Loading...I am out of the country must now, giving lectures for a tour of Greece and Turkey focused on “The Footsteps of Paul.” For the past three days we’ve been in Thessaloniki, a terrific place; tomorrow we’re off to Samos, an island near the coast of Turkey, from which we’ll make expeditions to Ephesus and Patmos (not connected with Paul, but how can we pass it up?), etc. Suffering for the cause.
In my talk to the group today, I was explaining why scholars have such difficulties knowing what Paul actually said and did. For one thing, the accounts in Acts (which give a kind of biography of Paul) may be roughly accurate in their broad picture, but there are reasons for thinking the details are problematic. That’s important because Acts is our only ancient source that claims Paul was from Tarsus, was a Roman citizen, and had three major missionary journeys. And some of the things it says about Paul are highly significant, if true – for example, that he never, personally, stopped keeping the Jewish law while on the mission field.
The other problem, as many of you will know, is that some of the letters in the NT that claim to be written by Paul were probably not. I thought this might give me an occasion for re-posting a series of blog posts from many years ago, dealing with a letter allegedly written to the Christians in the city I now find myself in, Thessalonica.
1 Thessalonians was almost certainly written by Paul (basic reason: it coheres in writing style, vocabulary, theological perspective, and presupposed historical situation with the other letters almost universally acknowledged as having been written by Paul). 2 Thessalonians? Yeah, not so much.
Here is how I started broaching the problem when discussing it before, in an earlier era of the blog. In this post I give the big and simple reason for thinking the letter is pseudonymous (written by someone claiming to be Paul who was actually someone else; modern term for that, of course, is “forgery”). After this post I’ll go into more detail.
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Paul himself thought the end was coming in his lifetime. Nowhere is this more clear than in one of the letters we are sure he wrote, 1 Thessalonians. Paul wrote the Christians in Thessalonica because some of them had become disturbed over the death of a number of their fellow believers. When he converted these people, Paul had taught them that the end of the age was imminent, that they were soon to enter the Kingdom when Jesus returned. But members of the congregation had died before it happened. Had they lost out on their heavenly reward? Paul writes to assure the survivors that no, even those who have died will be brought into the kingdom. In fact when Jesus returns in glory on the clouds of heaven, “the dead in Christ will rise first, then we who are alive, who remain, will be caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air” (4:17). Read the verse carefully: Paul expects to be one of the ones who will still be alive when it happens.
He goes on to say that…
The rest of this post is for blog members only. If you haven’t joined yet, I suggest you do so soon. The end will be coming like a thief in the night. Don’t leave something left undone!
Honestly, that is still a message that some Christians haven’t gotten yet and they neglect their lives in anticipation of the return of Jesus.
It’s the old saying “They’re so heavenly minded that they are no earthly good.”
Jesus thought the end of the age was imminent, at least as his words were recorded. Paul thought the end was at hand, in his lifetime. But when that proved to be untrue the true believers had to regroup and change the doctrine. We see the same thing in recent times, like the 7th Day Adventists and other groups who said the end was imminent, but it was not! I have to laugh at the apocalyptic pronouncements of these various groups!
Dr. Eherman,
For those biblical historians (like yourself) who feel 2 Thessalonians is a forgery, would it make sense for the dating of the letter to be before the destruction of the Temple in 70CE (and presumably after Paul’s death a few years earlier)? I ask because if it were written in say 90CE, wouldn’t Paul’s followers be tempted to read it and say “Well, that can’t be right. The all that happened 20 years ago and Jesus never reappeared.” Or is the description in 2 Thes. vague enough that Paul’s followers may not have associated it with the Jewish Revolt and the Temple destruction, but rather anticipated something even bigger yet to come after the Temple was rebuilt some day?
Enjoy your Greek adventure. I’ll get there some day!
They would have had bigger problems with 1 Thessalonians, since it’s the one that says the end is coming suddenly. 2 Thess gives a lot more wiggle room.
Somewhat off the topic, but what is your opinion of Paula Fredericksen’ s “Paul:The Pagan Apostle”?
I think she’s a top-rate scholar, massively learned and very insightful. I don’t agree with everything, but then again, it would be boring if I did.
There’s quite a difference between ‘The Pagan Apostle’ and ‘The Pagans’ Apostle’…..I thought you had discovered a whole new side to Paul…..
Do your consider Paul to be a zealot (lower case “z” or otherwise)?
No.
I must be missing something really obvious here but wouldn’t Christians have been aware of Paul’s death? How is that letters purporting to be authored by Paul could emerge after his death and yet their provenance not be questioned?
Because no one said “This letter was written last month.” They said: “I’ve seen another letter that Paul wrote!” Circulation of literature was very, very spotty and Christian churches often didn’t have access to important Christian literature for decades — and they knew it.
Have a safe and fruitful trip! If you have never ever attended a Greek Orthodox worship service in a church or monastery, I highly recommend doing so at least once, especially while you’re in Greece (Patmos has a nice monastery and there are plenty of Churches to choose from in Thessaloniki). I think you may find it fruitful, even from a scholarly research perspective, to experience a form of non-Reformation/non-Counter-Reformation Christianity — in Greek, no less! (if not Koine) — organically connected to the original Christian communities and infused with layers and layers of traditions accumulated over many centuries: kind of like those old Greek and Roman cities themselves: a vibrant, living, mix of ancient, medieval, and modern. I really do think it would add extra insight to your work. If you have already done so over the years, then never mind. And regardless, I promise not to bring this up again :-).
It seems like a good idea that II Thessalonians was written otherwise Jesus’ followers would be living on the edge, so to speak, “eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we may die.” There would be a complete lifestyle disruption and the nascent church might never have gotten off the ground. Pseudepigrapha it may be, but it played a significant role.
Thanks for the heads-up on 2nd T !!! Have a great trip and wonderful summer.
Bart, the glaring discrepancy regarding the imminent return of Jesus in 1 Thess and 2 Thess must have been noticed by the early church fathers. So how did it get into the New Testament?
They reconciled it. Just as almost all readers still do! Almost no one one notices it until it is pointed out.
The Harper-Collins study version of the NRSV is almost certain 2 Thess was written by someone else, using much the same argument you’ve posted (in less detail).
There are a couple of genuine Pauline letters where he adds that he is writing in his own hand (1 Cor. 16.21, Gal. 6:11, Philem. 19) – in Philemon the phrase is interesting because he was in prison and I have to wonder how the Romans would have let him dictate it. I see that the same phrasing is used in Colossians, which he didn’t write. I think you are right that the author added the extra emphasis here in 2 Thess. because it was so in conflict with 1 Thess.
1. Whan reference would you recommend me (beside Forged, i have read it hehe) to learn more of the studies done to the paulien letters to determine the differences between the undisputed letters and disputed.
2. How reliable is to infer that different writting style means different author. Doesn´t writting style could change during one’s live?
1. You might try the book by Calvin Roetzel on Paul’s letters, for starters.
2. It’s sometimes highly problematic, depending how it’s used. That’s why it’s used in connection with *other* criteria, almost never on its own. Even so, if you read Mark Twain and then James Joyce, there’s something to be said for differences of style leading to conclusions about identity of authorship.
If 1st Thess is early and 2nd Thess is late, shouldnt we expect his views on the immediacy of the end-times to become more nuanced?
Also isnt the greeting just “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all” same as 1st Thess, maybe that too was written in his own hand – Paul just trying to show some way they can tell the letter is genuine as a response to other forged letters being sent?
1. They are more nuanced. That’s one of the points.
2. Wait for a future post. For now: Paul never does that in any other letter. If it’s his way, why doesn’t he use it elsewhere? But that’s not really meant to be a probative argument. I’ll be giving that anon.
ok thanks.
Been to Ephesus before, amazing place, but it was before I knew anything about it.
I’m sure its an even better experience when you know the history. Enjoy!
Something that emerges fairly consistently: true believers are perfectly willing to lie when it suits them. Much is made of “the truth”. And yet, when truth becomes inconvenient, when it clashes with doctrine, truth gets thrown on the trash heap. That is very bizarre. The unavoidable conclusion is that there is something very much wrong about the way our brains process information. There’s some sort of assumption about what is real, and then information is accepted or rejected or distorted in order to to preserve what has been assumed to be real. Christians, obviously, are not immune. But it must be the case that some people are more susceptible than others. Some people are less rigid in their thinking than others. I wonder what determines the difference. Nature vs nurture again.
Upton Sinclair once said, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.” This is a special case of a broader principle which applies to much more than just jobs and salaries. For most people, being safe and comfortable and accepted by their in-group is vastly more important than any abstract notion of truth. For such people “truth” is whatever they need it to be in order to protect their peace of mind and/or their social standing. Consequently, if they change churches or religions or political parties or even football teams, they generally do so not because they have been convinced that their new commitment is objectively more in accord with the truth than the old one, but rather because they find their association with the new group to be more satisfying for other reasons. In other words, for most people commitment does not arise out of belief; belief arises out of commitment. In general, it is only a tiny minority who truly attempt to discern the truth and “follow the facts wherever they lead”–and they often pay a very high price for doing so.
I guess we need to remember that the human brain EVOLVED, and it didn’t EVOLVE in order to become a fact-finding and truth-seeking instrument. Whatever it became, it became by default. It seems to have been beneficial in terms of species survival so far. Whether it has what it takes to survive it’s own lethal by-products (and Christianity might be one of those by-products, as well as nuclear weapons and plastic garbage) remains to be seen.
Wow, talk about fake news !! Fooling people for close to 2 millennia already. Compared to this 2 Thess. dude, Fox News are just a bunch of amateurs.
By the way, it’s not the queen, but rather “the lady doth protest too much”. Methinks …
Ha, you’re right! And my wife’s a Shakespeare scholar!
Enjoy the weather! It’s a dry heat, right?
Professor Ehrman:
1 Thessalonians, generally thought to be the earliest Pauline Epistle, is interesting in that in never mentions the supposed crucifixion of Jesus. The key belief in it is the supposed resurrection of Jesus. I think you would agree that orthodox belief in Jesus significantly started with a belief in a resurrected Jesus and then worked backwards:
1) Resurrection.
2) Crucifixion.
3) Passion.
4) Teaching & Healing Ministry.
5) Birth.
6) Pre-existence.
Do you think this is why 1 Thessalonians does not mention crucifixion? Because it represents an early orthodox belief that only/primarily emphasized the resurrection?
http://skepticaltextualcriticism.blogspot.com/
I think that some of Paul’s letters don’t mention the crucifixion simply because everyone he was writing to knew about it and didn’t have to be reminded — since he was writing about *other* things. (Just as most of my letters don’t mention the crucifixion, though I think it happened)
If writing in Paul’s name was common, and the vast majority of letters written by Paul (and his forgers) were lost, how confident can you be that the “undisputed” letters were written by him and not a forger? What if the “undisputed” letters are coherent because they are from the same forger and the letters of Paul are either lost completely or amongst the disputed epistles? I might simply ask that as a devil’s advocate question. But then again: if Paul wrote lots of letters, and there were a lot of forgers, and Paul addressed forgery in his letters and the vast majority of letters were lost…how do you know which ones we have?
Yes, it’s possible. The argument is a bit complicated though for why these books are thought to be authentic; it’s not just that they cohere. Part of it is that hte theological and historical situations they presuppose fit in well with what almost certainly was going on in the 50s. Forgeries tend to sneak in later ideas, views, and issues.
After recently re-reading the gospel of Mark, something occurred to me. In chapter 13, Jesus talks of the “signs of the times” but also says “no one knows the day or the hour.” Might this seem like a similar contradiction that casts doubt that the same author wrote 1 and 2 Thessalonians? I realize there are other reasons to doubt the authorship of 2 Thessalonians. But is it an absolute contradiction to say certain things will happen first, but the end is still imminent?
Paul agrees he doesn’t know the day and the hour. He just knows it’s soon. And 2 Thessalonians doesn’t know the day or the hour either — it just indicates that when it’s close, it’ll be clear (or rather that since these things have not happened, it’s not close: not the same as saying that we know exactly *when* it will be clear.)
I’m a little off subject but related:
Wondering, when Acts ends in Rome, if Paul was released and traveled again and was again taken to Rome and executed the second time there, this final journey not appearing in Acts, where and when do you think Romans was written?
I don’t think Acts is accurate on that. I don’t think he was released from Roman prison and then came back again.
This concise and clear distinction between First and Second Thessalonians is quite helpful. How do apologists usually explain these differences?
Have a great trip!
By saying I”m being too overly literal!
Hmmm, so literal doesn’t always mean literal?!
Exactly.
It is interesting that the author of 2 Thessalonians is worried that people are ignoring their daily responsibilities. Is this not the proper approach to daily worries as instructed in the Sermon on the Mount?
I think the difference is that Jesus never tells people it’s OK to quit their day jobs….
Would this be an example of an exceptionally early forged letter, given the reference to the Jerusalem Temple in 2:4?
If the temple had already been destroyed when the letter was written, then it would have been a little odd for the forger to claim the anti-Christ had yet to take his seat at a Temple that no longer existed.
If the letter does pre-date 70, is it possible this was written while Paul was still alive, or is it more probable that it was written shortly after he met his end c67?
Lots of Jewish writings after 70 presuppose the standing of the Temple (even in the Talmud); so that can’t be used to date writings.
when it says “temple” does it imagine a building or can a location where the temple stood still referred to as temple?
so even if the temple was destroyed, could the location of that place still be called “temple” ?
These writings actually refer to priests offering sacrifices inthe temple. So they are imagining the temple is still up and functioningn in Jerusalem, even though they know it’s not, in order to make their point.
“the dead in Christ will rise first, then we who are alive, who remain, will be caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air”
Is Paul the only person we know of who made a statement like this?
Only Paul and those familiar with Paul I suppose. But no, it’s not in the other writings of the NT (including Revelation!)
Does that lead us to believe that Paul created this idea?
Sorry — I lost track of the flow of this conversation, and I can’t remember what idea we’re referring to. I tried to find it in the comments on the post, but to no avail. So remind me: which idea are we wanting to know if Paul created?
The idea that the dead in Christ will rise first, then we who are alive, who remain, will be caught up together with them to meet the Lord in the air.
Was Paul the creator of this idea or he inherit it from others?
Ah, we don’t know. I suspect he’s the one who came up with it.
I agree that many of “Paul’s” letters were not written by him. But in this case I’m not convinced. Seems to me Paul changed his mind about the timing and even importance of the Second Coming, seeing as how it is not such a big deal in his other letters, which must have mentioned it if he still considered it imminent. If so, then what is to prevent him from having written an update? I think of him as rather inconsistent and evolving in his theology. I recognize there are still problems with this view, but I also wonder how many of his letters are lost, and whether he would accurately remember what he wrote earlier. Open to be convinced otherwise.
IMHO… in 1 Thess 4 Paul says that he wants you to understand what happens when you die. He said that Jesus comes down from heaven and takes you back to heaven with him. None of this is physical & this is not about a second coming.
Jesus promised Thomas that he was going to go to God’s house in heaven and prepare a place for him. Jesus then promised to then come back & take Thomas there to live with him in heaven forever. Again, as Paul said, flesh & bone bodies can’t go to heaven.
“And some of the things it says about Paul are highly significant, if true – for example, that he never, personally, stopped keeping the Jewish law while on the mission field.”
It seems that he did keep the law but did minor things that made some Jews think he wasn’t. When he said he became a Gentile in order to win one of them to Christ, it’s not necessarily saying he didn’t keep the law. However, I think he caused a lot of confusion about it.
Part of the problem to understand the Bible comes from the fact that it is not ordered in a more chronological order. These kiind of observations could be more visible to the normal people if a versión of the new testament could begin with the Paul’s letters
in the order un which they we’re written instead of beginning with the gospels . Don’t you think it could be an useful idea for scholarly work?
Yes, it would be highly useful. But impossible to pull off. We can’t establish an absolute chronology of all the writings of the NT. But yes, it’s very important indeed to realize that Paul was writing first. the problem is that he presupposes things about Jesus, and to know something about Jesus you have first to read the Gospels. Complicated! The later books have to be read to make some sense of the earlier…. I talk about this at the beginning of my textbook on the NT.