St Paul discrepancies

Every serious student of Paul soon discovers that
the story of Paul in the Acts of the Apostles differs in several respects and
incidents from the story in Paul’s letters. For example, Acts 9 implies that
Paul went to Jerusalem within a short time after his Damascus experience, but in
Galatians 1 Paul says he went to Arabia and after three years went to Jerusalem.
There are many other variations. The discrepancies led one historian to write,
“In short, the Paul of Acts and the Paul of the Epistles are two different men….
Of the two pictures, that in the Epistles is on any showing earlier than that in
the Acts. The latter, therefore, must be unhesitatingly dismissed as
unhistorical.” A straightforward biography of Paul is impossible to write.
Sources are few and inconsistent. What we can assert is Paul’s conviction that
he was called by Christ to bring the gospel to the
gentiles.