Hello Patrick, thanks for taking the time to respond.

You said:

"You lost me as soon as you quoted Timothy, which was probably not written by Paul but rather a 2nd century writer using Paul's name to create authority for himself."

My friend, there is no historical evidence of such a thing, and plenty against it.

We have extensive records of conversations between church leaders in the early centuries. No one ever noticed 1 Timothy arrived half a century or more after the rest of Paul's letters.

Rather, they uphold all of Paul's letters together.

Polycarp wrote in 120 A.D./C.E., knowing the Apostle John personally, and learning from the community of those who knew the Apostles personally. Polycarp was the most significant ecclesiatical leader in the early second century. If anyone was in a position to know who wrote 1 Timothy, it was Polycarp!

And Polycarp wrote that Paul was the author of 1 Timothy. He clearly includes both 1 and 2 Timothy in his quotations of Paul's letters from Scripture.

You said:

"And your arguments that Paul was cognizant of the now-canonical gospels assumes he got his text from them. More likely, they got the text from him."

My friend, Paul himself calls his quotations "Scripture."

Scripture refers to something written down.

It's also a label he only applies to the direct Words of God what we refer to now as the Old and New Testaments.

For Paul to quote the Gospels and call them Scripture, they already had to be written.

You said:

"Paul states clearly that he took NO instruction from men but rather got all his information through direct revelation from God."

Precisely -- instruction.

Paul doesn't state that he ignores the Scriptures and never uses them! Rather, he quotes the Old and New Testaments constantly in his letters!

He received his instruction direct from the Lord, but he also extensively used the Scriptures in his letters and arguments.

The two go hand-in-hand.

You said:

"You might wish to pick up copies of The Authoritative Letters of Paul, by a team of biblical scholars, and Forged, by Bart D. Ehrman. There are many others, but those two books would be a good start."

I am well aware of their arguments. I simply don't find them persuasive.

They begin from a losing proposition: they reject the entirety of the historical evidence, all of which unanimously attributes the authorship of 1 and 2 Timothy to Paul.

They also commit logical fallacies in their reasoning. They see differences between 1 Timothy and other letters of Paul, and conclude this can only be because of a later forger.

They ignore all the other far more likely possibilities, such as the fact that the same author can write in different styles. Romans is a theological treatise; 1 Corinthians is a rebuke to a church. 1 Timothy is a personal letter to a dear friend. These are three different genres. Of course they'll have differences!

Trying to assert that the differences can only be due to a later forger is an argument they can't win.