"THE SPIRIT": LEFT OUT AND THEN REINTRODUCED? A STUDY OF COLOSSIANS 3:16 AND EPHESIANS 5:18-19 IN THE CONTEXT OF THE AUTHORSHIP DEBATE (original) (raw)

By Command of God Our Savior: A Defense of the Pauline Authorship of the Pastoral Epistles

Diligence: Journal of the Liberty University Online Religion Capstone in Research and Scholarship, 2016

Unbelieving biblical scholars like Bart Ehrman leverage the science of historical criticism to cast doubt on the reliability of Scripture by calling into question the traditionally accepted authorship of biblical books. For example, Ehrman argues that the Pastoral Epistles—1 and 2 Timothy, and Titus—are pseudepigrapha, letters falsely attributed to Paul by anonymous authors, and he claims something of a scholarly consensus as support, even from among believing scholars. However, their conclusions by no means go unchallenged by defenders of Pauline authorship, and the debate rages on. This paper analyzes and compares evidence offered for and against Pauline authorship of the Pastoral Epistles, and concludes that the apostle Paul is likely to have written them.

David Liu - The Work of the Holy Spirit in the Church: A Study of Ephesians (pp. 74‐92)

Asian Journal of Pentecostal Studies and APTS Press, 2011

This article discusses the role of the Holy Spirit in building up the church and his functioning in biblical theology. Paul’s epistles are composed of two cognitive dimensions. The first half of each epistle is theoretical and theological whereas the second half discusses pragmatic and ethical issues. This character appears in Romans, Galatians and other prison epistles. In the case of Ephesians, chapters one to three are theological discourse and four to six discusses ethical issues.2 The logic behind this arrangement is that, theory is the foundation of praxis. Christians’ spiritual and ethical life should be built upon theology. If there are problems in theology, there will be problems in spiritual life. This article is to investigate the work of the Holy Spirit in the church by analyzing the lexical and grammatical meanings of some biblical terms in Greek. It is aimed to elaborate not only the external manifest power of the Holy Spirit in the life of the church (doing), but also the internal transformation deep inside our life (being).3

The Holy Spirit in the letters of Paul

2014

espanolLa meta de este articulo es investigar acerca del Espiritu Santo en los libros de Pablo y hablar de uno de los temas mas desafiantes de su pensamiento teologico. Algunos investigadores incluso dicen que la pneumatologia de Pablo debe ser considerada como el aspecto central de su teologia. El objetivo de este estudio preliminar solo es introducir este vasto tema acerca del uso de la palabra πνeῦμα en las epistolas de Pablo e interpretar tambien las afirmaciones teologicas mas relevantes sobre el Espiritu Santo. EnglishThis article aims to research about the Holy Spirit in the books of Paul, discussing one of the most challenging subjects of his theological thought. Some researchers even say that the pneumatology of Paul should be considered the central aspect of his theology. The objective of this preliminary study is only to introduce this vast theme about the use of the word πνeῦμα in the epistles of Paul and also to interpret the most relevant theological affirmations about...

An Exegetical and Intertextual Exploration of the Presence of the Spirit in Colossians

2018

Presented on Wednesday, November 14, 2018, during the 70th Annual Meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society and the 2018 Autumn Symposium of the Adventist Theological Society in Denver, CO. Many New Testament scholars have noted significant differences between the theology of the undisputed Pauline writings and that of Colossians. One of these differences is the abundance of pneumatology in the former and its apparent absence in the latter. Most scholars agree that pneumatology is a central theme for Paul, but some of them question its presence in Colossians and, therefore, challenge its claimed Pauline authorship (Col 1:1; 4:18). Other scholars see the presence of the Spirit permeating the content of this epistle in a way that corresponds with typical Pauline theology. This debate raises the question: if Colossians is assumed to be Pauline base on its internal claim, where is the Spirit? This study seeks to answer this question by conducting an exegetical and intertextual analysis of pneumatological language and concepts in Colossians and the undisputed (primarily) and disputed (secondarily) Pauline writings for the purpose of determining (1) the degree to which the Spirit is present in Colossians and (2) whether or not there is correspondence between the pneumatological content of the undisputed Pauline writings and that of Colossians. This analysis leads the study to conclude that, while pneumatology may be seen as featuring less prominently in Colossians when compared to the undisputed and disputed Pauline writings, it is not altogether absent from it. Rather the Spirit is present in four explicit (Col 1:8, 9; 2:5; 3:16) and several implicit references (of which only seven are discussed) that have deep linguistic and conceptual connections to the pneumatological content in the traditional Pauline corpus. The paper also offers some preliminary suggestions, that need further investigation, for why pneumatology may be less prominent in Colossians than in the rest of the Pauline literature.

Issues Concerning the Authorship of the Pastoral Epistles

This thesis (of which this excerpt is taken from) will explore the authorship, genre, and date of Paul’s Second Letter to Timothy. 2 Timothy, alongside 1 Timothy and Titus, constitute what scholars term the “Pastoral Epistles”. The Pastoral Epistles identify themselves to be from the hand Paul. However, since the early 19th century, a majority of scholars have questioned this claim and argued in favor of a pseudonymous author who wrote in Paul’s name after his death. Consequently, they are often dated sometime after the death of Paul (~62 CE) and taken to be a reflection of late 1st century/2nd century Christianity. The differences between the Pastorals and Paul’s other letters in areas such as vocabulary, style, and theology are often cited in backing up this claim. This thesis first surveys what scholarship has to say about these differences and possible solutions. Subsequently, the case will be made for 2 Timothy’s uniqueness amongst the “Pastoral Epistles” and why the Pastoral Epistles should be studied as three separate letters rather than as a group. The focus will then turn to the consequences of grouping 2 Timothy with 1 Timothy and Titus and what consequences reconsideration of 2 Timothy’s dating and genre can have for our understanding of its nature and provenance.

Insights from Barclay, Paul and the Gift, Applied to the Shorter Pauline Letters

Horizons in Biblical Theology, 2019

This orientation essay provides an overview of the four other articles in this special section on J. M. G. Barclay’s, Paul and the Gift (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2015). After introducing key ideas from Barclay’s work, which focuses on Paul’s letters to the Galatians and Romans, we summarize three studies in which scholars employ Barclay’s method to examine some of the shorter Pauline letters. Wendell L. Willis discusses Philippians; Jerry L. Sumney discusses 2 Thessalonians; and Margaret Y. MacDonald discusses Ephesians. This special section also includes Barclay’s responses to all three. In addition, we explain how this collection of essays originated in the work of the Disputed Paulines Section of the Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature.

Topic: An Exegesis on Ephesians 5:1-5

Churches in Ephesus and the surrounding region A.D.62 while imprisoned in Rome (Acts 28) .During this time he also wrote Colossians and Philemon. All three letters were sent with Tychicus and Onesimus. 2 There are two arguments advanced to cast doubt on the letter's authenticity, the First Historical Argument-concerns a discrepancy between the Acts account of Paul's longstanding and intimate acquaintance with the Ephesian Church and the entirely impersonal and 'hearsay' relationship which the letter expresses. 3 Apostle Paul had intimacy with the elders of Ephesian church, and it was found in Acts 19:1-20:1, 31.Second, Theological In Ephesians as distinct from the letters of unquestioned Pauline authorship, the role of Christ assumes a cosmic dimension that the sphere of interest is 'the heavenly places' (a unique expression occurring five items) in which the principalities and powers operate, that the focus of concern is the church, that 'justification' is not mentioned, that 'reconciliation' is more between Jews and Gentiles than between the sinner and God, that salvation is portrayed not as dying with Christ but only as rising with him, and that there is no reference to our Lord's second coming 4. Ephesians strongly influenced the thought in I Peter. Polycarp A.D.156 echoes both words and ideas from the epistle. Several apologists in the second century, and Marcion. The stormy petrel of the early church, used this letter. Irenaeus quoted the letter as Paul's, not in any disputatious way, but as something accepted by Christians. This letter as Paul's was included in the Muratorian Canon (c.200) and in all subsequent lists of the New Testament