicism because something proves it. We are not really convinced until everything proves it. That was my story. I read a ton before taking the plunge. Still I am so glad I did.

My point? Early first century people believe in different gospels about Christ? Paul and Peter complain about people following different gospels and being led astray.

Fine - its not Christianity lite...

"I can see why so many look at the evidence objectively and conclude the resurrection must have happened." - So this is how you're selling the resurrection.

Lets see how Paul sells the resurrection - 15 More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. People believe Paul. Paul does not mention an empty tomb or evidence. People believe Paul's revelation from God about raising Christ is true. Its not being sold as a recent historical knowable event. He says "we are then to be false witnesses about God" - that means everyone who is preaching about Christ risen is preaching it as a result from knowledge given from God.

Then those unbelieving Galatians, just watch how Paul breaks out all that evidence.....

3 You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. 2 I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by believing what you heard? 3 Are you so foolish? After beginning by means of the Spirit, are you now trying to finish by means of the flesh?[a] 4 Have you experienced[b] so much in vain—if it really was in vain? 5 So again I ask, does God give you his Spirit and work miracles among you by the works of the law, or by your believing what you heard? 6 So also Abraham “believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”[c]

Nothing in what Paul preaches is he talking about a recent historical event that has evidence.

Paul's writing reminds me of this guy. Invokes spirits, speaks in tongues and is always worried people don't believe him

https://youtu.be/jNCR6PZ4-oA

This is just becoming repetitive. It does not prove your point. You keep saying it does. That just tells me you don't have anything else to try and make your rather hopeless point. I can see why so many look at the evidence objectively and conclude the resurrection must have happened.

"But there is simply nothing to suggest the existence of a Christianity-lite that scholars assert."

-

Paul disagrees. He complains of his followers following completely different gospels. He warns about following other gospels. Notice he does not say people leaving the faith. Whatever these gospels are, they are Christian but completely not what he preaches. Just look at the advent of Protestantism. Everybody has there own truths. All kinds of denominations pop up. As soon as people started to preach Christ, others started to preach it too. There own versions. Versions Paul did not like.
2 Peter But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction. - Even the Peter says there are Christians who deny the master, deny the divinity of Christ. --- Its pretty damn clear that some people don't believe in a resurrected Christ. Why should they? dead people don't live again.

"If we look around at religions today we see both the Mormons and the Muslims claim their gospel was taught to their spiritual leader by an angel. Interesting.

--- The same thing could be said about warnings from the old testament about Paul. Paul sounds exactly like the spiritists described in the old testament. Paul talked in tongues, spiritist sputtered and mummered...

"Great, we know one false gospel, how many others were their? "
Probably some. The New Testament criticized the teaching of the Nicolatians. So the apostles had doctrinal issues to deal with. But there is simply nothing to suggest the existence of a Christianity-lite that scholars assert. Such a belief happens today because people want to say they believe in Jesus without believing anything he actually taught. In the first century there would be no motive for this because the name of Jesus was not known. You could get in trouble for believing in Jesus so why go there? Be a Jew. Be an emperor worshiper. Be something safe.

"Why shouldn't we expect angels to preach false gospels?"
Actually I do not think Paul meant it literally at all. Still he was guided by the Holy Spirit. If we look around at religions today we see both the Mormons and the Muslims claim their gospel was taught to their spiritual leader by an angel. Interesting.

"I think the second century view of acts is different than Paul's own view of his conversion"
Acts was almost certainly written in the first century. Before the martyrdom of Peter and Paul and before the destruction of Jerusalem. Why else would Luke leave out any reference to those events?

Paul tells the story of his conversion a few times. Yes, he tells it a little bit differently each time. Do you tell stories about your life exactly the same way every time?

One thing to consider is that Paul probably wrote hundreds or possibly thousands of letters and we have 7 that are uncontested. Not a very good sampling.

If you read Galatians Paul tells you exactly what the false gospel

was. It was the Judiazers who ere saying you had to be circumcised to be

saved. You keep saying we do not know. We do know.

Great, we know one false gospel, how many others were their? Well, Paul seems to think they may come from angles and other people?

Even an angel is an exageration.

Why shouldn't we expect angels to preach false gospels? 1/3 of angels fell from heaven.... Satan is a fallen angel.... Why would an apostle from God prophesy something not true? He should take his position seriously and not joke about angels preaching other gospels

The church discerned his road to Damascus experience was legit.

I think the second century view of acts is different than paul's own view of his conversion. Enough controversy swirls around acts to dismiss it as a viable explanation of anything.

.

Here's a pretty good couple of paragraphs on fulfillment by a Protestant scholar and blogger whom I cannot vouch for at all. It is just that this is how I understand the concept of fulfillment to be interpreted by a certain group of Christian believers:

The early chapters of Matthew present several other problems along these lines. This gospel also says that Jesus dwelt in Nazareth “to fulfill what was spoken by the prophets, that he would be called a Nazarene.” Yet nowhere in the prophetic corpus, nor indeed anywhere in all of the Hebrew scriptures, is such a prediction recorded. And when, after Jesus’ flight into Egypt and return to Israel after Herod’s death, Matthew concludes, “So was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: ‘Out of Egypt I called my son,’” the reader is puzzled indeed. The prophet in this case is Hosea, and he was writing history, not predicting the future, when he made this statement. Specifically, he was describing the Exodus.

The necessary conclusion is that when Matthew speaks of “fulfillment,” he does not mean that a foreseen future has come to pass. Instead, he means that words spoken at an earlier time in redemptive history have taken on a fuller and deeper meaning in light of later, more developed redemptive-historical circumstances. This, to me, is actually a much more powerful concept: not that humans were given an advance glimpse of what was going to happen in the future, but that the God who superintends and overrules human affairs has demonstrated His unchanging character consistently through time and has revealed more and more of his purposes while reaffirming the earlier-revealed ones.

And of course there is a real problem if the Exodus from Egypt isn't historical.