These examples are sufficient to show how large a use is made in 1 Tliess. of traditional Jewish ideas. But these ideas have become the setting of new Christian truths — the knowledge of Christ's resurrection as a fact, and the assurance that His resurrection is the pledge of the resurrection of His servants (4" 5"). It is in these truths that we find the real centre of the writers' interest. For them, as for us, the setting is relatively unim- portant. The permanent lesson of their teaching
• This seems to be the sense of the difficult verse 1 Th 414 if we connect the clause 5id tou 'IijtroO with ofn rather tlian with
I KottJ^ij94vrat.
572 THESSALO^'IANS, EPISTLES TO
THESSALONIANS, EPISTLES TO
is that 'neitlier death nor any cosmic crisis in the future will iniike any essential (lillerence to the close relation between the Christian and his Lord' (Mollktt, EGT, 'Thessalonians,' p. 38).
(A) Tlie time of the Parotisia. — The expression fi(i€i? ol fiii-Tfs oi irfpiXeiTri/ieroi (4'°' ") is generally understood to inijily tliat Paul expected the Parousia to be witiiin his own lifetime. Perhaps this is reading too much into his words. The Thessalonians had asked a question concernin<; the relative advantages of ' tliose who are dead ' and of ' us who are still alive,' in the event of a speedy return of Christ. It may be that the Apo.stle's answer merely repeats tlie terms of the question. Or the clause tj/kU ol f^ii'res ol vepCKeiirbnevoL may well be paraphrased, 'When I say "we," I mean those who are living, those who survive to that day' (Lightfoot, Notes on Epistles of St. Paul, p. 66). At any rate, the writers definitely refuse to predict ' times and seasons ' (5'- ''). The Chris- tian's duty is not to seek to know the future, but so to live as to be prepared for the Lord's coming at any time (5*^-)-
(2) 2 Th 2'-'2.— TAe signs of the end.— The es- chatological teaching of the Second Epistle is supplementary to that of the First. It deals with the troublous times which will immediately pre- cede the Second Advent. The coming of Christ is certain, but the end is not yet. First must come the apostasy, and the culmination of evil in the per.son of the ' man of lawlessness,' who will wage war on every object of human veneration, and take his seat in the Temple, claiming Divine honours as his right. Deceived by the signs and wonders he displays, those who have rejected the true Christ will hasten to follow this blasphemous imitator. Their infatuation is the Divine punish- ment of their previous wilful blindness.
The 'mystery of lawles-sness,' of which these things will be the climax, is already at work in the world. But at present it is prevented by some inHuence (rh Karixo", 2*) or penson (6 xar^x'^". 2') from attaining its full development. Only wlien the restraining power has been removed will the ' man of lawlessness' be revealed. For a time he will succeed, but his reign will be ended by the coming of the Lord Jesus to destroy him and to set up the kingdom of the saints (2'''-). This teaching claims to be merely an echo of instruction already given to the Thessalonians by word of mouth (2-^). Tliis will help to explain why to us it seems frag- mcnt.ary and obscure. The readers for whom it was intended had clues to its meaning wliich we no longer possess. One thing, however, is certain. The main features of this ' Pauline Apocalypse ' are taken unmodilied from purely Jewisli sources.
Later Jewish eschatology always spoke of the time immediately preceding the coming of the Messiah as one of great upheavals among the nations, andof unprecedented outbreaks of evil (see iEzr. V. 1-12, vi. 19-28, Apoo. Bar. lxx.,Jiib. xxiii., As.i. Mos. X. ; cf. Mt 24). Whether or not this idea has its roots in a primitive Babylonian Creation- myth (so Bousset, The Antichrist Legend, London, 18'J6; and H. Gunkel, Schopfung tend Chaos in Urzeit und Endzeit, Gbttingen, 1895) is immaterial. It is sufficient to trace its development in Jewish literature. The very earliest 'Messianic'* pro- phecies of the OT represent the Golden Age as preceded by a time of conflict — the conflict which will destroy the particular oppressor of Israel at the time, and wipe out the ungodly in Israel itself (e.g. Am 9, Is 10^-lP 31. 32; cf. Hag 2«-»). The
• It is convenient to speak of these passagfes as 'Messianic,* although some of them contain no reference to a personal Messiah. The fact that in some cases the description of the Messianic age is of much later date than the account of the conflict is unimportant. It is sufficient that they were placed side by side when the prophetic books took their final form.
power to be overcome is in each case an actually existing Empire — Assyria, BaliyKin, or Persia — whose downfall will immediately usher in the glorious reign of peace. In the later prophetic books a dillerence appears. The Messianic age is thrown forward into a remote future, and is intro- duced by a struggle on a much vaster scale. Not one but all the heathen n;itions gather in a com- bined attack upon Jerusalem and are destroyed (Kzk 38. 39, Jl 3"-=' ; cf. Zee 14'-'- >=). Obviovlsly such descriptions are symbolical. They mark the transition-stage between prophecy properly so called and apocalypse.