Earliest and latest possible times for Paul's first letter?

[lsayre]

What would you consider to be the earliest, latest, and most probable time for the writing of Paul's first letter?

[Joseph D. L.]

118 ad to 141 ad.

[toejam]

49-65CE... with textual tinkering happening up to c.100CE

[Joseph D. L.]

49-65CE... with textual tinkering happening up to c.100CE

Absolutely not. The Pauline corpus is tailor made to promote Hadrian and his policies.

As far as later redactions: probably 160-180 ad, and again during the time of Severius.

It's a dream to have these letters in the first century. It ain't happenin'.

[Jax]

44 BCE (probably no earlier than 40 BCE though) for some of the Corinthian letter originals to (around) 19 BCE as latest for proto-Romans, with additions, collation and editing going on until the mid to late second century (or thereabouts).

The Philippian proto-letters I would place post 42 BCE and the 1 Thessalonians proto-letters around this time. Galatians may be earlier than the above timeline however and Philemon may be later (if Philemon is actually written by Paul).

I realize that this sounds totally nuts, but my research into this subject seems to validate at least some of these conclusions. YMMV.

[Charles Wilson]

Our reasons may differ but I'm with Joseph D. L. on this one.
The use of "holy spirit" - code for Domitian - places the possibility for Pauline Mischief no earlier than about 98. The lack of h.s. in some of the Letters is intriguing.

Mucianus is the template for "Paul" (See: Tacitus, Histories, Book, 4, esp.) and this is seen in 1 Corinthians 1: 14 - 16. Mucianus had 2 books, "Epistolae" and "Acta" - "What do THOSE 2 words mean?" - so the Authorship time frame is known generally. Hadrian* is not my specialty so if JoeDL wants to give a few examples I would welcome them.

I have Mark @ 110 earliest with the GJohn Fragment dated to c. 125. We know something happened with Acts telling the Tale of the few people not knowing the Baptism of the Holy Spirit has already displaced the Baptism of John before the Baptism of John was known by more than a select few.

118 is a good possibility for an earliest letter but the entire package is put together very late. Certainly after Domitian's death. The enterprise started sometime before this - but not much earlier - with the deification of Titus (Mucianus loved Titus). The Project changes to the advantage of the "Holy Spirit" after Titus is poisoned but the hiding of identities of the Flavians for effect came a few decades later.

CW

* I automatically wrote "Trajan" originally. Joseph D. L. mentioned "Hadrian".

[DCHindley]

I prefer to apply External Criticism, and as Edgar Krentz describes in The Historical Critical Method (1975) "Dates ... if absent ... must be supplied (as far as possible) from internal references to persons, institutions or events, from stylistics, or from quotations made. The historian seeks information as complete as possible not in order to discredit his source, but to understand its credibility and use its witness."

I am referring specifically to 1 Cor. 11:3-10, which I feel fits the circumstances of Quene Helena, Dowager Queen of the Parthian buffer kingdom of Adiabene, better than others. Helena converted to the Judean way of life sometime before 34 CE, which did not require any sort of physical alteration. However, when her sons Izates II and Monobazus II also showed interest in the Judean way of life she urged them to follow her Judean advisor's recommendation that they assume the role of a God-Fearing gentile.

A different Judean made the sons acquaintance and convinced them to convert fully, by rite of circumcision. Helena, or her part, acquiesced and somewhat unwillingly allowed them to proceed. There was push-back on the part of the Adiabene aristocracy and a sort of revolt broke out. Helene vowed to God to take on a seven year Nazirite vow if her son Izates won the power battle, and he did, ruling from 34-58 CE. After seven years (41-42 CE) Helena tried to fulfill the 7 year vow in Adiabene. When she traveled to Jerusalem to fulfill the vow in the temple, which meant cutting off her now extra long hair, the local sages said that due to a technicality (corpse impurity was assumed in countries external to Judea) such a vow had to be re-done in Judea.

This she did (ca 42-49 CE), building a fine palace there and making a great number of expensive donations to the Judean temple and local causes. Finally she went to fulfill her vow in 49 CE, but may have been persuaded by local sages to do it all over again, making the final fulfillment as late as 56 CE. Now comes the hair shearing.

IMHO, Paul heard of her visit and felt she had made absolutely the wrong choice in allowing her sons to be circumcised. Her sons should have been content to be God-fearers. To make it worse in Paul's eyes, Helena had no living husband to authorize it, so he considered her vow a "rash" vow with no power. When she did arrive to have her hair ritually cut, either 41 or 49 or 56 CE, Paul may have driven himself into a frenzy over it, and in the process of venting said a "few" hateful things about her. 1 Cor is traditionally dated to about 57 CE.

The other is 2 Thessalonians 2:2-10 (about the "Man of Lawlessness" who wants to exalt himself but is temporarily restrained by someone), which I relate to the Caligula statue affair (Petronius, Legate of Syria, was the restrainer, unless he is thinking of Agrippa I), dating this somewhere around 39-40 CE. This letter is traditionally dated to 52-53 CE.

So, based on this alone, the earliest possible date for 2 Thess would be 39 CE, and for 1 Cor would be 41 CE. There you have it, the two independently verified historical events, seem to point to 39-41 CE as the time Paul flourished.

The Jesus & Christ theology is not part of my analysis because I think it was added at a later point (after 75 CE). FWIW, the 3 most likely dates for Jesus' death would be in 21 CE (Acta Pilati) or 30 CE (Gospels) or 36 CE (Nikos Kokkinos based on Josephus).

DCH

[Jax]

^ I just have two observations to make on your post.

1: 1 Corinthians 11:3-16 is described by William O. Walker Jr as a later interpolation.

William O. Walker, Jr, '1 Corinthians 11.2-16 and Paul's Views regarding
Women', JBL 94 (1975), pp. 94-110; Lamar Cope, '1 Cor 11.2-16: One Step
Further', JBL 97 (1978), pp. 435-36; G.W. Trompf, 'On Attitudes toward Women
in Paul and Paulinist Literature: 1 Corinthians 11.3-16 and Its Context', CBQ 42
(1980), pp. 196-215; William O. Walker, Jr, 'The Vocabulary of 1 Corinthians
11.3-16: Pauline or Non-Pauline?', JSNT 35 (1989), pp. 75-88.

2: 2 Thessalonians is regarded by many as not having been written by Paul but is rather regarded as much later than Paul.

Don't mean to be a kill joy.

[Joseph D. L.]

You people are crazy.

[Jax]

You people are crazy.

They are, totally!

Not you and me though.