resting on human tradition, with the elements of the world and not Christ for its content; in holding fast to antiquated ordinances it lets slip the substance to grasp the shadow; it is, in spite of its humility, a manifestation of fleshly conceit, but devoid of real wisdom ; and the things from which it commands abstinence are so insignificant that they perish in the act of use.
The external evidence for the Pauline authorship of the Epistle is as strong perhaps as we have any right to expect. It is first referred to by name in the Muratorian Canon and by Irenzus. It was probably used by Justin Martyr and Theophilus; and it is not unlikely that there are echoes of it in Barnabas, Clement of Rome and Ignatius. But these are quite insufficient to prove acquaintance with the Epistle, still less the Pauline authorship. It is more important that Marcion included it in his canon, but this again is not at all conclusive proof of the genuineness. The question has to be settled by the evidence drawn from the Epistle itself. On the ground of internal evidence many critics have decided against its authenticity. Mayerhoff (1838) was the first to reject it. The Tubingen school, including Hilgenfeld, treated it as a second century work. Ewald thought that Timothy wrote it after consultation with Paul. Holtzmann (1872), following a view indicated by Hitzig, recognised a Pauline nucleus, but regarded more than half of the Epistle as non-Pauline. Von Soden (1885) reduced considerably the range of interpolation in a series of articles on Holtzmann’s hypothesis, but has since recognised the whole Epistle as Pauline, with the exception of i. 16°, 17, which he thinks may be a gloss, since it disturbs the symmetry.
The authenticity has been impugned on various grounds: the language and style, the false teaching, the angelology, the Christology, the likeness to Ephesians. Enough has been said already of the false teaching and the angelology, so that it is needless to add anything here. The Epistle has a considerable number of words which are peculiar to itself, but on the whole not an exceptional number (34); and the contents of ch. ii. would have made even a larger proportion not at all strange. Greater difficulties are caused by the style. It is heavier and less impetuous than in Galatians, Corinthians and Romans. Several of the logical particles most common in Paul are almost absent. There are also strange collo- cations of words (of which Haupt gives a good list), many being