Thessalonians, THE EPISTLES TO THE. The first epistle to the Thessalonians, the earliest extant epistle of the apostle Paul, was written at Corinth, probably about the beginning of the year 53 A.D., or, at latest, in 54 A.D., within a year and a half of the founding of the church at Thessalonica under the circumstances related in Acts, xvii. 1-10. Some time after leaving Thessalonica, the apostle had heard of 'sufferings' to which his converts there had been subjected by their unbelieving fellow-countrymen (1 Thess. ii. 14; iii. 2-4), and there was some cause for fear lest 'the tempter' had 'tempted' them from their faith (iii. 5). He accordingly sent Timothy from Athens to learn further about their state, and to 'establish' and 'comfort' them (iii. 2, 5). Timothy brought back to the apostle, now in Corinth, a fairly satisfactory account of their faith and loyalty, but mentioned some matters of Christian doctrine and life in which they were deficient; hence the epistle. Of the two parts of which it is composed the first is mainly personal and explanatory (i.-iii.), and the second ethical and doctrinal (iv. v.), warning in particular against sins of impurity, perhaps also of commercial greed (iv. 6), and still more specially against a tendency of the Thessalonians towards pious idleness in view of Christ's imminent second coming and towards a hopeless sorrow on account of those of their number who had already died. With regard to the second coming, the apostle's own doctrine is that it may be expected at any time, and that diligence and watchfulness are therefore necessary; and he clearly anticipated that at latest it would take place before the generation then living had wholly passed away. Baur, who was the first to deny the genuineness of this epistle, has not been followed in this by the more recent representatives of the Tübingen school.
See the commentaries of Jowett, Ellicott, Lunemann (in Meyer), and Schmiedel (in Holtzmann's Hand-commentar); P. Schmidt, Der erste Thessalonicherbrief (1885); and the New Testament Introductions of Bleek, Hilgenfeld, Reuss, Holtzmann, and Weiss.
The second epistle consists of three parts. The first part is introductory, and mainly an expression of the writer's thankfulness for the steadfastness the Thessalonians have displayed under continued persecution (i. 1-12). The second part (ii. 1-12) is eschatological, and warns the readers against supposing 'that the day of the Lord is now present' (so R.V.; A.V. has 'at hand'). On the contrary, it will not be except the falling away ('the apostasy') come first, and the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition, he that opposeth and exalteth himself against all that is called God or that is worshipped; so that he sitteth in the temple of God, setting himself forth as God. This mystery of lawlessness is already at work, only there is one that restraineth. When this restraining presence or influence shall be taken out of the way, then shall be revealed the lawless one, whom the Lord Jesus shall slay with the breath of His mouth, and bring to nought by the manifestation of His coming. The coming of the lawless one is to be according to the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders and with all deceit of unrighteousness. The third and concluding part of the epistle (ii. 13-iii. 18) is of a practical nature, and substantially repeats the exhortations of 1 Thessalonians. The genuineness of this epistle was first doubted by J. E. Ch. Schmidt (1801); the volume of opinion in this sense has steadily increased since then, and is now very great. The argument turns chiefly upon ii. 1-12; in the rest of the epistle there is nothing that can be called un-Pauline, and the question of its absolute genuineness apart from these verses is comparatively unimportant. The difficulty about the eschatological passage in question is, in a word, that no traces of such a view occur in any other writing of the apostle Paul, whether prior or subsequent to the supposed date of 2 Thessalonians. Indeed the difficulty of reconciling it with the ordinary Pauline view is suggested by the passage itself: 'be not quickly shaken . . . by epistle as from us, as that the day of the Lord is close at hand' (enestêke); but this is practically the suggestion of 1 Thessalonians. It is impossible to fix with any accuracy the date of the verses in question. They are conceived in the spirit of a great deal of the apocalyptic that was current in Jewish (and in a less degree in Christian) circles during the last two centuries of Judaism; and, with certain modifications, the ideas admitted of application to a considerable variety of circumstances, now to those of the Jews under Caligula, now to those of the Jews or Christians under Nero. On the hypothesis of its genuineness, in whole or in part, 2 Thessalonians must have been written shortly after 1 Thessalonians and before the apostle's sojourn of eighteen months in Corinth had come to an end. Apart indeed from ii. 1-12, 2 Thessalonians may conceivably have been written before 1 Thessalonians, a view which has been argued for by Grotius amongst others.
The literature of the subject is the same as for 1 Thess. Add Weizsäcker, Apost. Zeitalter; Pfeiferer, Urchristentum; and the suggestive incidental discussion in Spitta, Offenbarung des Johannes (1889).