The fake apostle Saul/Paul started selling "Christ" after inventing him as an imaginative addition to the story of Jesus (who was actually an itinerant Pharisee rabbi of the First Century).
Supposedly a magical "get in free" ticket to "heaven"......the Christ scam has been lucrative for charlatans from Saul/Paul to Swaggart and Robertson.
Read all about it in the works of Hyam Maccoby.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Mythmaker-Paul-Invention-Christianity/dp/0062505858 
