THESSALONIANS, EPISTLES I-II to. — The first two letters written by St. Paul, in 50-51 AD, from Corinth, within a few months of each other.
I. E. A. T. —
I. Occasion
At the beginning of the second apostolic journey, in the early months of 50 AD, St. Paul, after evangelizing Philippi (Acts 16) and encountering, as usual, opposition from the Jews who brought upon him “sufferings and insults” (1 Thess. 2:2), proceeded with Silas (Acts 16:25–17:4) toward Thessaly.He passed through Amphipolis (v.), APOLLONIO (v.) and stopped at Thessalonica (150 km from Philippi), where there was a synagogue of Jews. To these, for three Sabbaths, he expounded the Holy Scriptures, demonstrating the messiahship of Jesus; some of them believed and joined Paul and Silas; there also adhered “a great number of proselytes and Greeks and not a few women of the first families” (Acts 17:4). This enraged the Jews, who stirred up the riffraff, hired the idlers of the market and squares, and set the city in an uproar; to rid themselves of Paul and Silas in short order, they surrounded the house where they were staying, but these had fled by night to Berea, a nearby town, in order to keep close watch on the development of the new community of Thessalonians; but the Jews also in Berea incited the crowd against Paul, who, having left his collaborators behind, had to depart for Athens (Acts 17:1–15). 1 Thessalonians alludes to external trials, sufferings and insults that Paul and the converts endured in Thessalonica, persecutions that continued unabated (2:2–20); and Paul, anxious, unable to return, sends
THESSALONIANS, EPISTLES II — Explicit of 1 Thessalonians and incipit of 2 Thessalonians. Bible of Borso d’Este, illuminated between 1435 and 1461, vol. II, fol. 207 — Modena, Biblioteca Estense.
his beloved Timothy to confirm and encourage the Christians in their faith (3:2–8; cf. also 2 Thess. 1:4–6). Having driven the Apostle out after barely three weeks, without allowing him to complete his instruction on the truths of Christianity (1 Thess. 3:10), the Jews now hope to erase every trace of his work; they resort to violence and slander; they portray Paul as a charlatan, vain and cowardly, who abandoned those who had believed in him. St. Paul learns of this from Timothy, who, however, brings encouraging news about the steadfastness of the converts. This report was the proximate occasion for 1 Thessalonians.
2. Content
After the greeting, which is a wish and a blessing (1:1), St. Paul defends the honor of his ministry with pride, as in Galatians and 2 Corinthians. The faithful of Thessalonica remain devoted (3:6 ff.) to Paul, who interweaves the greatest praise for them with the richest affirmations in his own defense. Against those who would paint him as a charlatan, he recalls (1:5) the miracles, the manifest signs of the Holy Spirit that accompanied his preaching (cf. 2:2) and the great result achieved (1:6–9). Paul has always acted with a view to fulfilling only the will of God amid constant sufferings and humiliations (2:1–6); his disinterestedness is such that, though having a right to support from the faithful, he has always wanted to provide for himself and his collaborators through manual labor (2:7), driven to this by a supernatural motive (cf. 1 Cor. 9:7–18), not by distrust of his faithful, whom he loves as a nurse, a father (2:8–11). It is not true that he fled thinking of himself and abandoning others to their fate (2:13; 3:1–13); he attempted twice to return to them, but Satan hindered him; he therefore sent Timothy, who on his return brings the best news: the Apostle feels revived and gives thanks to God, invoking His graces upon the faithful (3:8–13). Here ends the main and unified part of the letter (chaps. 1–3). Chaps. 4–5 contain various practical exhortations, brief and very brief, which follow one another without forming an organic whole: they should remain pure (4:1–8); advance in love (4:9–12); temper external expressions of mourning, giving the Gentiles, who have no hope, a demonstration of their faith in the future resurrection with the reunion in Christ of those whom death had separated (4:13–18); await with fervor the fulfillment of God’s promise regarding the triumph of the Kingdom of God, preparing for it through prayer and holiness of life (5:1–12); respect and love the leaders of the community, correct the idle and those in need of admonishment, always rejoicing in the Lord and grateful to God, persevere in prayer, welcome the gifts of the Holy Spirit and flee from all evil (5:16–22). Paul concludes by invoking every grace of the Lord for the faithful and sending them his greeting (5:23–28).3. The “consolation” concerning the dead
The text of the third exhortation (4:13–18) is as follows: “We do not want you to be ignorant, brothers, concerning those who are asleep (“have fallen asleep”), so that you may not grieve as the others (the pagans) who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, we must also believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in Him. This is what we declare to you by the word of the Lord: We, the living, the survivors, will not precede those who have fallen asleep at the coming of the Lord (we will all go to meet the Lord when He comes, both we and those whom we now mourn as dead). For the Lord Himself, at the command, at the voice of the archangel, at the sound of the trumpet of God, will descend from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first; then we, the living survivors, together with them (the dead in the flesh whom we now mourn) will be caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore console one another with these words.” This translation, especially for the phrase “We, the living, the survivors, will not precede those who have fallen asleep when the Lord comes,” which excludes in Paul, as in his faithful, the error of any fanciful expectation of the imminent return of Christ and the end of the world, and thus of the exemption from death of supposed survivors at the parousia (v.) of the Lord (in stark contrast to what Paul explicitly and repeatedly teaches about the universality of death and his certainty and desire to die in order to be with Christ), has been established on solid lexicographical and syntactical grounds by A. Romeo (Nos qui vivimus, qui residui sumus, in Verbum Domini, 9 [1929], pp. 307–12; 339–47; 360–64) and accepted by K. Staab in his recent commentary (1950) as the only one consonant with the text, the context and all of Paul’s teaching. To explain, as many still do, “we who are left until the parousia of the Lord,” and to hold that “the principal aim (of St. Paul in this letter) is revealed, namely to correct the error of the neophytes regarding the disadvantages of the dead at the moment of the parousia, thought to be imminent, and to connect this error with the idleness of some” (D. Buzy and others), is to base a fantastic reconstruction on a false premise. In reality the verb “leipo” (“to be left, to survive”) is never constructed with “en” and the accusative; it never refers to the future; whereas the verb “phthano” (Grimme, Zorell: “nequaquam ante illos aut sine illis ad gloriam perveniemus”) in later Greek authors is always constructed with “en” and the accusative; and this is the usage of St. Paul in the other two instances where he employs it (Rom. 9:31; Phil. 3:16), always placing “en” and the accusative before the verb “phthano.” The two participles (the living, the survivors), with the article, are equivalent to two relative clauses; and they must be detached from the future verb, contrary to what would be translated: “We will not be the first to live” (cf. Plato, Euthydemus, II, beginning; Curtius, § 391), which would be nonsense.Nor can it be affirmed that six verses (4:13–18), set among other exhortations, constitute the principal aim of the epistle, which here treats of an excessive display of mourning; the Apostle explicitly states that he writes to the faithful “so that they may not grieve as do the pagans, who have no hope” (v. 13), and to “console them” (vv. 13, 18): it is a secondary theme concerning practical life, and not an “error” or new doctrine (Vosté, Buzy, Amiot, etc.). There is no trace in St Paul or elsewhere in the New Testament of any alleged “advantages” or “disadvantages” regarding the final coming of Christ; nor can the nature or motives of the supposed “error” be discerned. Finally, it is arbitrary to connect the most natural exhortation against the idle—one that recurs, for example, in Eph 4:28; 1 Tim 5:13—“We exhort you, brethren, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, etc.” (1 Thess 5:14; cf. 4:11 f.)—with the alleged expectation of an imminent end. St Paul will repeat this with vigour in 2 Thess 3:6–12: “If anyone will not work, let him not eat.” At Thessalonica there must have been many idlers (cf. Acts 17:5), and some had insinuated themselves among the faithful, perhaps exploiting the generous charity of the good converts, which Paul praises (2 Thess 1:3). Not a single word in either epistle can give rise to the suspicion that anyone refrained from work for a theoretical error, and precisely in expectation of the parousia.
St Paul heartens the faithful with the promise of the triumph of the kingdom of God and their liberation from the hated persecution (events for which they must prepare worthily, V. 11 ff.), and with the threat of merited chastisement for the Jews (1:3–10).
This is the theme treated in 1 Thess 5:1–11, now re-examined: it suffices to compare 2 Thess 1:7, 10; Matt 24:30 ff.; Luke 21:28, 31 (F. Spadafora, *La fine di Gerusalemme*, Rovigo 1951, pp. 93–108). The following correction concerns a particular aspect of the above theme: the continued observation of the literal parallel between 2 Thess 2:1 ff. and Matt 24:31, 6, 4 etc. (Rinaldi [V. BIBLICA.], p. 141). “We ask you, brethren, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ (= Matt 24:3; Mark 13:4; Luke 21:7; the ‘day of the Lord’ of 1 Thess 5:1–11 = the destruction of Jerusalem) and our gathering to Him (= Matt 24:31; cf. Luke 21:28, 31; it is the ‘triumphal expansion of the Gospel, of the messianic kingdom, following the ruin of Jerusalem’: M.-J. Lagrange; F. Spadafora, op. cit., pp. 97 ff.), not to be so shaken (= Matt 24:6) as though the day of the Lord were imminent. Let no one deceive you (= Matt 24:4 ff.); do not be misled. The Apostle has given them unmistakable signs by which it will be manifest that it is near: he recalls these to their memory (2 Thess 2:1–17). There follow a general admonition, which is also a prayer of Paul (3:1–5); a vigorous rebuke for those who continue to live at others’ expense (3:6–15); and the final wish and greeting (3:16–19).
The signs: “That day will not come unless the rebellion comes first (Matt 24:6–13; cf. 23:16, 19; Mark 13:11 ff.; especially Luke 18:8—these refer to the defections that occurred in the Church of Palestine: Heb 6:4 ff.; 10:26–38; cf. Matt 24:13; Luke 21:19; Heb 10:36) and the lawless one is revealed, the accursed, the adversary (or the antichrist): cf. 1 John 2:18–22—it is the synagogue in a collective sense, the Zealots, their leaders, or in particular one of these, he who opposes God and exalts himself” (phrases taken from Dan 11:36; cf. 8:10 ff., spoken of the persecutor Antiochus IV Epiphanes, profaner of the Temple) “and who will rise up and exalt himself above every god...” until he takes his seat in the Temple of God and proclaims himself God. In reality, the Zealots and their leaders did take their seat in the Temple, which they profaned (Flavius Josephus, *Bell. Jud.*, V, 1, 3, 13). This is the pre-eminent, final sign given by Jesus for the “beginning of the tribulation” (the siege) and the destruction of Jerusalem (Matt 24:15; Mark 13:14: “when you see the abomination of desolation (Dan 9:17; 12:11) standing in the holy place”). The abomination of desolation will be where it ought not to be (Mark); more precisely, in the holy place (Matt), that is, in the Temple (Dan.). It will be the profanation of the Temple, which occurred in AD 68, two years before the ruin of Jerusalem (Flavius Josephus, *Bell. Jud.*, IV, 5, 1; 5, 3); the profanation of the Temple by Antiochus Epiphanes, which must be reproduced on the eve of the desolation foretold by Daniel. In AD 68, when John of Gischala took possession of the sanctuary to make it his stronghold, human blood flowed in streams in the holy place; two high priests and a multitude of noble victims fell beneath the Zealots’ daggers. This profanation was the presage of the imminent ruin. St Luke substituted for this sign one more intelligible to his readers: “When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies...” In AD 69 the Roman legions occupied Hebron, Emmaus, Bethel, and Jericho; the iron ring closed around the capital (F. Prat, *Jésus-Christ*, II, Paris 1933, p. 247; S. Van Dodewaard, in *Studia catholica*, 20 [1944], pp. 125–35). “Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things? And you know what is now restraining him (τὸ κατέχον ‘what holds back’), so that he may be revealed only in his appointed time; for the mystery of lawlessness is already at work, only there is one who now restrains it, until he is taken out of the way. Then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will slay with the breath of his mouth and bring to nought by the manifestation of his coming. The coming of the lawless one by the activity of Satan will be with all power and with pretended signs and wonders, to deceive those who are to perish, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved.”
“It must be admitted with certainty that Jesus (Mt 24; Mk 13:22) and Paul (2 Thess 2:1–12) speak of the same event and that the prophecy of Jesus is the source of Paul’s doctrine” (K. Staab [V. BIBLICA.], p. 41). The “mystery of iniquity,” already at work, is the violent persecution of the Jews, of which the Apostle speaks in both letters. The keystone for the exegesis of the pericope and of the theme under discussion is the identification of the power (τὸ κατέχον, neuter) and of the person (ὁ κατέχων, masculine participle) that prevents the full manifestation of this iniquitous fury. “The neuter of V. 6 expresses an impersonal function of the obstacle, the masculine of V. 7 the personal agent of this same function... It must be recognized that the only explanation that accounts for the shift from neuter to masculine is the oldest and most common one, from the Fathers of the Church to modern scholars, despite the different ways in which it is understood: the neuter indicates the Roman Empire, Roman authority; the masculine, its representative in Palestine (others, the emperor, with variations in the identification). Hugo Grotius proposed, with good reason, the name of the governor Vitellius” (O. Cullmann [V. BIBLICA.], pp. 212 ff.). Fr. Vostè described this explanation as “traditional” and almost “apostolic.”
The objection repeatedly raised (Cullmann, Buzy, etc.) against it—that the Roman Empire has fallen and the Antichrist has not come with the end of the world—vanishes when, instead of projecting this pericope prematurely onto the end of the world, the terms are explained in their true sense and in the light of Mt 24 and Lk 21 from which they are drawn, and when the fulfillment of this prophecy is viewed realistically. The Jews are restrained in their hatred of the nascent Church by Roman authority. They stage a popular uprising to kill St Stephen without authorization (Acts 7:57–60); only the providential intervention of a tribune rescues Paul from their hands as they drag him from the sacred precincts to kill him (Acts 21:27–34), and the tribune must send him under escort to Caesarea to foil the plot to murder him (Acts 23:12–35). Under Herod Agrippa (Acts 12) James is killed, and Peter would have suffered the same fate. When, however, Judaea returned to Roman procurators (AD 42–62: from Agrippa’s persecution to the death of James “the brother of the Lord”), the Church enjoyed peace. “This twenty-year truce is undoubtedly brought about by the Roman administration, which resumed control of Judaea...” (G. Lebreton, in Fliche–Martin–Frutaz, I [1937], p. 209). “In AD 61 and 62, the high priest Ananus (Hanan) the Younger, taking advantage of the interval between the death of Festus and the arrival of his successor Albinus, convened the Sanhedrin and had James, the brother of Jesus, and several others brought before it on charges of violating the law, and he had them stoned to death” (Flavius Josephus, Antiquitates Judaicae, XX, 9, 1).
The hatred will break out violently when this authority, in its representative, is removed by the rebellion of the Zealots against the Romans; they drove out Gesius Florus (in mid-AD 66) and defeated the legate of Syria, Cestius Gallus (early November AD 66), who had intervened with an army. For the signs and wonders etc. on the part of the impious, cf. Mt 24:23 ff.; Mk 13:21 ff. (Flavius Josephus, Bellum Judaicum, VI, 5).
Jesus had told the Jews that, by rejecting his word, they would welcome any other pseudo-messiah (Jn 5:43); this was now coming to pass, and the Jews (2 Thess 2:12), “who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord,” will incur the dreadful punishment (ibid. 1:7–9). To Christians, on the other hand, is promised the marvelous expansion of the Church in connection with the destruction of Jerusalem (Lk 21:28–31; 2 Thess 2:17: cf. A. Harnack, Missione e propagazione del cristianesimo nei primi tre secoli, Italian trans., Turin 1906, pp. 41 ff.).
At Thessalonica, in the face of violent Jewish persecution, St Paul communicated this prophecy, following the example of Jesus, who after foretelling sufferings and persecutions to his followers had added the promise of the Church’s triumph. St Paul knew from apostolic catechesis that the destruction of Jerusalem would occur before the generation contemporary with the Redeemer passed away (Mt 24:34 and parallels), but he did not know the precise date, which the Lord had kept secret (Mt 24:36; Mk 13:32). About twenty years had passed (from AD 30 to about AD 51), and Paul considered it already imminent (1 Thess 1:10; 2:16; cf. 5:1–11). There is no cause for surprise or error (no new doctrine) if, under the lash of persecution, the faithful were to believe it even more imminent. Yet St Paul had also communicated to them the signs that would precede it, and among these the immediate and unmistakable sign of rebellion against Rome and the profanation of the Temple. They were therefore not to indulge in idle expectations or nurture illusions that might prove dangerous. This explains why St Paul does not return to this topic in his other letters (Galatians, Corinthians, Romans, etc.); it was a matter of circumstance. He does, however, return to it in Hebrews with fairly clear allusions.
The literal-historical interpretation, which excludes any reference to the end of the world, is the only plausible one and makes sense of the text and its context (cf. L. Tondelli, Gesù Cristo, Turin 1936, pp. 388–399). It suffices to consider the futility of attempts to explain 2 Thess 2 in terms of the end of the world (Buzy [V. BIBLICA.], pp. 182 ff.), so that many modern scholars (B. Rigaux [V. BIBLICA.], pp. 306 ff.; G. Ricciotti; etc.), following St Augustine (De civitate Dei, XX, 19), affirm that it is impossible to determine the nature of the obstacle and therefore the precise meaning of the pericope.
Among the most recent exegetical attempts, one currently favored among Catholics (Allo, Buzy, Amiot) holds that, by bringing 2 Thess 2:1–11 close to Rev 11, the struggle of the beast against the two witnesses provides a clarifying analogy for our pericope: the witnesses (who fight against the forces of evil and are slain by the beast) would correspond exactly to the obstacle preventing the manifestation of the adversary, who would have free rein only once the obstacle is removed. Yet even Amiot must admit ([V. BIBLICA.], pp. 277ff.) that the temporary disappearance of the Gospel preachers remains a mystery, and that Jesus assured His protection until the end of the earthly phase of the Kingdom of God (Mt 28:20). What matters most, however, is that it is erroneous to adduce Revelation here, a later work of a quite different literary genre. The seer of Patmos depicts the continuous struggle of Satan against the Kingdom of God throughout its entire development, from the Incarnation of the Word until the close of the earthly phase of the Kingdom of God. The pericope of the two witnesses is now rightly understood as referring to the martyrdom of Saints Peter and Paul in Rome under Nero. Satan triumphs through his satellites, but the true victors are the martyrs; the persecution has passed, Nero has been killed, yet the Church endures, purified and triumphant (Rev 11:3–13; cf. J. Munck, Tertius una Paulus in der Glaubenslehre des Johannes, Copenhagen 1950, reviewed in Revue biblique 58 [1951], pp. 627ff.; P. Boismard, L’Apocalypse ou les apocalypses de St Jean, ibid. 56 [1949], pp. 533ff., 540; and already J. Mariana, 1619).
Nor need one emphasize that the signs mentioned by Saint Paul had to be clear, unmistakable events that would occur at that time. In other explanations, by contrast, one remains in the greatest indeterminacy: the signs would be generic and therefore useless. To admit, moreover, that Paul held an erroneous opinion about the nearness of the end contradicts the historical and circumstantial context of both Thessalonians. The explanation of Jesus’ discourse on the end of Jerusalem (Lk 17:20–18:8; Mt 24; Mk 13; Lk 21), which excludes any reference to the end of the world, has finally opened the way to a correct understanding of 2 Thess 1–2 in close connection with 1 Thessalonians (especially 5:1–11); in both Thessalonians, the solemn prophecy of Jesus resounds.