Re: 1 Thessalonians 2:14-16 --- Interpolation or Not?
Posted: Thu Jan 17, 2019 4:31 pm
Well, only 2.15a is directly attested for the Marcionite text:GakuseiDon wrote: ↑Thu Jan 17, 2019 2:19 pmBut "wrath has come upon them to the utmost" doesn't fit my proposal, since it seems to refer to the Jewish war. Perhaps just that part is an interpolation, but once one starts declaring parts that don't match "interpolations" for no other reason than to get a passage to fit, it shows a weakness in the theory.
Jason BeDuhn, The First New Testament, page 306: Tertullian attests the reading ‘the Judeans killed their own prophets’ (occiderant Iudaei prophetas suos; interfecerunt … prophetas suos > Gk tous idious prophetas), which he claims is Marcion’s addition; but the reading is also found in Gk mss Dc, E*, K, L, Ψ, and many others, some versions and some patristic witnesses. Thus, the imaginable ideological motive for Marcion to make the change from ‘the prophets’ to ‘their (i.e., Jewish) prophets’ is beside the point, since the variant was already present in the textual tradition of Paul completely independently of Marcion (cf. Clabeaux, A Lost Edition of the Letters of Paul, 117 and n. 79). On the persecution of Christians in Judea mentioned here, cf. Gal 6.12. Tertullian omits ‘Jesus’ following ‘the Master.’ Harnack also cites the verse from Adam 5.12, but Marcion’s text is not involved here. Pearson, ‘1 Thessalonians 2:13-16: A Deutero-Pauline Interpolation,’ has made a case for interpolation in this passage, to explain several oddities in the grammar and syntax, as well as inconstistencies with Paul’s thought elsewhere (see also Eckart, ‘Der zweite echte Brief’). While the evidence of the Apostolikon does not confirm the entire passage as an interpolation, the most severe anomalies of the text are not attested for Marcion’s text by our sources, in particular v. 15b-16. The Prologue’s reference to the persecution of the Thessalonian Christians by their fellow countrymen comes from 2.14.