THESSALONIC LETTER

 

THESSALONIC LETTERS

Paul visited this city on his second mission with Silas and Timothy, this congregation has a pagan background who likes ritual and a sense of nationalism, until the gospel was preached to them, and many elites accepted this gospel message. The Thessalonians were written around AD 50-52 in Corinth.

 

1 Thessalonians

Apart from the news from Timothy that Paul received about the Thessalonian church, Paul wrote this letter also because he wanted to show his satisfaction with the progress of the church, as a fight against his opponents who accused him of seeking profit and being cowardly, encouraging the congregation to persevere in his faith, an explanation of the second coming of the Lord Jesus (parousia), exhorting the congregation to respect the leader, and concerning the manifestation of the Spirit (5:19-20). where the purpose of writing this letter is practical, and contains a direct message to fix the problems that exist in the congregation. Regarding the authenticity of this letter I Thessalonians, actually the existing evidence is very strong to prove that this letter was written by Paul. However, there are several theories that disagree with this, where they make an alleged gap between I Thessalonians and Acts which formulates that there is a different time gap in Acts 17:2 with I Thess. 2:7-11 if Paul wrote this Epistle. Then the composition of the congregation as seen in KPR 17 with 1 Thess. 1:9; 2:14; 4:1-5 there is no equivalence and seems to be a different story, but this theory can be refuted if you think that Paul wrote where he realized and emphasized his calling as an evangelist or Apostle to non-Jews while Luke as a mortgage writer focused on Jewish activities. It is also considered that many of the contents of the letter do not show the peculiarities of Paul's writing, there is also a theory that 1 Thessalonians consists of two letters and four letters put together.

 

Monday, April 29, 2019 at 20:13 – 20:55 WIB

 

2 Thessalonians

This letter has stronger evidence than 1 Thessalonians in its authenticity. But there are still theories from theologians who refute this, they are convinced by the eschatology of this letter, where it is assumed that some events that occurred after Paul did not exist. Then the differences in the expressions in 1 and 2 Thessalonians are raised as the reason for their authenticity, even though it is possible that when writing these two letters Paul wanted to convey a message according to the feelings he was experiencing and perhaps different problems. Also the problem is that from these two letters Paul seems to be sending to different readers (1 Thessalonians to Gentiles, 2 Thessalonians cannot be understood by Gentiles). And some theologians think that 2 Thessalonians was written by an imitator, but this can be rejected, because seen in chapter 33 verses 6-15 implicitly describe the close relationship between the author and the reader. 1 Thessalonians was written before 2 Thessalonians.

 

Saturday 4 May 2019, 15:35-17:12 WIB

 

LETTER OF RETURN

The Epistles of Timothy and Titus are mentioned and known as the Pastoral Epistles, they can also be mentioned as guides for pastoral theology, or rather as valuable guidance for church leaders.

 Authenticity of the Pastoral Epistles from the traditional view

From the traditional view the statements at the beginning of the Epistles are data that supports authenticity as internal evidence. External evidence is the similarity of language with Clement's letter to the Corinthian church being a very strong dedication, and in the Muratorian canon the Pastoral Letter was included in the corpus of Paul's Epistle. Although the above evidence is quite strong, there are still objections to claiming that this letter was not written by Paul, as historical, ecclesiastical, doctrinal and linguistic issues are raised as very strong evidence to refute the authenticity of this letter. It can be concluded from all of that theologians who reject Paul's authorship, argue that there are stories and events that are not in sync with the Acts of the Apostles with the contents of this Epistle, and it is seen that the writing of this Epistle does not show the peculiarities of Paul's writing style.

Although the explanations are so complex and difficult to refute (with alternative theories), so to assume with the traditional view that these letters are genuine. And if it is true that this letter was not his work, it could be assumed that Titus and Timothy edited Paul's material after his death and produced the Pastoral Epistles in their present form. It can also be assumed that Luke wrote this letter, because of its stylistic and linguistic uniqueness the Pastoral Epistles have similarities to Luke's writings. And the theory that has been accepted or has been accepted until now is the theory that some of the material has been not to Timothy and Titus, so editing is only limited to language and maybe some concepts.

 

Thursday 09 May 2019 22:03-22:29 WIB

 

Purpose of Writing Pastoral Letters

In 1 Timothy and Titus, Paul gives advice on the church's ordinances to these two people in their responsibilities as temporary church leaders. To Titus, Paul wrote a message to meet him at Nicopolis, Titus had to help Zenas and Apollos on their way. Then for Timothy, Pulus tried to give encouragement and edification and guidance in organizing the congregation, because Timothy seemed to need encouragement to be stronger and firmer in preaching the gospel. In 2 Timothy, Paul emphasizes more for Timothy to focus on his work, warning Timothy about false teachers (Gnosticism). And this letter was written about 63-64 AD.

Berbagi :