Corpus-Paul

[kraft AT ccat.sas.upenn.edu (Robert Kraft)]

Two brief clarifications:

By "3 Corinthians" I mean that letter attributed to Paul in the Acts of
Paul, but also circulated separately, in which "Paul" answers queries sent
to him (also in an extant letter) from Corinth. My point is that at least
some of the criteria and caveats about judging authorship that have been
mentioned in this thread could be used to argue that "3 Cor" is also
authentic. It was in this sort of context that my plea for consistency was
presented -- I personally would not argue for Pauline authorship in any
direct sense for 2 Timothy or for 3 Corinthians, but if one is inclined to
accept the former, is it possible to draw the line to exclude the latter?
What constitutes convincing criteria?

On Pauline authorship of 1 Thessalonians, Frank Hughes knows the
literature much better than I do, and if he knows of no real challenges
since F.C.Baur (who had come to mind when I made the comment), I'm not in
a position to quibble. Glancing at my old notes on 1 Thess, articles by
K.G.Eckart (ZTK 58, 1961) and by W.Schmithals (Bultmann Festschrift 1964)
come into view, but I guess they are more oriented to questioning the
integrity of the present form of 1 Thess (fragment/interpolation type
theories) than to questioning authenticity as such. (I also thought
that the early Koester had doubts, but I don't find them reflected in his
1982 Introduction.) But I'd still hesitate to use 1 Thess as a firm basis
for establishing Pauline thought, relative to the big four!

Bob
-- 
Robert A. Kraft, Religious Studies, University of Pennsylvania
227 Logan Hall (Philadelphia PA 19104-6304); tel. 215 898-5827
kraft AT ccat.sas.upenn.edu
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/rs/rak/kraft.html