Chapter Two

The circumstances and character of the Apostle’s preaching among the Thessalonians (1–12). The success and effect of apostolic preaching among the readers, faithful to it and suffering persecutions (13–16). The holy Paul’s desire to see the Thessalonians and obstacles to it (17–20).

1 Thessalonians 2:1. You yourselves know, brothers and sisters, about our coming to you, that it was not ineffectual; The character of the life and activity of the Apostle Paul among the Thessalonian Christians. The Apostle returns again to the idea expressed earlier in 1 Thess 1:5, and now develops it, turning to an apology for the motives and character of his preaching, which apparently had been subject to vilification and reproach, and certainly at first from the Jews and certainly not from the pagans, who knew very little about the Apostle Paul’s past.

1 Thessalonians 2:2. But though we had previously suffered and been shamefully treated in Philippi, as you know, we dared to declare to you the gospel of God in spite of great opposition. The beginning of preaching in Thessalonica was not “in vain”—without purpose and without seriousness. Having suffered both bodily and spiritually, the heralds, not frightened by the failure in Philippi, dared to “speak” about God also in Thessalonica “in spite of great opposition”—not withdrawn by the enormous opposition from the enemies of the Gospel.

1 Thessalonians 2:3. For our appeal does not come from deceit or impure motives or trickery; 1 Thessalonians 2:4. But just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, even so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God, who tests our hearts. The Thessalonians know this well and also know that the teaching of the heralds does not come from self-deception, and not from the desire to preach dissolution (ακαθαρσία) or to rely on trickery. This hint about impurity (ακαθαρσία) or “sensuality” as a possible source of preaching was very important in view of the extremely immoral forms of service to the gods that were often sanctioned by the religions of that time. Such was, for example, the mystical cult of “Kabiri” in Thessalonica itself, accompanied by grossly immoral rites. The heralds are free from these deficiencies. Tested by God and deemed worthy to be bearers of the Gospel, they strive to serve and please not the low desires and passions of man, but God.

1 Thessalonians 2:5. For we never came with flattering speech, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed: God is our witness! 1 Thessalonians 2:6. And we did not seek praise from men, not from you nor from anyone else; 1 Thessalonians 2:7. Though we could have been demanding, as apostles of Christ, we were instead mild among you, like a nursing mother caring for her own children. Their preaching is devoid of flattery calculated for crude personal interest, devoid even of any “pretext” for greed. They do not seek glory from men or from them. They “could have been a burden” (έν βάρει είναι) as Apostles—but this was actually not the case. What does this expression έν βάρει είναι—“could have been burdensome”—mean? Is it a matter of monetary assistance to which the heralds had a right, or is here the meaning the demanding recognition of their authority? Βάρος has two meanings: a) it can have the direct meaning “heaviness,” “burden” (Vulgate—oneri esse), and in that case can indicate the right of Apostles to demand help and support (see v. 1 Thess 2:9 and 2 Thess 3:8); b) but it can have the derived meaning “authority, dignity”; in that case it would indicate the honor which the heralds could expect from the Thessalonians as “Apostles of Christ.” If we connect the thought of v. 7 with the thought of v. 6, the second meaning of the word βάρος is more appropriate; if we connect v. 7 with v. 5, then the first meaning of the word is more acceptable. But “it may be safer to assign to the expression έν βάρει είναι an all-encompassing meaning, including both these royal, so to speak, prerogatives of Apostolate—and the right to insist on one’s authority and the right to receive assistance” (Lightfoot, op. cit.). The heralds, while not being burdensome, were, on the contrary, “mild” among them (ήπιοι). At this point there is another possible reading: “νήπιοι,” in which case the meaning would be: “we were children among you.” This reading is found in two of the most ancient codices—the Sinai and Vatican codices. But the reading ήπιοι is as well supported by manuscripts as νήπιοι, and in terms of the line of thought is much more acceptable.

1 Thessalonians 2:8. In our eagerness for you, we were delighted to share not only the gospel of God but also our very lives, because you had become dear to us. 1 Thessalonians 2:9. Surely you remember, brothers and sisters, our labor and hardship; we worked night and day in order not to be a burden to any of you while we proclaimed to you the gospel of God. Here before us is a wonderful picture of the life and activity of the Apostle Paul and his coworkers in Thessalonica. Unwilling to be a burden to anyone, the Apostle worked himself to support himself. This work, undoubtedly, was making tents, a craft that the Apostle Paul was taught, according to Hebrew custom, from childhood itself; he also made his living by this craft in Corinth (Acts 18:2-3). But the Apostle Paul was not always dependent on his own craft alone; judging by Phil 4:15, in Thessalonica he received support from the Philippian Christians, and later in Corinth (2 Cor 11:9) received support from Macedonia. There is no contradiction here with 2 Thess 3:7-10. The Apostle could easily have had in mind two motives for a self-supporting and laborious way of life—both the desire to avoid the accusation “of greed” and the striving to give those around him an example of diligence for imitation.

1 Thessalonians 2:10. You and God are witnesses as to how pure, upright, and irreproachable was our conduct toward you believers; 1 Thessalonians 2:11. As you know, we treated each one of you like a father does his own children, 1 Thessalonians 2:12. We urged and encouraged and implored each one of you to conduct yourselves in a way worthy of God, who called you into his kingdom and glory. But this work for subsistence put the Apostle Paul in a very advantageous position in relation to the believers. It gave him the ability to study each one thoroughly, through constant association in work, and to become a father to each of them in a spiritual sense. Each of them the Apostle Paul exhorted and entreated to “conduct yourselves in a way worthy of God, who calls you into his kingdom” (καλούντος). The idea of God’s kingdom was Jewish in origin; it is very often found in the Gospel, but not so often in other writers of the New Testament. To the Greeks this idea was foreign. But the Apostle apparently especially emphasized this idea in his preaching in Thessalonica. His enemies—the Jews—took advantage of this and gave it a false interpretation, dangerous from a political perspective (Acts 17:7). It is quite possible that the unhappy experience in Thessalonica led the Apostle Paul to abandon this form of revealing Christianity in Greek cities.

1 Thessalonians 2:13. Therefore we also constantly give thanks to God, because when you received the word of God that we proclaimed, you accepted it not as a human word but as what it truly is, God’s word, which is also at work in you believers A new expression of gratitude from the Apostle for the conversion of the Thessalonians and their steadfastness in persecutions. They received the word of God not as a human word, hence its power. They received it with their whole hearts, and it works in them bearing good fruit—works in them “believing” (present participle πιστευουσιν). “The word is powerful as long as those who listen believe. These two facts coincide. If faith were to disappear, the influence of the preaching would cease” (Adeney. W. 7, The Century Bible, Thessalonians, p. 171).

1 Thessalonians 2:14. For you, brothers and sisters, became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea, because you also suffered the same things from your compatriots as they did from the Jews, Here we have the strongest attack on Jewry on the part of the Apostle Paul (compare Acts 7:51-53). “This is the only place in his epistles where the expression ‘Jews’ is used, similar to how it is used in the Gospel of John, to designate the chosen people as enemies of faith in Christ. To understand this passage, so sharply differing in language from Rom 9-10, we must remember that the Apostle Paul, generally a man of passionate nature, still acutely felt the recent persecution of himself by his own countrymen, whom he realized were struggling not only against him but against God and the truth” (Fulford, Thessalonians, p. 22). This contains a fine refutation of the Tübingen hypothesis (F. Baur) about the alleged hostility that existed between the Apostle Paul and the churches in Judea. The Thessalonians became imitators of these latter, and in the words of the Apostle Paul one senses “admiration full of love” (Lightfoot) before the steadfastness of Judean Christians who became a model for Christians in Thessalonica. On the other hand, this verse beautifully confirms our conclusions about the state of the church in Thessalonica and the source of persecution of Christians. “Although in the Book of Acts the Jews appear as the chief persecutors of the Apostle Paul in Thessalonica, we cannot nevertheless doubt that the course of events was the same everywhere; the opposition to the Gospel aroused by the Jews was taken up by the local population, without whose assistance they would have been powerless” (Lightfoot op. cit. v. 32).

1 Thessalonians 2:15. Who killed both the Lord Jesus and the prophets, and drove us out, and are displeasing to God and oppose everyone, Here by the words “πάσιν άνθρώποις εναντίων” is beautifully portrayed the God-fighting and hostile to mankind character of Jewry. Wherever the Apostle Paul went, it persecuted him. On the other hand, the great Apostle, wandering through pagan cities, could observe well the feelings toward Jewry everywhere. The words of the Apostle Paul find beautiful confirmation in the history of Tacitus, who said that Jews have “adversus omnes alios hostile odium” (V:5). The Roman satirist Juvenal speaks no better of them: “Romanas autem soliti contemnere leges, Iudaicum ediscunt et servant ac metuunt jus… Non monstrare vias eadem nisi sacra colenti, Quaesitum ad fontem solos deducere verpos.” XIV:100–104. “The holy Paul sees an example of their enmity toward mankind in their opposition to the spread of the Gospel among the Gentiles. But both their characterization and their exclusivity in the matter of spiritual privileges and their selfish withdrawal in everyday relations in general were obliged for their existence to one and the same spirit devoid of love and freedom, all the more hateful in that it was a caricature and unnatural growth on the exclusive purity of their old monotheism” (Lightfoot, op. cit. p. 34).

1 Thessalonians 2:16. Hindering us from speaking to the Gentiles so that they may be saved—thus continually filling up the measure of their sins. But God’s wrath has overtaken them finally. “But God’s wrath has overtaken them finally”—there is no basis for referring these words to the fact of the destruction of Jerusalem. If that were so, references to such an extraordinary event would be in other places of the epistle, and here this event would be described more definitely. The Apostle Paul here read, so to speak, the signs of the times, the coming fate of the God-fighting and stiff-necked Jewry.

1 Thessalonians 2:17. But we, brothers and sisters, were separated from you for a short time in body, not in spirit, and with great eagerness we sought with much longing to see your face. 1 Thess 2:17-3:10. The Apostle Paul’s concern for the Christian church in Thessalonica, Timothy’s visit to Thessalonica, and the joy of the herald at seeing the prosperity of their church and the growth of their faith and love.

1 Thessalonians 2:18. For we wanted to come to you—certainly I, Paul, wanted it more than once—but Satan blocked our way. The Apostle Paul especially emphasizes his personal desire to “see the face” of his disciples, but “Satan blocked our way,” he writes. What does this expression mean? An obstacle could have been an illness at that time of the Apostle Paul; he hints at this illness in his epistle to the Galatians (Gal 4:14), among whom he had been not long before this. But, more likely—this expression refers to opposition from Jewry. “Satan, acting through the Jews, stirred up persecution against the Apostle, so that his repeated intention to visit Thessalonica remained unfulfilled.” Ramsay, W. M. (in St. Paul the Traveller, p. 230–31) suggests that here reference is made to the action of the politarchs (Acts 18:9), which prevented the Apostle Paul from returning to Thessalonica (Fulford op. cit. p. 23–24).