A few days ago I published a post trying to show why many critical scholars do not think Paul wrote the letter to the Colossians even though its author claims to be Paul.  It's pretty easy to put the matter in simple, easy-to-understand terms for non-experts: all you have to say is that the writing style, theology, and presupposed historical circumstances don't match up with what we know about Paul otherwise.  But, well, that's really not very convincing.  It's just informative. So I provided a few of the details connected with writing style and theology, but tried to do it still in fairly simple terms.  As I've done sometimes before, I thought it might be useful to (some of?) you to see how I would argue that for scholars without having to mince words, just so you can see how it might be done.  To do it fully would take many pages, but here is the discussion I devote to the matter in my academic book Forgery and Counterforgery: The Use of Literary Deception in [...]

Now that I have summarized the major themes and emphases of Colossians, I can talk about who wrote it, when, and why.   The book, as we have seen, claims to be written by Paul.  But there are good reasons for doubting it. In a number of ways, this letter does look very much like those that Paul himself wrote. The prescript written in the names of both Paul and Timothy, the basic layout of the letter, and the closing all sound like Paul; and a number of important Pauline themes are sounded throughout: the importance of suffering in this world, Jesus’ death as a reconciliation, and the participation of believers in Jesus’ death through baptism.  On these grounds, one might think that Paul may well have written this letter. There are, however, solid reasons for questioning Paul’s authorship of this letter. One of the most compelling arguments depends on a detailed knowledge of Greek, for the writing style of Colossians differs markedly from that found in Paul’s undisputed letters. Whereas Paul tends [...]

Here is an annotated list of books on Ephesians, most of them relevant to all the Deutero-Pauline epistles (that is, the letters that are assigned a “secondary” standing in the New Testament collection of Paul’s letters because scholars doubt they were actually composed by Paul himself) with a couple of commentaries specifically on Ephesians.  One benefit of serious commentaries is that they always begin by discussing major critical issues in understanding a book: authorship, date, historical context, major themes, disputed issues, and so on. ****************************** Beker, J. Christiaan. The Heirs of Paul: Paul’s Legacy in the New Testament and in the Church Today. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress, 1991. A clear assessment of the theology of the Deutero-Pauline, especially in light of the views embodied in the undisputed Paulines. Ehrman, Bart D. Forged: Writing in the Name of God—Why the Biblical Authors Are Not Who We Think They Are. San Francisco: Harper One, 2010. An account of the phenomenon of literary forgery (pseudepigraphy) throughout the early Christian tradition that asks how and why a [...]

When I have talked about the “disputed” Pauline letters, the ones that scholars have argued were not written by Paul (even though the author claims to be Paul), I have pointed out that one reason for thinking so is that the writing style of, say Ephesians, is significantly different from what you find in Paul’s “undisputed” letters, such as Romans and 1 Corinthians. Some readers have asked whether this argument is compromised by the fact that so many of Paul’s letters claim to be “co-authored.”  Colossians, for example, claims to be from Paul “and Timothy” but 1 Corinthians from Paul “and Sosthenes.”  If they were jointly authored, wouldn’t we expect differences in writing style?  So how convincing is this argument? Good question.  I deal with it in my book Forgery and Counterforgery (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013) pp. 212-13.  The book is written for scholars, but this particular discussion is not particularly difficult.  Here is what I say about the issue there.  You’ll notice that I adopt a rather polemical tone!  Ah, I was [...]

Now that I have summarized the major themes and emphases of Ephesians (in the previous post), I can move to the issues of who wrote it, when, and why. The “Who” is the big question in this case, with the “when” and “why” depending on our answer. As I indicated in the earlier post, broadly speaking Ephesians sounds like something that Paul could have written, since it addresses a number of themes known from Paul’s seven undisputed letters:  salvation coming by the death and resurrection of Jesus, the unity of Jew and gentile in the church, the need for strong ethical standards and behavior, etc.  There would, of course, be differences with a letter of this sort, since unlike Paul’s other letters that are addressed to specific situations of specific churches, and this appears to be  a circular letter in which the author addresses no specific problem, such as moral improprieties or false teachings, and therefore offers no specific resolutions. But even taking into account the different kind of letter it is, is it likely [...]