Theories of a sudden collection
Theories of a sudden collection
Many scholars think that Paul’s letters were neglected after they had been sent to their addressees and that it was only at at certain point that someone took the initiative to gather them together. Since the first clear references to an actual corpus of the letters of Paul comes from Marcion, some suggest that he may have had something to do with the process. Marcion had a Pauline corpus of ten letters (he did not include the Pastorals). Marcion was perhaps the first to collect Paul’s letters together. Later "orthodox” collection of the letters (see, e.g., the Muratorian Canon, at the end of the second century) may have been a reaction to Marcion.
Another popular theory puts the time of the first collection about fifty years earlier. Goodspeed, followed by John Knox and C. L. Mitton, argues that Paul’s letters were neglected by the church after they were written and that the publication of Acts (which he dates c. A.D. 90) led a devoted follower of Paul to initiate a collection. According to Goodspeed, this follower was none other than Onesimus (the runaway slave of Philemon), who wrote Ephesians as a covering letter for the collected corpus. 70
Goodspeed’s theory is open to objection at a number of points. Ephesians was probably written by Paul (see chap. 11 below); Acts was probably published much earlier than A.D. 90; and, most seriously, there is good reason to think that Paul’s letters circulated among the churches long before the end of the century. Paul himself encouraged some of his letters to be read in other churches (see Col. 4:16), and it is certainly likely, granted the mobility of the early Christians, that exchanges of letters began at a fairly early date. 71 Another indication in the same direction is 2 Peter 3:16, which, while not necessarily speaking of a completed corpus of the letters of Paul, does refer to a number of Pauline letters. Despite the weight of scholarly opinion that dates 2 Peter in the beginning of the second century, there is good reason to date it as early as 64 or 65 (see chap. 20 below). It is possible, then, that another figure, earlier in the course of the church’s history, was responsible for the collection. Guthrie, for instance, suggests that it may have been Timothy. 72