Vii. The Relationship Between The Two Epistles
As in the case of the first epistle, there are good reasons for thinking of 2 Thessalonians as authentic. It has early attestation, for Polycarp, Ignatius, and Justin all seem to have known it, and possibly the writer of the Didache. It is found in the Marcionite canon and in the Muratorian Fragment. It is quoted by name by Irenaeus and later writers. As with 1 Thessalonians, the mention of Silvanus and Timothy as associates of the author and the obviously early date of the writing favor Pauline authorship. 2 Thessalonians emerged into church history associated unequivocally with 1 Thessalonians. It claims to have been written by Paul, and the language and theology are Pauline. It is difficult to think of a suitable motive for a forger (notice that, in addition to the opening verse, since 2 Thess. 3:17 claims to be Paul's signature, forgery is the only alternative to authenticity;32 we cannot think of someone putting out in good faith a sample of Pauline teaching). It is difficult to think of a reason for making the letter resemble 1 Thessalonians so closely, and it is not easy to understand how a forger could have entered so fully into the mind of Paul as to produce a writing so redolent of the apostle as this one.33 There is also the point that if we did not have 1 Thessalonians we would scarcely doubt the authenticity of 2 Thessalonians. It is rather strange to call in question an epistle that has all the hallmarks of a genuine Pauline writing on the grounds that it is similar to another Pauline writing.
For such reasons most scholars have not hesitated to accept this writing. In recent times, however, some of them have focused on certain matters that raise doubts, and a number have come to the conclusion that 2 Thessalonians does not come from the hand of Paul. The following points have been raised.
1. There is the matter that Neil puts this way: "The problem of the letter is one of accounting for the similarity to and difference from a letter written by the same hand, to the same people, only a short while before." 34 Sometimes 2 Thessalonians repeats 1 Thessalonians not only in general ideas but also in actual words. The objection is that such an outstanding man as Paul would not find it necessary to repeat himself. He would, if he had to say the same thing, say it in different words, so that deliberate imitation is a better explanation. At the same time there are differences, such as those on eschatology, which we shall notice in the next section. The contention is that the ideas are not the ideas of Paul, and that they are expressed in language that is a deliberate imitation of that of the great apostle.35
In the first place it must be said that the similarity to Pauline style is very close indeed. It is very difficult to envisage a forger who could imitate Paul's language so very closely. Pauline words and phrases and constructions are everywhere.36 So are Pauline ideas. If Paul wrote 2 Thessalonians not so very long after 1 Thessalonians, it would not be surprising if sometimes words and phrases were repeated,37 especially if, as Neil thinks possible, he read through "the customary draft copy of his first letter before writing the second."38 This would be the more likely in that he had to bear in mind what was written in 1 Thessalonians, because some of it had been misunderstood.
It must also be borne in mind that the extent of the resemblances is easy to exaggerate. It is natural for the openings and closings to resemble each other, and indeed for the whole structure of the letters to be similar. It is natural also for an author to come close to repeating himself when he is writing on the same subject twice within a matter of weeks or even months.39 But the suggested parallels do not cover more than about one-third of the letters, which is strange in deliberate imitation. And even so, more or less identical language is used in different ways. For example, there are marked resemblances between the ways in which Paul describes hard manual labor in the two letters. But in the first he does it to show his love for his converts, while in the second it is to bring out the force of his example. This kind of thing is more likely to be due to a writer's free handling of familiar expressions than to slavish imitation by a forger.40 There is, moreover, the point that the resemblances are to 1 Thessalonians. Why should a later imitator confine himself to this one letter and not make use of Paul's major writings?
The differences are no more conclusive. Thus Paul's comments on the Man of Sin (or Lawlessness) in the second letter are different from anything he has to say in the first. But the difference does not amount to an incompatibility. It is no more than a person might add as a supplement to what he has already said on the subject. It is the same with other differences that are brought forward.
This combination of likeness and difference is interesting, and there may be more to it than appears at present, but the point is that it does not prove difference of authorship. Such a man as Paul was quite capable of both.
2. The eschatology of 2 Thessalonians is said to be different from that in the first letter.41 The simplest way of putting this is to say that in the First Epistle the coming of the Lord is thought of as about to take place very soon and very suddenly. But in the Second it will be preceded by signs, like the great rebellion and the appearance of the Man of Lawlessness.
But to state this objection is virtually to refute it, for it is a commonplace in apocalyptic literature that the Lord's coming is to be sudden, and yet that it will be preceded by signs. We find this in the Gospels and Revelation, to name no other. It should also not be overlooked that Paul's warning not to be unprepared when the day comes (1 Thess. 5:1-6) may well imply a knowledge of premonitory signs.
A similar objection is that the people to whom 2 Thessalonians was written obviously knew a good deal about the Parousia, for even the teaching about the Man of Lawlessness is given them only by way of reminder, and not as communicating new information (2:5). Such people would scarcely be in ignorance of fundamental teaching on the subject (such as is given in 1 Thess. 4:13-17). But again the objection does not get us far. In the short time that he was in Thessalonica Paul could not give all the teaching on the second coming that he would have wished. Many matters were certainly left ungrasped by the Thessalonians. It is entirely natural that eager new converts should have fastened their attention on such an outstanding figure as the Man of Lawlesness without appreciating that some of their number would die before the great day. Indeed, they may well not have given this matter thought at all before the decease of some of their number forced it on their notice.
Other objections turn on the Man of Lawlessness. Thus some expositors urge that this figure does not appear elsewhere in Paul and argue that therefore we cannot accept the idea as Pauline. But once more we may remark that to say this is to refute it. We cannot dismiss an idea because Paul produces it once only. For that matter it does not occur elsewhere in the New Testament. But Paul had an eager, questing mind. He is more likely to have seized on the truth concerning this being than some at least of his contemporaries. There is no real objection here.
A variant of this objection dates the origin of the idea of the Man of Lawlessness too late to put it within the time of Paul. This objection maintains that the whole idea of the Man of Lawlessness is based on the Nero redivivus myth. After Nero's death in A.D. 68 a number of people appeared claiming to be that emperor come back to life again. They were discredited, but the idea persisted that one day Nero would return and put himself at the head of the forces of evil. The myth came to have a supernaturalistic tinge. Nero was held to be demonic as well as human. Now if the portrait of the Man of Lawlessness was drawn from this myth, then obviously Paul could not have drawn it. The idea did not gain currency until after his death. But the idea of the Antichrist is far older than the Nero redivivus myth, as Bousset, for example, has shown. It goes back long before the time of Paul, and there is no reason to hold that 2 Thessalonians 2 is based on the late myth. Consequently the objection falls to the ground.
There are thus several ways of putting the argument from eschatology, but none of them is decisive.42 The eschatological teachings in the two letters are not contradictory but complementary.
3. Some scholars think that a difference of authorship is indicated by the fact that, whereas 1 Thessalonians is warm and friendly in tone, 2 Thessalonians is cold and rather formal. But this difference is difficult to sustain. Frame points out that the vehement self-defense in the first letter accounts for a good deal of its warmth, and that if this were omitted the differences in tone "would not be perceptible."43 Again, the coldness alleged in the second letter is very largely due to a few expressions. Thus Paul says, "We ought always to thank God for you, brothers," and adds, "and rightly so" (2 Thess. 1:3). But this is probably to be understood as a protestation that his praise of them in the first letter was no more than was right (see the notes ad loc.). Again, the objection that we meet authoritative commands (2 Thess. 3:6 and elsewhere) overlooks the fact that throughout the whole section there is an undertone of genuine brotherly warmth. Paul is very concerned to bring back into full fellowship some whose conduct had raised a barrier. But he is just as loving as he is authoritative.
Thus while admittedly 2 Thessalonians is slightly cooler in tone than the first letter, it does not seem as though the difference amounts to much. Even if we were to grant all that the objectors put forward, it would still prove very little. Writers are not always in the same mood, and we have no reason for thinking of Paul as an exception. Moreover, as we saw in the opening section, there is good reason for thinking that when he wrote 1 Thessalonians Paul was experiencing a joyful reaction after a time of discouragement. It would not be surprising if a later letter failed to reproduce such a mood, especially if it revealed that some had failed to give heed to instructions given in that first letter. Moreover, we know that Paul was in a somewhat difficult situation when he wrote the second letter (see 2 Thess. 3:2).
Thus it does not seem as though any of the objections is compelling. There is none for which an answer does not lie ready to hand. As Luke T. Johnson puts it, "it is difficult to make that case [i.e., the case for inauthenticity] convincing."44 Other authors have also stressed the difficulties in the way of establishing inauthenticity. Holland Hendrix, for example, cites R. Jewett's view that, "While the likelihood of definitely proving the Pauline authorship of 2 Thessalonians remains at a modest level, the improbability of forgery is extremely high."45 Hendrix goes on to point to two difficulties Jewett has brought to light: "On the one hand, an adequate theory of inauthenticity must provide a likely occasion for the forgery. On the other, the explicit avowal of Paul's signature as a practice in all of his letters (2 Thess. 3:17) must be rendered comprehensible as an authenticating tactic on the forger's part."46 The positive evidence, taken with the difficulties in the way of inauthenticity, means that we should accept this epistle as an authentic writing of Paul.47