THESSALONIANS, EPISTLES TO TIIE (Gk.
irpbs OecreaXcasserss Se. irwroXi, pros salonikcis, to the Thessalonians, Sc. cpistole, epistle). Two letters in the New Testament, purporting in their opening passages of greeting to have been written by Paul, and generally so accepted by scholars. They were written in Corinth during Paul's first visit to that city in the year 50-51 within a few months of each other, and, if a later date for Galatians be ac cepted, are the earliest of the preserved writings of the Apostle. They were sent to the Christian community of Thessalonica., where Paul had but recently preached the gospel, in order to comfort his people in the persecution they were suffering, the beginnings of which had driven Paul and his companions from the city. They are consequent ly marked by an absence of doctrinal discussion. In fact, apart from a short apologetic passage in the first Epistle, a brief statement in the same Epistle regarding the advent of Christ, and a more elaborated caw in the second Epistle as to the coming of the Day of the Lord, involving a declaration of the character and work of the 'Man of Sin.' they may be considered purely pastoral letters whose concern is with the read ers' practical religious needs—and even in these excepted passages the spirit of the writer is essentially that of the pastor.
Both Epistles were rejected by the Ttibingen School (1845) and are disowned to-day by the radical Dutch School (1882), the force of whose criticism, however, is largely broken by the general negative position which they maintain toward all of Paul's writings. At the same time there is considerable critical debate regarding the PauUnity of the second Epistle—due to the difficult passage in chapter ii. regarding the 'Man of Sin'—a passage the subject of which is a most unusual one with Paul and the mean ing of which in itself is most obscure. It is argued on the one side that the unusual char acter of this passage in Paul's Epistles—no parallel to it being found in his writings— the agreement of the picture which it presents with any one of several situations late in the century. particularly with the situation occa sioned by the expected return of Nero, and the evident literary dependence of the rest of the Epistle on I. Thessalonians, all show the author to have been some one after Paul's clay, who, ap parently out of a desire to quiet tendencies to disorder consequent upon expectations of the immediate coining of Christ, described the events which must necessarily precede that coming, writing in the name of Paul in order to secure authority for his statements, and modeling his production on Paul's Thessalonian letter, the contents of which were more or less of an eschatological character.
On the other side, it is asserted that when con sideration is given to the fact that recent investi gations in the field of apocalyptic literature have shown the existence among the Jews of a popular anti-Messiah legend. having its source in pre exilic times and coming down through various stages of development to the times of the Chris tian Church, and when it is remembered that this popular belief is made use of in various ways by Jesus Himself (e.g. in His eschatological
discourse in Mark xiii. and parallels) as well as by some of the Apostolic writers (cf. e.g. I. John ii. 22), it cannot be held an unlikely thing for Paul also to make the use of it which we find in this passage, though such usage does not occur again in his writings. On such a theory it is maintained that the picture here presented would not need to be applied to any definite per son, any more than would the corresponding pictures in the other New Testament writings. They would all refer rather to personified prin ciples of evil hostile to Christ and His religion, or to principles impersonated generally in the enemies of Christianity. In any event, it is contended. nothing can be made out of the re semblance of the second Epistle to the first which would show a greater dependence of the latter upon the former than would he natural for Paul in writing two letters to the same people within a few months of each other. The contention that in the second Paul has reversed his belie in a sudden coming of Christ within the limits of his own lifetime which he expressed in his darner letter. is answered by saying that in 1, Thessahmia us the return of Christ is pre sented as unexpected only to those who are evil, while the perspective given to that coining in II. 'Thessalonians does not necessarily carry it beyond the limit of life to which Paul might naturally look forward.
Bisu400RAPin'. Commentaries: Schmidt (Mer lin, 1885) ; Schmiedel, in Handkownicntar aunt IVcucn Testament (Freiburg, 1893) ; Borne mann, in ileyer-Kommentar iiber des Sem= Tes tament (GOttingen, 1894) ; Ziickler, in Straclo umd Zilekler kommentor (Munich, 1894) ; Goebel (Gotha, 1887) ; Zimmer (Flerborn, 1891) ; id., Textkritischcr Appurat iced 'Commenter (Gotha, 1893) ; ,Towett (London, 1894) ; Light foot, Notes on the Epistles of Saint Paul (Lon don, 1895). t rod act ions : B. Weiss (Eng, trans., Edinburgh. 1888) ; Holtzmann (Freiburg, 1892) ; Godet (Eng. trans., ib., 1894) ; Salmon (London, 1894) : Zahn (Leipzig, 1900) ; Moffatt, The Historical New Testament (New York and Edinburgh, 1901) ; Jill icher ( Tfibingen and Leipzig, 1901). Discussions: Baur, Paulus (Eng. trans.. London, 1872-75) ; Thackeray, The Relations of Saint Paul to Contemporary Jewish. Thought (London, 1900) : Stanton, The Jewish and Christian. Messiah (Edinburgh, TSSG) ; Klopper, Der zweite Brief an die (Kiinigsberg, 1889) ; Weizsiicker, Des aposto lische Zcitulter (Eng. trans., New York, 1894) ; Spitta, Zur tlesehichtc and Littcratur des Urclristeutorns (Gottingen, 1893) ; Clemen, Die Einheitliedrkeit der panlinischen Briefe (Gottin gen, 1894) : Bonsset, Der Antichrist (Eng. trans., London, 1896) Wrede, Die Echtheit des zweiten Thessalonieherbriefes (Leipzig, 1903).