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  • From: rfellows AT intergate.ca
  • To: <corpus-paul AT franklin.metalab.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: Dating 1 Thessalonians


Karl Donfried wrote:

>You might also
>want to take a look at pp. 9ff in K. P. Donfried & I. Howard Marshall,
>THE THEOLOGY OF THE SHORTER PAULINE LETTERS, where the issue of the
>early dating of 1 Thessalonians is discussed.

Karl,

in your "THE THEOLOGY OF THE SHORTER PAULINE LETTERS" you write, "there is
little doubt that Paul made one of his visits to Corinth at the time that
Gallio was proconsul of the province of Achaia". I agree. However, whereas
Luke and I place the Gallio incident in Paul's first visit to Corinth, you
place it in a supposed second visit before 1 Corinthians, and John Hurd
places it in Paul's third and final visit to Corinth just before his final
visit to Jerusalem. Which visit is more likely?

Karl's theory is countered by Hurd's observation that Paul is unlikely to
have made a second visit to Corinth before 1 Corinthians (see "The Origin of
1 Corinthians" p56). John's theory, conversely, is undermined by Donfried and
Jewett, who support a later date for Paul's final visit to Corinth. Donfried
(A Short Note on Romans 16, JBL LXXXIX, Dec 1970) shows that Paul's last
visit to Achaia belongs after the death of Claudius, which is too late for
the Gallio incident. This is confirmed by Jewett's dating of the Egyptian
rebel (Acts 21:38) to 56 or 57. Also, placing the Gallio incident after 1 Cor
1:1 makes the movements of Sosthenese difficult to explain.

Thus, Hurd's theory that the Gallio incident belongs after 1 Corinthians is
successfully countered by Donfried's chronological observation. At the same
time, Donfried's idea of placing the incident in Paul's second visit to
Corinth before 1 Corinthians is successfully countered by Hurd's observation
that Paul probably made no such visit.

We should therefore place Gallio in Paul's first visit to Corinth. This is,
in any case, most likely because Acts places it there, and because it was, by
all accounts, the longest visit, and because the Gallio incident cannot be
extracted from the rest of the Corinth narative.

Donfried and Hurd must assume that Acts 18:1-17 is compositional in
character, but I just don't see it. Donfried writes "Acts 18 may well
conflate two or more Pauline visits to that city into one account. Among the
several factors pointing in this direction is the fact that in Acts 18:8
Crispus is the ruler of the synagogue and in 18:17 Sosthenes is the ruler of
the synagogue!". Donfried and Leudemann and others are right to point out the
problem of the two references to the synagogue ruler, but I think they have
found the wrong solution. The Crispus-Sosthenes hypothesis solves the problem
without us having to resort to improbable redaction theories. It seems to me
that the entire passage reads as an indivisible unity. The mention of Paul's
original accommodation with Prisca and Aquila is given as background to his
move to the house of Titius Justus, which is central to the whole passage,
because the location of that house, right next to the synagogue, is what the
Jews found so provocative. This, and the defections, led to the anger, which
led to the beating of Sosthenes. The passage is a unity. Without the Gallio
incident, Acts 18:1-8 is left dangling. And without Acts 18:1-8, the Gallio
incident has no background or explanation.

For all these reasons, it is time, I think, to finally abandon the idea of an
early absolute dating of 1 Thess. Paul's first visit to Achaia was in 51-52.

Richard Fellows.



  • Re: Dating 1 Thessalonians, rfellows, 05/02/2002

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