I AND II THESSALONIANS: INTRODUCTION TO THE LITERARY STRUCTURE

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 Malherbe praises the first epistle for its lively style but notes that Paul’s passion in writing the letter did not result in any weakening of its overall structure, as evidenced by his extensive use of inclusions.  Regarding the organization of this same letter, Goulder says, “The clarity of this brief writing enables us to see its literary structure without difficulty.” That may be the case, but it has not resulted in much consensus among commentators regarding the exact nature of that structure.

For those who do see a literary pattern for these letters, important clues are provided by the presence of prayers/prayer reports and the use of the vocative “brothers” as key structural markers. Due to these indicators, there is fairly good agreement as to the limits of the individual literary units that comprise each letter. There is somewhat less agreement when attempts are made to group the various pericopes into larger sections. However, with the realization that similar prayers or thanksgivings are used in each letter to bracket the intervening material, the overall structures of the two epistles become clear (see figs. 1 and 2).

Figure 1: The Structure of I Thessalonians

I. Address (1:1) Lord Jesus Christ...Grace

II. Thanksgiving (1:2-10) Faith, Love and Steadfastness

Excursus 1: Past Events (2:1-12)

III. Thessalonians’ Past Behavior (2:13-3:6)

A. Apostles’ first visit (2:13-16)

B. Timothy’s visit (2:17-3:6)

II'. Thanksgiving (3:7-10) Faith, Love and Steadfastness

_____

II'' Prayer (3:11-13) May God himself...at the coming of our Lord Jesus

III'. Thessalonians’ Future Behavior (4:1-12; 5:12-22)

A. Old Exhortations (4:1-12)

We ask and urge you, For this is the will of God, Abstain from immorality, Love one another

Excursus 2: Future Events (4:13-5:11)

B. New Exhortations (5:12-22)

We ask and urge you, For this is the will of God, Abstain from evil, Do good to one another

II'''. Prayer (5:23-24) “May God himself...at the coming of our Lord Jesus”

I'. Final Words (5:25-28) Grace... Lord Jesus Christ

Figure 2: The Structure of II Thessalonians

I. Address (1:1-2) Grace and Peace

II. Thanksgiving (1:3-10) “We are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren.”

3. Satan in Action (1:11-2:12)

II'. Thanksgiving (2:13-15) “We are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren.”

_____

II''. Prayer (2:16-17) “Now may our Lord...”

III'. Christians at Rest (3:1-15)

            II''' Prayer (3:16) “Now may our Lord...”

I'. Final Words (3:17-18) Peace and Grace

The use of prayers/thanksgivings as markers is more than an artificially added structural feature. In each case these elements capsulize major theological points present in the intervening material. Thus, commentators have noted that the material located in between the two thanksgivings at I Thessalonians 1:2ff and 3:9 is also properly part of the Thanksgiving section. Hendricksen expresses a variation on this view by labeling the first thanksgiving section as a “Thanksgiving with an Undertone of Defence” while the subsequent writings prior to the second thanksgiving are labeled “Defence with Continuing Thanksgiving.” 

Similarly, sanctification is the theme of the two prayers in I Thessalonians labeled II'' and II'''. Elias demonstrates the role of sections II'' and II''' in both recapitulating the previous literary unit and preparing for the subsequent one. Prayer is also a major emphasis of the unit, labeled III'B, that is enclosed within the two prayer sections in I Thessalonians.

The organizational symmetries built into these two letters can be seen in figs. 1 and 2 by comparing the subject matter and key phrases of parallel sections. Some additional confirmation of these proposed structures is summarized below, starting with the simpler structure of the second epistle.

A glance at Fig. 1 immediately reveals that the structure of I Thessalonians is not nearly as neat as that of the second epistle. However, if one ignores for the moment the sections shown in italics, the remaining elements of the letter are seen to be organized exactly as in II Thessalonians. Each of the italicized passages is labeled as an excursus for convenience sake to distinguish them from sections that have structural parallels in II Thessalonians. However, the designation is a misnomer since these passages are actually quite germane to the purpose of the letter and are firmly attached to their immediate settings in I Thessalonians.

Authorship of the Letters

While Paul is almost universally held to be the author (or at least co-author) of I Thessalonians, many scholars in the past have held that II Thessalonians was a later product of a pseudonymous writer who attempted to imitate the language and style of the genuine letter. Evidence usually evinced for this viewpoint includes supposed differences in eschatology, the lack of reference to a previous letter, the use of OT apocalyptic literature, the more formal character of II Thessalonians and its slavish imitation of the language and format of I Thessalonians. This opinion is not as popularly held today, as evidenced by several recent commentaries which express the strong opinion that the same writer is behind both letters.

A comparison of the structures of the two letters (see Fig. 3) demonstrates that the intertextual relationships are certainly more than superficial. Malherbe has performed a similar identification of parallels in the two epistles and notes that the similarities are especially strong between the same structural elements, although he emphasizes in his treatment the different order in the presentation of the specific content items in each letter. 

Both observations are reflected in a complete mapping of the two letters side-by-side (not shown here because of their complexities). That  reveals tht the many strictly parallel elements are supplemented by a crisscross relationship between the two extra elements in I Thessalonians (given in italics in Figure 1) and the two major content sections of II Thessalonians. Such a purposeful ordering of the contents of these two epistles is too obvious to deny and, at the same time, subtle enough in detail to argue against a superficial copier attempting a pious fraud. Goulder sees other non-obvious features in the structures and the common use of previewing passages that drive him to the same conclusion – both epistles were written by the same person.

If, therefore, the same hand is behind the composition of both letters, whose hand is it? An attractive possibility, suggested often in the literature, is that one or more of Paul's co-authors given in the opening verses was responsible for the unusual overall format of the letter. The mere inclusion of co-workers in the introductory greetings of the epistles is no real evidence for multiple authorship since that practice “remains a traditional convention,” to use Childs’ words. However, the pervasive use of the first person plural throughout these two letters differs from the usage in all other Pauline epistles. Strong confirmation of Silvanus as a major contributor to the writing of both letters comes from structural analysis. A study of figs. 1 and 2 reveals that each is divided into two definite parts using standard epistolary elements (thanksgivings and prayers) to create the divisions. This feature is found in no other Pauline letter. However, as will be seen in a subsequent chapter (see I Peter: Introduction to the Literary Structure), it is also present in I Peter. That letter is, tellingly, written “by Silvanus, a faithful brother” (I Peter 5:12).

The Order of the Letters

The relative size of the books in the Bible is often the determining factor in the order in which they are given in the canon. Therefore it is logical that I Thessalonians appears before II Thessalonians. In recent years, however, it has been questioned whether that is indeed the order in which they were written. A growing voice is being heard defending the chronological priority of II Thessalonians, although a consensus is a long way from being reached. Structural analysis appears to supply several more pieces of evidence that II Thessalonians. was in reality the first of the two existing canonical letters written to that Christian community.

A. First is the observation that the church is addressed in II Thessalonians as “brothers” exactly seven times, and that most of these occurrences serve to introduce a new section of the letter. In I Thessalonians, the vocative “brothers” again often signals a new literary section, but this time appears fourteen times, a number only symbolically significant by way of extension (i.e., 2 x 7) to the usage in II Thessalonians.

B. A more important argument comes from a comparison of the structures of the two epistles. Taking the common assumption that one of the two letters was firmly in mind when the author wrote the second one, either (a) the structure of I Thessalonians was derived by inserting elements (shown in brackets) into the totally symmetrical format of II Thessalonians or (b) the asymmetrical structure of I Thessalonians was tidied up by deletions to produce that of II Thessalonians. The first possibility appears to be more logically defensible.