Paul, the Pastoral Epistles, and the Early Church (Library of Pauline Studies)

James W. Aageson

• Publisher: Baker Academic
• Year: 2007
• Print ISBN:
  9780801045400
• eBook ISBN:
  9781441241665
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Studies

Paul's influence on the history of Christian life and theology is as profound as it is pervasive. A brief survey of almost twenty centuries of Christian thought and practice will confirm the enduring importance of Paul for the life of the church in the Roman and Protestant traditions of the West as well as the Orthodox traditions of the East. Even as Christianity, at the dawn of its third millennium, has become increasingly global and traditions have come to develop and intersect in new and complex ways, Paul's place in the story of Christianity remains deeply rooted in the church's theology, worship, and pastoral life. In both past and present, Paul's influence on the Christian church can hardly be overestimated.

Among the many intriguing issues generated by the historical Paul, his New Testament letters, and early church history is the question, what happened to Paul after Paul? Whether we think in terms of the reception of Paul's theology, or the ongoing legacy of Paul, or early Christian reinterpretation of his letters, the questions persist: what did the early church do with Paul's memory? How did it reshape his theology? And what role did his letters come to play in the life of the church?

The focus of the present discussion is in the early decades and centuries of Christianity, a time when the memory and legacy of Paul came to serve varied and often competing interests in the emerging church. It was a time when Paul's reputation and importance to the church were being reinforced and when his epistles were gaining the authority that would ensure their place in the sacred library of Christianity. It was also the time when the Jesus movement forged itself into Christianity, a process in which Paul played a pivotal role and eventually also became an object of revision and transformation himself. What is virtually indisputable in this process is that Paul, during his lifetime and after, played a critical role in making Christianity what it was to become.

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PAUL, THE PASTORAL EPISTLES, AND THE PAULINE LEGACY

INTRODUCTION

PAUL’S INFLUENCE on the history of Christian life and theology is as profound as it is pervasive. A brief survey of almost twenty centuries of Christian thought and practice will confirm the enduring importance of Paul for the life of the church in the Roman and Protestant traditions of the West, as well as the Orthodox traditions of the East. Even as Christianity, at the dawn of its third millennium, has become increasingly global and traditions have come to develop and intersect in new and complex ways, Paul’s place in the story of Christianity remains deeply rooted in the church’s theology, worship, and pastoral life. In both past and present, Paul’s influence on the Christian church can hardly be overestimated.

Among the many intriguing issues generated by the historical Paul, his New Testament letters, and early church history is the question, “What happened to Paul after Paul?” Whether we think in terms of the reception of Paul’s theology, or the ongoing legacy of Paul, or early Christian reinterpretation of his letters, a number of important questions persist. What did the early church do with Paul’s memory? How did it reshape his theology? What role did his letters come to play in the life of the church? This book focuses on how these issues played out in the early decades and centuries of Christianity, a time when the memory and legacy of Paul came to serve varied and often competing interests. It was a time when Paul’s reputation and his importance to the church were reinforced and when his epistles gained the authority that would ensure their place among the sacred texts of Christianity. It was also the time when the burgeoning Jesus movement forged itself into Christianity. In this process Paul played a pivotal role and eventually also became an object of revision and transformation himself. What is virtually indisputable is that Paul and his letters, during his lifetime and after, played a critical role in making Christianity what it was to become.

If the image of Paul and the theology of his letters were thoroughly interwoven in the early church, as they undoubtedly were, the adaptation of Paul and his words by the early Christians was more than an issue of simple textual reinterpretation. It was also a matter of an evolving Pauline image merging with the developing concerns of the day, where the words and ideas of the apostle came to bear on the circumstances and conflicts of the church. Paul’s personal authority continued to inform this process and his legacy endured through the ongoing reinterpretation of his letters. All the while, the Christian church continued to grow in size, develop as an institution, and mature theologically.

THE PASTORALS AND PAUL’S LEGACY

The Pastoral Epistles and the images of Paul represented in them have an important place in the symbolic and ecclesiological matrix of early Pauline tradition. They also contributed in significant ways to the development of this tradition. Contrary to the position taken by some scholars, the developing mainstream of Christianity did not reject Paul.[1] Rather, the re-imaging of the apostle Paul and the echoes of his theology over the early decades and centuries of Christianity illustrate the church’s complex, and most often conflicted, development as a diverse social and religious movement. From the early attempts to define Christian orthodoxy, to Marcionites and gnostics, and on to the countercultural movements of early Christian women and martyrs reflected in the Acts of Paul and Thecla, the apostle was valorized as an authority figure and wonder-worker. His letters were cited and alluded to, and his legacy often burst forth in new and unanticipated ways. The reception of Paul and his letters in the church was exceedingly complex, diverse, and uneven. There is rarely a straight-line to be drawn in this history. The Pastorals represent only one part of this complex Pauline tale, and it is this aspect of the story, to the middle of the third century when the church began to confront a new set of troubling issues, that is the focus of the discussion that follows.

In the case of the Pastoral Epistles, we are able to see how one part of the early church responded to the problem of incorrect belief and practice (heterodoxy and heteropraxy), to the church’s relationship with Jews and the Jewish law, and to what some saw as a problematic form of Christian asceticism. Already in 1 Timothy and Titus we see an emerging sense of church order expressed in the writer’s concern for the qualities appropriate for overseers, deacons, and elders, identified as leaders in the church. In 2 Timothy we can hear the call for Timothy to suffer as Paul has suffered, a message sure to resonate among those in the early church who would be called upon to suffer for their faith in Christ. Confronted with disunity that threatened to tear the church apart, the Pastorals reflect an effort to unite the church in the face of both internal and external threats.

Despite the absence of the Pastorals from 𝔓46 and Codex Vaticanus in the manuscript tradition, we are able to detect in these three letters a sense of the Pauline writings as Scripture, perhaps even the early functioning of a Pauline canon.[2] Even more to the point, the plea to Timothy to guard the “good deposit” foreshadows the church’s debates about the relationship between Scripture and tradition and also the role of the church, represented by its bishops and theologians, as the bearer and protector of the truth. In retrospect, we can see that the Pastorals reflect many of the issues that would confront the church in the early centuries: the character of the truth and true faith, the relationship of Christians to Jews and things Jewish, Christian asceticism, the threat of disunity, the formation and functioning of a canon, the balance between Scripture and tradition, the place of women, and the role of the church represented by episcopal hierarchy in preserving the faith and practice of the true church. As we look at the Pastoral letters in relation to this development of the church more broadly, we are able to see quite clearly how the figure of Paul served to confront crucial issues of the emerging church with the apostolic authority that had accrued to him and his teaching.

SCHOLARSHIP: PAUL AND THE PASTORALS

It will be helpful to identify a number of the important areas of scholarship related to the Pastorals and the development of early Pauline tradition. The intent here is not to provide an exhaustive treatment of scholarship on the Pastorals but rather to provide a sketch of the scholarship important for the arguments developed later in the book.

The Pastorals and Pauline Authorship

In addition to the large body of commentary literature on the Pastoral Epistles, there are numerous monographs that focus primarily on exegetical aspects of these three letters, their place in the scope of Pauline theology and tradition, and their role as pseudepigraphic documents.[3] For example, Lewis Donelson has focused explicitly on the character of pseudepigraphy and ethical argument in the Pastoral Epistles.[4] Margaret Y. MacDonald has looked at the institutionalization of the Pauline writings from a sociohistorical point of view,[5] whereas Frances Young has focused exclusively on the theology of the Pastoral Epistles.[6] James D. Miller has recently revived a version of the composite document theory of the Pastorals,[7] while Luke Timothy Johnson has challenged many of the traditional assumptions used to argue against Pauline authorship.[8] Still others have focused on letter writing and the rhetoric of the Pastorals.[9] More specifically, Gerhard Lohfink, Peter Trummer, and J. Christiaan Beker have examined Pauline theology and tradition in the Pastorals.[10]

The critical issue that runs, either directly or indirectly, through a number of these works as well as through the body of commentary literature, is the question of Pauline authorship. For most modern critical scholars, that question has been largely settled for some time. The linguistic and theological dissimilarities with the seven undisputed Pauline letters, as well as the difficulty of situating these three letters in the chronology of Paul’s ministry, raised for many scholars the prospect of the Pastoral’s pseudepigraphic character. The new and seemingly more developed sense of church structure, authority, and leadership reflected in the Pastorals also appeared to confirm their dating after the death of Paul, perhaps as late as sometime in the second century. Likewise, the issues of Gentile inclusion and righteousness by faith, so important in Paul’s epistles to the Galatians and the Romans, appeared to be much more subdued and to have lost much of their urgency in the Pastorals. Taken together, these considerations prompted most modern scholars to conclude that, despite the fact that Paul is the named author of these three epistles, it is most likely that they were written by someone other than Paul.[11] To be sure, not all subscribed to the majority view, but for many scholars the non-Pauline authorship of the Pastorals became virtually axiomatic.

For some who continued to maintain Pauline authorship, the question of authorship had theological implications, since the idea that someone other than Paul could have written these letters seemed to contradict what the letters themselves actually say. From a conservative theological perspective, this could be thought problematic. More recently, Luke Timothy Johnson and others, unpersuaded by the traditional arguments for non-Pauline authorship, have sought to challenge the seeming consensus and reopen the question. As a result, a group was formed in the Society of Biblical Literature in the 1990’s to address this and other related issues. Even if this has not in the end altered the majority view, it is still healthy to have assumptions reconsidered and scholarly canons challenged. It is also a reminder not to presume too quickly that the critical issues related to the study of Paul are necessarily settled.

In the present investigation, the question of authorship will be neither the centerpiece of the discussion nor argued directly, but it will be considered more generally in terms of a comparison of literary and theological patterns. One of the interesting possibilities to come from this is the prospect that the author of 1 Timothy and Titus might not have been the person who wrote 2 Timothy. Furthermore, as we will argue, the epistle to the Philippians appears to be the linchpin in considering the relationship between 2 Timothy and the other two Pastoral letters. When all of this is considered it still seems that the evidence leans in the direction of the non-Pauline authorship of the Pastorals whether all three of them were written by the same author or not.

Paul and the Early Church

William Schoedel, in his commentary on the letters of Ignatius, has explored the influence of the Pauline letters and their theology on the Bishop, and in this commentary, he pays particular attention to the influence of 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus.[12] Regarding Polycarp and the Pastorals, Hans von Campenhausen argued that Polycarp is the author of the Pastoral Epistles.[13] But while there can be no doubting the links between Polycarp’s letter to the Philippians and the Pastorals, the claim of common authorship is not finally persuasive. Donald Hagner and James Carleton Paget have also examined the use of Pauline material in Clement of Rome and the Epistle of Barnabas.[14] More broadly, Andreas Lindemann has investigated the legacy of Paul, his letters, and theology in the early church to the time of Marcion, including the Pastorals.[15] Rolf Noormann in turn has written a major work focusing on the reception of the Pauline letters in Irenaeus.[16] Similarly, Richard Norris has addressed Irenaeus’ use of Paul specifically in his debate with the gnostics.[17] Robert Sider has written on the figure of Paul in Tertullian,[18] and David Rankin has focused more narrowly on Tertullian’s use of the Pastoral Epistles in his doctrine of ministry.[19]

With the exception of Rankin and Campenhausen, these authors all consider the full corpus of Pauline letters, and the influence of the Pastorals is only part of the reception of Paul’s epistles more generally. Whereas the question of Pauline authorship of the Pastorals focuses attention back to the historical Paul, the issues addressed here center attention on the legacy of Paul and the reception of his letters in the post-Pauline period of the early church. This makes clear that the Pastoral Epistles are close to the balance point between the historical Paul on the one hand and the Pauline legacy on the other, and the decision about authorship simply moves the Pastorals from one side of that balance point to the other. In either case, we must attend to their links to the historical Paul, to the undisputed letters, and to the Pauline legacy.

The Pastorals and the Acts of Paul Debate

The arguments by Dennis MacDonald and Richard Bauckham set the categories for this scholarly debate.[20] According to MacDonald, the author of the Pastoral Epistles represented a socially conservative movement in the church that reacted against the more radical Paul reflected in certain folk traditions and attitudes toward women. We might characterize MacDonald’s depiction of the relationship between the Pastoral Epistles and the Acts of Paul as a conflict model, where conservative forces contend against more popular and radical elements in the church, elements marked by openness to women and their central place in the church, as well as an ascetic and celibate way of life.

After acknowledging the close relationship between the Acts of Paul and the Pastoral Epistles, especially with 2 Timothy, Bauckham contends that the evidence is best explained by claiming that the Acts of Paul was intended as a sequel to the Acts of the Apostles. The author of the Acts of Paul sought to continue the story of Paul from the point where the Lukan account left off to the time of the apostle’s eventual martyrdom in Rome. Because the author of the Acts of Paul assumed the events reflected in 2 Timothy and 1 and 2 Corinthians came from a time after the events reported in Acts he drew his characters from these letters (perhaps also from Titus) rather than Acts. Unlike MacDonald, who argues that both the Acts of Paul and the Pastoral Epistles were dependent on a common oral tradition, Bauckham claims that the author of the Acts of Paul worked with those Pauline letters thought to come from the end of Paul’s first imprisonment in Rome to his martyrdom in the imperial capital. Thus, the Acts of Paul was an extension of the Pauline story whereby the author searched the texts thought to come from the time in Paul’s life following the Acts of the Apostles.

In either case, the Pastoral Epistles are linked in some fashion to the Acts of Paul tradition, and the respective arguments affirm once again the importance of the Pastorals in shaping the Pauline tradition and the legacy of Paul. Perhaps most importantly, the two arguments also suggest different models for how to understand the important question of authority in the early church: conflict (MacDonald) and extension (Bauckham). Moreover, in the particular episode in the Acts of Paul dealing with Paul and Thecla, we see Paul’s legacy developing in terms of a countercultural movement in the church, a movement centering on issues associated with authority, women and sexual purity. To the extent that the Pastorals and their views of women are connected to the apocryphal tradition of Paul and Thecla, we can see that the lines between more and less normative notions of Pauline authority intersect in complex ways in the early church.

Paul the Person, Paul the Personage

In terms of the construction of Paul’s image in the early church, Anthony Blasi’s argument about charisma is important. He argues that charisma is bigger than an individual and the person who has charisma is not only a “person” but a “personage.”[21] The term “person,” according to Blasi, refers to a historical individual, whereas the term “personage” refers to an individual’s public and charismatic persona constructed in the minds of other people. For a person to maintain charisma and continue to be a personage, his or her charisma must be constructed anew for each generation. This, Blasi argues, is exactly what happened in the case of Paul.[22] As this process of construction moves from generation to generation, there is a renewed sense of why the person is important and is endowed with special power and authority. Hence, Paul’s charisma was a matter of how the public perception of him was formed and invested with significance by those who honored ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• 1 Paul, the Pastoral Epistles, and the Pauline Legacy
• 2 The Pastoral Epistles and Their Theological Patterns
• 3 The Pastoral Epistles and Paul: A Comparison of Patterns
• 4 Apostolic Authority, Images of Paul, and the Development of the Pauline Scriptures
• 5 Paul, the Pastoral Epistles, and the Postapostolic Church
• 6 Paul, the Pastoral Epistles, and the Early Church: Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement, Origen, and Other Early Figures
• 7 Paul, the Pastoral Epistles, and the Acts of Paul (and Thecla)
• 8 Summary and Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Index of Modern Authors
• Index of Subjects
• Index of Ancient Sources
• Notes