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corpus-paul - Re: Pauline authorship of the Pastorals - additional comments

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  • From: "David C. Hindley" <DHindley AT compuserve.com>
  • To: corpus-paul
  • Subject: Re: Pauline authorship of the Pastorals - additional comments
  • Date: Sun, 2 May 1999 13:31:44


Jack Kilmon posted:

>>In 1 Timothy "Paul" speaks
of himself as free and traveling. The situation in 1 Tim cannot
fit into any of the time periods in Acts and Acts ends in 64.<<

And true this is! Of course, this is one of the reasons that Acts' value as
an historical account has at times been questioned.

But, instead of supposing an unrecorded period of freedom following the
imprisonment recorded in Acts, it could also be assumed that Acts is
actually an arbitrary reconstruction that may, or may not, be closely
related to the events related in the epistles. If so, then the events in
the epistles can be reconstructed in a much different order, and even cover
a broader range of dates than Acts would allow.

Such alternative dating schemes have been advocated by Knox, Buck & Taylor,
Ludemann, Jewett, Murphy-O'Connor and Donfried, according to Raymond Brown
(in his _Introduction to the New Testament_), but I have to confess that I
have not yet reviewed any of thesae author's works on this subject. It
looks as though at least some of these have interpreted the evidence in the
epistles against the account in Acts, with added assumptions related to the
date of Jesus' death.

My own hang-up on dating is due to 2 Thess 2:3-8a, which to me seems to be
an unquestionable reference to Gaius' attempt to erect his statue in the
temple, and the mediation of Petronius. However, the date would then be
about 42 CE, a decade earlier than is usually assigned to this epistle. On
the other hand, 1 Cor 11:1-15 appears (to me, anyways) to be an oblique
(and reworked?) reference to the shaving of the head of Queen Helen of
Adiabene after the completion of her first Nazarite vow around 52 CE.

If these relative datings are correct (and I am not saying catagorically
that they are), then the chronology of Acts can be excusably disregarded to
some extent. This would leave open the possibility that the pastorals were
authentic, and written be earlier than the dogmatic epistles. But the
composotion of the latter are another matter that would complicate the
whole investigation of relative date.

Dave Hindley, BA
Cleveland, OH, USA
Dhindley AT compuserve.com




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