(2) Again, sections of the Epistle are personal and distinctly Paulino throughout; while others {'2"-'i") consist of va^e generalities, consistent with I'auline authorship, but not demanding it.
(3) There are some amiarent contradictions, e.g. 3' a-s contrasted w ith 2" (but they are not neces- Eanly spoken of the same persons, and, while 3° lefers to external success, 2" refers mainly to internal degeneracy) : again, 4" as contrasted with 4-' (but Luke may have been St. Paul's only attendant in prison, Eubulus and the others Human Christians who had access to him from outside).
(4) The construction of the opening sentence is dilhcult, and has suggested that it has been care- lessly reconstructed from some earlier form ; but its difficulty does not go beyond that of many
Pauline jiaragiaphs. Again, l'»-'8 ig easily separ- able from the surrounding context, and its con- nexion with it is not at linst sight obvious: yet there is a real connexion (see the analysis), and the dilliculty of its position wUl remain on any theory of construction.
These facts have given rise to attempts of two kinds to resolve the Epistle into separate parts.
(1) It consists of two, or possibly more, letters by St. Paul himself, which have been accidentally combined. In this case l'-4' with, perhaps, 4'"'-' and — '' might form one letter, wrilicn from the Konian imprisonment, and 4"""' with 4-^ wUl be a second letter, perhaps written earlier, at the time of the imprisonment in Ca'sarea (Clemen), or even later in the Roman imprisonment. This theory meets many ditllcuUies, would imply very little dislocation of MSS, anl very possibly has an analogy in the end of the Epistle to the Romans.
(2) It consists of genuine fragments of Pauline letters, worked up into one whole by some later writer, say of the time of Uomitian (Clemen), with the object of strengthening Christians in the face of persecution, and securing the tradition of apos- tolic doctrine against inuuvatiiig tendencies. We might then have (a) 4""- '"■-'■ -^ a short letter, calling Timothy to rejoin him, written at some time in the third niissionaiy journey (McGifl'ert, Rartlet) ; (b) I'-S'^ 3"'-4» and 4"^-^» a letter of encijuragement to Timothy, written at the end of the Roman imprisonment ; (c) S^-S' the addition of the ultimate redactor. Further and more de- tailed suggestions of the jjossibility of reconstruc- tion will be found in Clemen {Die Eivheitlkhkeit dcr Paul. Brief c, pp. 142-156); McGittert (The Ajw.stolic Age, yp. 404-414); Moflatt {The His- turical New Testament, pj). 700-704). But there is no suflicicut reason for treating any part of the Eiiistleas un-Pauliiie : the theories of interweaving of^ document with document are too intricate to be probable, and no one theory has commanded any- thing like a common assent. iuWuhar (Einleitung^, pp. 10.5, 1.56) entirely rejects the theory, because of the unity of each of the Pastoral Epistles, and regards them throughout as purely inventions attributed to the apostle.
vii. Value. — The importance of the Epistle is not great on doctrinal or ecclesiastical grounds : doctrinally, indeed, it adds the fullest statement of the inspiration of the OT and of its primary value to a Christian teacher that is to be found in the NT : it probably bears witness to the practice of prayer to God for mercy to the dead (!'"), and it shows the power of the Christian doctrine of a Ri.scn Christ to support a Christian in the face of death : ecclesiastically, it shows the value attached to the imiiosition of the apostle's hands, and to a succession of ministers as a means of securing the tradition of sound teachini' ; but none of these points are peculiar to this Epistle. Its real value IS historical and personal. Assuming the Pauline authorship, it is the chief source of evidence for Paul's life after the clo.se of the Acts, supporting the theory of a second imprisonment, giving details of the last trial, implying further missionary work to the east, and possibly to the west (4'") of Rome, testifying to his reconciliation with John Mark, and giving glimpses of some of his friends, who are not known to us from other sources. On the non-Pauline authorship, its witness to these his- toric facts may be trusted, ond it would also be a witness to the tone of ecclesiastical thought in Pauline Churches at the end of the 1st or beginning of the 2nd cent. But its main interest is one of character, and two portraits emerge from it. (1) The portrait of the ideal Christian minister. He is, like Christ Himself, to re- produce the features of Isaiah's ideal of ' The
Servant of the Lord,' patient, gentle, hopeful, interceding (2") : he is to be God's man, His loyal liegeman (3") ; like a soldier, unentangled with civil duties (2'*) ; like an athlete, obej'ing loyally the rules of the contest (2'') : like a husbandman, toiling hard, and, if so, earning his reward (2'*); like a tradesman, honestly cutting out his goods (2" ?) ; like a fisherman, trying to catcli back those who have been caught by the devil (2-* ?) : he needs courage, gentleness in face of opposition, willing- ness to face sullering, hopefulness for those who have gone wrong : he is to be serviceable (euxpiffTos, 4"), tnoroughly equipped for every good work (3"), to keep himself free from moral evil (2--), to re- kindle the grace given by ordination, remembering that it was the gift of a s]jirit of love and power and discipline (1'). In teaching, he is to avoid idle speculations and restless innovations, to be loyal to the truth, to be long-sufi'ering and yet bold in rebuke ; the remembrance of the Risen Christ is to be ever before him ; and he is to take for his standard of life and teaching («) the facts of the apostle's life (3'"), (6) the outline of the apostle's teaching, (c) the OT Scriptures, which are not only able to make him ■wise unto salvation, but also to guide hiin in his discipline of others.