New Testament Letters by Saint Paul

First published:Pauli Epistolas, c. 50-c. 65 c.e. (English translation, 1380)

Edition(s) used:The New Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical Books, edited by Bruce M. Metzger and Roland E. Murphy. New York: Oxford University Press, 1991

Genre(s): Nonfiction

Subgenre(s): Letters; theology

Core issue(s): The cross; ethics; faith; freedom and free will; grace; Jesus Christ; salvation

Overview

Several years following the death of Jesus of Nazareth (30 c.e.), a young Jewish scholar, from the town of Tarsus in what is now Turkey, experienced a dramatic transformation on the road to Damascus. A persecutor of the fledgling Christian movement, Paul had a vision in which Jesus appeared to him and called him to become his apostle to the Gentiles. As part of his missionary journeys across the northern Mediterranean region, Paul was a prolific letter writer, offering direction, support, encouragement, and correction to his network of congregations.

There are several ways to approach the letters. The most common way is to speak in terms of canon. By the late second century, Paul’s letters were accepted into the New Testament and given authoritative status for the life and faith of the Church. Thirteen letters are ascribed with the name of Paul. Many are named for residents of cities where congregations were located: Romans, 1-2 Corinthians, 1-2 Thessalonians, Philippians, Ephesians, and Colossians. One is the name of a region: Galatians. Several are names of individuals: Philemon, 1-2 Timothy, and Titus.

In the canon, the organizing principle is not chronological. Rather, the letters are arranged according to length. Paul’s importance led composers of the King James Bible to attribute to Paul also the anonymous letter to the Hebrews, a conclusion rarely accepted today. The canonical approach also recognized the possibility that Paul wrote other letters including two other letters to the Corinthians (1 Corithians 5:9, 2 Corinthians 2:4) and one to Laodicea (Colossians 4:15). These letters, and possibly others, were assumed to have been lost. Other letters attributed to Paul, such as 3 Corinthians and the correspondence between Paul and the Roman philosopher Seneca, were considered to be later imitations of Paul’s writing.

A second approach to Paul’s letters has been to focus on the historical context. The Acts of the Apostles, which describes three missionary journeys of Paul and a final journey to imprisonment in Rome, has often been used to establish a framework for the letters. Accordingly, 1 Thessalonians is the first of Paul’s letters written from Corinth in the spring of 50 c.e. Over the next six or seven years, other letters would have followed while Paul was traveling in the Aegean Sea area, in the following general order: 2 Thessalonians, Galatians, 1-2 Corinthians, and Romans. The remaining “prison” letters are designated to Rome prior to Paul’s martyrdom under Nero around 65 c.e.

Many scholars have now opted to take a more critical historical approach, noting that Acts fails to mention any of the letters of Paul, that the author was likely not eyewitness for most of these events, and that there are significant disagreements between Acts and Paul’s letters. Rather, it is preferable to begin a historical construction based on Paul’s letters. The material from Acts is thus weighed against what Paul himself says in his letters. Other imprisonment locations, such as Ephesus, are considered for Paul’s prison letters.

The historical-critical approach also raises the question of authorship. Seven letters are universally considered authentic: Romans, 1-2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, and Philemon. 1-2 Timothy and Titus are frequently disputed because the theology and hierarchical church structure suggest a second century context. Others question the authenticity of Ephesians, Colossians, and 2 Thessalonians based on vocabulary usage and sentence structure.

At the same time, careful analysis of several authentic letters of Paul suggests that they are compilations of shorter letters. Philippians is likely made up of two separate letters, while 2 Corinthians is a compilation of four or five shorter letters including those previously identified as “lost.” Even 1 Corinthians may have changed, with the famous “Let a woman be silent” passage added by later scribes.

A very real, human Paul comes across in his letters. He sometimes turns angry and sarcastic, as in Galatians, when attacked by opponents. At other times, as in Philippians, he is very personable and appreciative. In Philemon he comes across as manipulative, and in 2 Corinthians he seems depressed. In his greetings, he notes his dependence upon the grace of God. From a theological standpoint, many prefer Romans, a letter written near the end of his missionary travels in 57 c.e. as an introduction to a congregation he wishes to visit.

Christian Themes

It is surprising that Paul mentions little about the life and teachings of the historical Jesus. Yet Paul himself notes that he never met him face to face. There is nothing about Jesus’ childhood or parents, no descriptions of a Galilee ministry, no Lord’s Prayer or Sermon on the Mount, no parables or miracles. Other than a short reference to the Last Supper, Paul’s focus is on the death and resurrection of Jesus.

As a Pharisee, Paul had already accepted the concept of the final resurrection. However, the Damascus road experience convinced Paul that the resurrection had already occurred in history in the person of Jesus, evidence that Jesus was the long-awaited Jewish Messiah. Thus he places himself as last in the list of those who witnessed appearances of the risen Jesus (1 Corinthians 15). This witness became the driving force for Paul’s missionary travels, his energy, passion, and urgency. In his first letter (1 Thessalonians), Paul expresses the belief that Jesus will return within his lifetime to complete the resurrection of the dead. Later he qualifies that view, accepting the inevitability of his own death (1 Corinthians 15, 2 Corinthians 5, and Philippians 1:21) and the continuation of the Church living in hope.

It is the death of Jesus that provides meaning. He tells the Corinthians that he decided to know nothing but Christ crucified, a concept that he identified as foolishness to the Greeks and a scandal to the Jews. Paul thus discovered the value of suffering so that he could speak of his own self as dying with Christ and as bearing the marks of Christ’s death in his own body. Christ’s death, for Paul, was carried out “for others.” It took place “for our sins.”

A student of the prophets, Paul saw this sacrificial death as the extension of God’s grace beyond Judaism to the gentile word. Admission of Gentiles into the Church was accepted in a gathering of Christian leaders in Jerusalem in 49 c.e., but it was in his letter to the Galatians (and more fully in Romans) that Paul argued that Gentiles are justified by faith, not by works of the law. The critical test for this view was his rejection for Gentiles of circumcision as the initiation ritual, but it also became evident in the abandonment of kosher food laws, Sabbath observance, and a law orientation in general. Paul is thus responsible more than any other for Christianity having developed as a religion separate from Judaism. However, it is important to note that in Romans 9-11, he stresses the continued validity of God’s covenant with the Jews.

Paul’s letters are best known for their theology, yet there is also a significant amount of ethical advice. This is a result of his focus on Christian freedom. Ethics is not determined by law but by the guidance of the Spirit, who breathes life into the individual. It is not what is lawful that matters but what builds up the community, to which Paul refers as the “Body of Christ” (1 Corinthians 12). An ethic of love (1 Corinthians 13) and service characterizes the Christian life.

Sources for Further Study

Dunn, James. Theology of Paul the Apostle. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2006. Basing his work primarily on Paul’s letter to the Romans, Dunn constructs a theology around topics such as God, humankind, sin, Christology, salvation, the Church, and the Christian life.

Murphy-O’Connor, Jerome. Paul: A Critical Life. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996. An account of Paul’s letters based primarily on information gathered from the letters themselves rather than from the Acts of the Apostles. Includes contextual information from numerous first century sources.

Roetzel, Calvin J. The Letters of Paul: Conversations in Context. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1998. Treats each letter in terms of possible dating, situation, and literary structure. Includes arguments for dividing later letters from authentic letters of Paul.

Stendahl, Krister. Paul Among Jews and Gentiles, and Other Essays. Philadelphia, Pa.: Fortress Press, 1976. A series of essays, based on careful word study, that show that Paul’s primary goal was to incorporate Gentiles into the family of God.

Wright, N. T. Paul in Fresh Perspective. Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress Press, 2006. Part 1 focuses on themes of Creation and covenant, Messiah and apocalyptic, Gospel and empire. Part 2 deals with structures such as rethinking God, reworking God’s people, and reimagining God’s future.