Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] First Thessalonians who, When, and why?
[00:00:06] Written by Bart Ehrman, Read by Ken Teutsch now that I have given an overview of the major themes and emphases of First Thessalonians, I can say a few more things about what we know about its authorship, when it was written, and why the book, of course, is always called Paul's First Letter to the Thessalonians.
[00:00:29] But as you'll notice, the opening verse indicates that it comes from Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy. And throughout the letter, the first person plural pronoun we give thanks, we know our visit, and so on.
[00:00:45] So was this a letter written by committee?
[00:00:48] If so, how does that work exactly?
[00:00:52] Aspects of the letter make it pretty clear that the three named authors did not take turns writing Silvanus writing one passage, Timothy another, Paul yet another, but that it comes from one hand and the hand was Paul's. Timothy in particular does not appear to be involved in the writing of the letter, since in chapter three the authors indicate that when they were in Athens they were distressed, not knowing what was happening among the Thessalonians, and so they sent Timothy back to find out.
[00:01:23] We could bear it no longer, so we sent Timothy.
[00:01:27] That means that Timothy was not one of the we that is, even though he is named as one of the persons the letter is from, he is not actually writing, since the authors talk about him. That leaves Silvanus and Paul.
[00:01:41] Did they jointly write it?
[00:01:43] I doubt it. At one point Paul breaks out in the first person, I Paul.
[00:01:50] So it looks like he is putting pen to papyrus or dictating the letter, but he is including Silvanus as if they were doing it together so that his views represent their views.
[00:02:02] That's a bit different from other letters. For example, First Corinthians claims to be written by Paul and Sosthenes, Second Corinthians by Paul and Timothy. But in both of them, Paul talks about himself in the first person.
[00:02:16] Why is it different here?
[00:02:18] I'm not sure.
[00:02:19] One other interesting aspect of the authorship is that Paul or Paul and Silvanus refer back to the founding of the church in the letter, and there is a narrative about it in Acts 17:1 9 as well. That means it's possible to compare the two brief accounts closely.
[00:02:38] Timothy is not mentioned in the account. In Acts 17, Paul and Silas traveled to Thessalonica from Philippi on their missionary trip.
[00:02:47] Silas is almost always understood to be Silvanus, a shortened version of his name.
[00:02:53] According to Acts, Paul preaches three sabbaths in a row in the synagogue, trying to convince Jews that Jesus is the Messiah. He has some not great success converting a few, along with a great many devout Greeks and a good number of the leading women.
[00:03:13] We'd love to know more about all that, especially the prominent women. Who were they? How did Paul convert them, and who are all these Greeks converting?
[00:03:23] In the Acts account, the Jews became jealous and got some ruffians together to form a mob and more or less drive the apostles out of town. They head then to Berea and after that Paul goes alone to Athens.
[00:03:38] Among the interesting points of comparison A Paul never says anything in 1 Thessalonians about preaching in the synagogues, converting Jews there, or the leading women. B On the contrary, he indicates his converts were all former pagans.
[00:03:58] 1910 but he does indicate that he had come to Thessalonica after having a hard time in Philippi, which is exactly what Acts narrates in Acts 16 Timothy is mentioned there.
[00:04:16] Both Paul and Acts indicate there was considerable opposition to the Christian message among non believers in Thessalonica.
[00:04:25] They disagree, however, on the role of Timothy, who is absent from the account of Paul and Silas in Thessalonica in Acts 17.
[00:04:36] In addition, there is a contradiction about when Timothy does go to Thessalonica.
[00:04:42] 1 Thessalonians 3:1 Paul clearly says that he, Silvanus and Timothy were all together in Athens after the church was started in Thessalonica. Distraught over how they were doing, he and Silvanus sent Timothy to Thessalonica to check up on the church.
[00:05:01] But Acts is also explicit. Paul went to Athens alone, without Silas and Timothy.
[00:05:10] He meets up with them in Corinth after leaving Athens.
[00:05:14] It's a small detail, but it sure looks like a discrepancy to me.
[00:05:19] G A bigger discrepancy, though not an absolutely clear contradiction, is that Acts assumes that Paul engaged in his mission first by going to synagogues and converting Jews before being forced to take his mission to Gentiles, whereas Paul himself says nothing about going to synagogues and converting Jews there.
[00:05:41] This congregation, he indicates, is all from pagan stock.
[00:05:46] I think this kind of closer analysis shows what I've repeatedly said, that Acts gets a good deal right in terms of the overall picture. In this case, Paul goes from Philippi to Thessalonica to Athens, for example, but also has some rather important differences.
[00:06:04] Is he trying to convert mainly Jews? Does he convert Jews and is sometimes contradictory in the details? Well, maybe a lot of times.
[00:06:15] In short, I think Paul himself wrote this letter, but sees himself as doing so with the full participation of Silvanus and Timothy in what he says there is no reason to doubt this is one of the authentic letters.
[00:06:29] It is usually dated as the first of Paul's surviving writings, possibly written as early as 49 CE. That makes it the earliest surviving piece of Christian literature we have.
[00:06:41] As I pointed out in my earlier post, that makes it of special interest what was going on in early Christianity around the year 50.
[00:06:50] This is our best source of information.
[00:06:53] What we can say by way of generalization would be the Paul is going to various urban locations in Macedonia, of which Thessalonica was the capital, and Achaia making converts. The converts we know of are pagans. There is no hint in first Thessalonians that any of them is Jewish. Paul, by the way, never quotes the Old Testament in this letter or refers to the Jewish law.
[00:07:20] Paul has been facing opposition by outsiders and apparently he it involves some rough treatment too too, the churches that he founded are also facing opposition. This must be on the local level, almost certainly as family members, friends, neighbors and other locals are upset, angry that these people have adopted this new and strange religion and openly opposing it and them.
[00:07:46] Paul's message itself is clear. Pagans worship dead and false gods and he convinces them that the God of Jesus is alive and true.
[00:07:55] He gets them to abandon the worship of idols and to wait for Jesus to come back from heaven in the imminent day of judgment. 1910 the appearance of Jesus is expected to come any day now and is a central element in Paul's message. He mentions it in all five chapters of the letter.
[00:08:16] The Thessalonians expected it to happen already and became disturbed that it hasn't come.
[00:08:22] Paul has to assure them that it is coming soon. They need to be ready for it and not be caught unawares and they should not worry about those who have already died. They have not missed out on the glories to come with the return of Jesus.
[00:08:39] The main reasons Paul is writing this letter are to assure them of that, to encourage them to stay true to their new faith despite tough opposition and pressure, and to live moral and cohesive lives together as a new community of believers. 4:1 through 12 it is a very short letter for all of that, but it packs a lot of information in it when read closely.
