2 Thessalonians 2.1-4:
2.1 Now we request you, brethren, with regard to the advent of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, 2 that you not be quickly shaken from your composure or be disturbed either by a spirit or a message or a letter as if from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. 3 Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, 4 who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God.
Is this the kind of thing an author would say while the temple actually lay in ruins? Or is this evidence that the letter predates 70? Does not the author come across as innocent of the knowledge that the temple had been destroyed? Or is a rebuilding implied in this text somehow? Are there examples of this kind of writing about the temple from after its destruction?
Contrast a verse like Barnabas 16.4:
4 So it comes to pass; for because they went to war it was pulled down by their enemies. Now also the very servants of their enemies shall build it up.
It is not altogether clear from context that the temple to be
built up is meant as literal, but the one which was
torn down pretty much has to be the literal temple in Jerusalem.
What do you think? (I am not asking about the authenticity of this epistle, incidentally. Only about its date.)
Ben.