Saul of Tarsus was running a con.
He took the dying and rising god and the mystery cult idea and marketed it. The con of the Jewish dying and rising god had nearly run its course among Jews.
(Perhaps a man coming back from the dead was a bit rich even for 1st century Jews.) Saul himself had been instrumental in quashing the new Jewish sect. BTW. This may have introduced him to the idea of expanding the con of the new Jewish sect based on the supposed teachings of Jesus.
Seeing an opportunity, Saul/Paul invented his ‘Road to Damascus’ revelation (much as Joe Smith invented the Angel Maroni and Mohammed invented a visit from Gabriel, the archangel.)
Paul then expanded the fundamentals of the new Jesus sect (and the Pharisaic sect) by tossing aside the Jewish laws (e.g. circumcision, dietary restrictions, etc.) which had discouraged non-Jews from joining the new sect/cult. Saul/Paul – as a Pharisee - had to put aside the demand of adherence to Judaic law for new ‘con-verts’.
By doing so, Saul was able to woo Gentiles (pagans) into the con. With the expanded market (Galatians, Romans, Corinthians, etc), he was able to bilk more folks; getting them to finance his extensive travel, his food, his lodgings, his clothing, etc. for not only himself, but for his assistant and their wives/partners. The promise was easy; eternal life heaven after you died. All it took was ‘blind faith’ and contributing to Paul’s ‘mission’.
The pay-off (i.e. eternal life) may or may not happen but that didn’t matter. That was a can one could kick endlessly down the road. What mattered was Saul/Paul getting a thick slice of the pie that he’d seen the Sanhedrin and the Sadducees gobbling down.
Palestine, at the time the Pharisaic sect originated, was heavily influenced by Greek culture and religion. For many Jews, this was an abomination against the one God of the Temple, YHWH. Pharisees resisted this Greek-inspired culture in Palestine. One might consider the influence of the Greek mystery cults of dying and rising gods in the Levant (Osiris, Bacchus/Dionysius, etc).
Saul/Paul was a Pharisee and had been charged with crushing the new sect. Here’s what Pharisees bought into.
Josephus wrote that Pharisees began as a sect devoted to strict observance of the ''Will of God'' as delineated in the Laws of Moses
In order to conduct this strict observance, Pharisees devised a set of behavior prescriptions to follow, conveyed generationally in an oral tradition.
Pharisees became fastidious in defining what behaviors were acceptable under the Laws of Moses, attempting to define away any ambiguity.
By defining the acceptable practice in every possible situation, Pharisees believed that the Will of God would be followed.
Pharisees avoided people who did not follow their purity practices.
In governing their actions, Pharisees added these oral tradition behavior prescriptions to the written Law of Moses, the five books of the Torah.
In about 200 BCE, these oral rules and regulations became written as the Mishnah, the core of the Talmud, the sacred texts of Judaism.
The dead would be resurrected at the end of time.
Note that last one; sounds like the promise of Christianity? If there was no Jesus of Nazareth, then this bit of speculation is as viable as anything postulated by Christian apologist. How did the Christian/Jewish sect proliferate? By Paul’s proselytizing the myths of the Jesus tales. That is well-established and accepted; Christianity was Paul’s baby. Paul took the proverbial ball and took it across the goal-line by making the new sect/cult open to pagans who didn’t want to cut up their dicks, eat unleavened bread and shun shellfish and the wearing of garments of mixed fabrics.
Boom et Voila!
Could it be that ‘Saul the Conman of Tarsus’ is an over exaggeration for effect? Most assuredly. Could it be that Saul/Paul was an actual ‘Believer’ of the professed teachings of Jesus of Nazareth? Again, most assuredly.
Does a conman who takes his own con on Faith mean that the con-game is less of a con-game and the con-man is any less of a con-man for promoting a falsehood?
Are the leaders of the Heaven’s Gate cult any less culpable for the deaths of the cult’s members if the leaders actually ‘Believed’ the lie?
Call it a cult or a con; it amounts to the same thing.
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