1 Thessalonians first?

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stephan happy huller
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Re: 1 Thessalonians first?

Post by stephan happy huller »

More digression
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Bernard Muller
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Re: 1 Thessalonians first?

Post by Bernard Muller »

Hi Jay,
I think it is essential to remind ourselves that there was no post office in ancient Rome. This meant that you had to have a friend deliver the letter or a slave.
And Paul had a friend to deliver from Corinth "Romans" in Rome: Phebe, a Christian woman from Cenchrea: Rom 16:1-2
A city such as Thessaloniki had 1/2 million people in the First century. It would be extremely difficult to find some specific person.
But Timothy would know where these Christian congregations were in Thessalonica (1 Th 3:2) and Corinth.
Timothy was used as a messenger between Ephesus and Corinth & Ephesus (1 Cor 4:17, 1 Cor 16:10, Php 2:19)

Also Titus was used as messenger between Macedonia & Ephesus and Corinth (2 Cor 7:6,13,14, 2 Cor 8:23, 2 Cor 12:18).

Also Epaphroditus was used as messenger between Philippi and Ephesus (Php 2:25, Php 4:18).

No need to hire a slave. Fellow Christians were available to carry Paul's epistles and get information about problems, disbeliefs, doubts in Christian communities that Paul founded.

Also, the Pauline epistles are more than just rhetorical. They contain info like Paul's relationship with the addressees, Paul's emotive state, planned collections and future travels, past events in Paul's ministry, etc ...

Cordially, Bernard
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DCHindley
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Re: 1 Thessalonians first?

Post by DCHindley »

Colby D Strang wrote:New testament. Is it true that the book of Thessalonians was written before any of the epistles or the gospels? I've been studying theology for half a year now and this is the 2nd time I've come across this note.
That is a common conclusion if one reconstructs of the relative order of the epistles based on Acts and internal references in the epistles.

I once worked it out as follows:

1) 1 Thes, ca 50-51 CE
2) 2 Thes, ca 50-51 CE
3) Galatians, ca 51-52 CE
4) 1 Cor, ca 52-53 CE
5) Rom, ca 56 CE
6) 1 Tim, ca 56 CE
7) 2 Cor, ca 56 CE
8) Philemon, ca 61-63 CE
9) Colossians, ca 61-63 CE
10) 2 Tim, ca 61-63 CE
11) Ephesians, ca 61-63 CE
12) Philippians, ca 61-63 CE
13) Titus, undatable (Acts never mentions Epirus)

However, I came to the conclusion soon afterwards that using Acts with the epistles is like comparing apples and oranges.

Here are the widely varying orderings of 9 respected scholars (I selfishly snuck myself in as the 10th):

Book
Schaff
Zahn
Alford
Bagster
Conybeare & Howson
Lewin
Farrar
Harman
Mitchell
Hindley
1 Thes 53 52 52-53 52 52 52 52-54 50-51
2 Thes 53 53 53 53 52 52 53-54 50-51
Galat 56 52 54-57 54-57 57 58 59 58-59 56-57 51-52
1 Cor 57 57 57 57-58 57 57 57 57-58 57-58 52-53
Romans 58 58 58 59 58 58 58 58-59 58-60 56
2 Cor 57 57 58-59 57-58 57 57 58 57-58 57-58 56
1 Tim 67-68 65 67 64 66 65-66 56
Ephes 61 64 61-62 54-57 62 62 63 63 61-63
Philippians 63 63 61-63 62 63 61-62 63 61-63
Colossians 63 61-62 63 62 62 63 63 61-63
2 Tim 66 67-68 65 68 66 67 65-66 61-63
Philemon 63 61-62 63-64 62 62 63 63 61-63
Titus 67-68 65 67 64 66 65-66

DCH :whistling:
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Tenorikuma
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Re: 1 Thessalonians first?

Post by Tenorikuma »

Those are ridiculously early for the Pastorals. There's no reason to think they were written before the mid-second century.
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Tenorikuma
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Re: 1 Thessalonians first?

Post by Tenorikuma »

J.V.M. Sturdy, in Redrawing the Boundaries: The Date of Early Christian Literature (London: Equinox 2008), reexamines the dating of every NT work and all early Christian writings that cite them. He arrives at this dating (rounded to nearest decade):

40 1 Thessalonians
50 Galatians, Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Philippians, Philemon
60
70 Q
80 Mark, Colossians
90
100 Ephesians
110 Luke, 1 Peter, Hebrews
120 2 Thessalonians
130 Matthew, Acts, James, Jude, 1 Clement
140 John, Pastorals, Barnabas, Papias (up to 160)
150 Johannines, 2 Peter, Revelation, Didache, Hermas
160 John 21
170
180 Ignatian letters
190
200 Polycarp (possibly as late as 250)

His case for each work is well-documented and based on prior scholarship.
Last edited by Tenorikuma on Wed Jan 22, 2014 6:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 1 Thessalonians first?

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Tenorikuma wrote:Those are ridiculously early for the Pastorals. There's no reason to think they were written before the mid-second century.
Well, I'd like to chuck the pastorals in the trash because their Christology is suspect, but unfortunately so is the Christology of the "undisputed" letters. Since I've come to the oh-must-be-so-wrong conclusion that all the Christology in all the letters represent redactive strata (inserted in letters having nothing to do with Jesus Christ at a time when the largely rural Jesus movement had become a mystery cult and crossed paths with the remnants of Paul's "gentile brother" movement).

Both the earlier Jesus movement and the roughly contemporary Paul movement had been decimated by the polarization between those of gentile and Judean birth engendered during the Jewish War of 66-74, which included a rather hefty degree of ethnic cleansing and killing of moderates in Judaea and southern Syria by both gentiles and Jews. This cast a pall upon the degree of trust that Jews (including several gentile converts to Judaism in the Jesus movement) and gentiles could justify giving one another.

A Jesus movement that had fixed this dissonance by transforming the resurrected Jesus story into a redeemer myth in which God's favor had passed from Jews to gentiles apparently had an appeal for the gentile followers of Paul who no longer believed they would be allowed to inherit a physical kingdom of God along with Jews.

That period I would place sometime in the very late 1st or first few decades of the 2nd century CE.

But there I go thinking outside the box again ... :eek:

DCH
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Tenorikuma
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Re: 1 Thessalonians first?

Post by Tenorikuma »

DCHindley wrote:Since I've come to the oh-must-be-so-wrong conclusion that all the Christology in all the letters represent redactive strata (inserted in letters having nothing to do with Jesus Christ at a time when the largely rural Jesus movement had become a mystery cult and crossed paths with the remnants of Paul's "gentile brother" movement).
Do you have any examples that are easy to show? (I'm just curious, not being adversarial or anything.)
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DCHindley
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Re: 1 Thessalonians first?

Post by DCHindley »

Tenorikuma wrote:
DCHindley wrote:Since I've come to the oh-must-be-so-wrong conclusion that all the Christology in all the letters represent redactive strata (inserted in letters having nothing to do with Jesus Christ at a time when the largely rural Jesus movement had become a mystery cult and crossed paths with the remnants of Paul's "gentile brother" movement).
Do you have any examples that are easy to show? (I'm just curious, not being adversarial or anything.)
Yes, I can, but it will have to wait for tomorrow. I have to drive an hour to another office to get a replacement cell phone for work tomorrow, and need to turn in early tonight.

DCH (sorry no snoozing smilie)
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stephan happy huller
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Re: 1 Thessalonians first?

Post by stephan happy huller »

at a time when the largely rural Jesus movement
I assume you posit the existence of simple unsophisticated Jews who would match your ideas about a simplified Christian doctrine. But I've never met these 'simple' Jews. The closest thing I ever met to what you were talking about was this family from Morocco who had a thriving hot dog cart business and pinball business. This family was heavily into kabbalah as are all Sephardim.

The point here is that (what I am assuming are) your assumptions about a 'simple' religion don't work with Jews. The more rustic, the more mystic. The only Jews I've ever known who deny mysticism are fancy lawyers and professionals who eat shrimp and intermarry. The lower down the chain you get, the more immersed into kabbalah - not the other way around.
Last edited by stephan happy huller on Wed Jan 22, 2014 11:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 1 Thessalonians first?

Post by Bernard Muller »

My dating:

1 Thessalonians 50-51
1 Corinthians (3 parts) 53-55 (earliest to latest)
Hebrews (not by Paul) 54
2 Corinthians (3 parts) 55-57(earliest to latest)
Philippians (3 parts) 53/54-58 (earliest to latest)
Philemon 57
Galatians 57-58
Romans 58

Colossians (not by Paul), around 65
James (not by James) 60-65
Mark's gospel (anonymous) 70-71
Q compiled around 80
1 Clement (possibly by Clement of Rome), around 80

That's it for known Christian literature written before (about) 80.

Cordially, Bernard
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