The apostle Paul’s writings are the earliest in the New Testament and so give us an invaluable insight into the character of the embryonic Christian churches. The first Friends believed that, based on their life-changing spiritual experiences, they had rediscovered the lost way of primitive Christianity. In trying to make sense of these experiences, it seems that they recognised something in Paul’s letters that looked very familiar to them. Here was a charismatic, spirit-led community with no fixed hierarchy, no set-apart priesthood, and no New Testament, in which women clearly held positions of authority. Here were churches gathered under the direct inspiration and leadership of the Spirit of Christ. Paul himself, unlike the other apostles, had not known Jesus in his earthly life, but had instead encountered the risen Christ and proclaimed his living presence in spirit within the midst of his people. This seems to have been the experience of early Friends too. In line with their reading of Paul, they rejected the primacy of both the institutional church and the Bible as sources of authority, in favour of the authority of Christ as inward teacher and the only head of the church. They frequently used Paul’s writings in order to justify their position. George Fox in particular demonstrated a strong identification with Paul. Like the apostle, he travelled as an itinerant minister, established gathered churches, and wrote pastoral epistles of spiritual encouragement, guidance, and admonishment to these communities.