The Harmony Chronicle and Order of the New Testament, Part 2 · 1 Thessalonians – 2 Thessalonians
THE FIRST EPISTLE TO THE THESSALONIANS,
which was the first Epistle that he wrote.
The postscript affixed to that Epistle doth date it from Athens [as it seemeth] because of that passage in Chap. 3.1. We thought it good to be left at Athens alone: whereas 1. There was a Church in Achaia when Paul wrote this Epistle, Chap. 1.7. now there was none there while Paul was at Athens, for from thence he went to Achaia, and began to plant the Church at Corinth. 2. Timothy and Silas were joynt Writers with the Apostle of this Epistle, Chap. 1.1. now if they were with him at Athens whilst he abode there, which it may be they were, at the least one of them, 1 Thess. 3.1. yet was not the Epistle then written, for it is questionable whether Silas was there, and Timothy went a messenger thither, and returned again before this was written, Chap. 3.6. The time of its writing therefore was when Timothy and Silas with him returned from Macedonia and came to Paul at Corinth, Act. 18.5. and Timothy who had been sent thither purposely, gives a comfortable account of their faith and constancy. So that this Epistle was written from Corinth, somewhat within the beginning of the first year of Pauls abode there.
In it, among other things, he characterizeth the condition of the unbeleeving Jews, Chap. 2.15, 16. for the Thessalonian Church from its first planting had been exceedingly molested with them.
He saith, The wrath is come upon them to the utmost: which whether it mean passively, that the wrath of God lay so heavy upon them, or actively, that in their vexation and anger against the Gentiles, that was come upon them, that was foretold for a plague to them, Deut. 32.21. it sheweth that that Nation was now become unrecoverable: and so he looks upon it as the Antichrist in the next Epistle, as we shall observe there.
Paul abiding still at Corinth, a tumult is raised against him, and he is brought before the tribunall of Gallio the Proconsull, who refusing to judge in matters of that nature, [because the Jews themselves had power to judge such matters in their own Synagogue] the people become their own carvers, and beat Sosthenes even before the Tribunall. This Gallio was brother of Seneca the famous Court Philosopher, N…ro's Tutor: and of him Seneca giveth this high Encomion in the Preface to his fourth Book of naturall Questions. I used to tell thee [saith he to his friend Lucius] that my brother Gallio, whom no man loves not a little if he can love no more, is not acquainted with other vices, but this of flattery he hates. Thou hast tried him on all hands. Thou hast begun to praise his disposition—He would go away. Thou hast begun to praise his frugality, He would presently cut thee off at the first words: Thou hast begun to admire his affability and unaffected sweetnesse—For there is no mortall man so dear to any, as he to all—And here also he withstood thy flatteries, insomuch that thou criedst out, that thou hadst found a man impregnable, against those snares that every one takes into his bosom. And again in Epist. 104. Gallio, saith he, when he was in Achaia and began to have a fever, he presently took ship, crying out, that it was not the disease of his body but of the place. To him he Dedicates his Treatise de Beatâ Vitâ. See more of this Gallio, Tacit. Annal. 15. Sect. 11.
From Corinth in the time of his present abode there [but whether before this tumult before Gallio or after, is not much materiall] Paul writeth
THE SECOND EPISTLE TO THE THESSALONIANS,
whilest he and Sylvanus and Timotheus were there together, Chap. 1.1. as they had been at the writing of the first.
The exceeding much trouble and persecution that this Church had suffered from the unbelieving Jews from its first planting, Act. 17.5, &c. 1 Thess. 1.6. & 2.14. & 2 Thess. 1.4. gave the Apostle just occasion whilest he was present with them to discourse with them, and to inform them, concerning the condition and carriage and end of that Nation: that they might be setled and resolved to bear all whatsoever they should suffer from that accursed people and generation: and here he taketh up the same discourse again for their further establishment.
Besides outward molestation and affliction of their bodies, there were false teachers that troubled their mindes, and especially with these two puzzles. 1. To make them to doubt what became of them that died in the faith and profession of Iesus: for whereas the Apostle handles the matter of the resurrection in the former Epistle, Chap. 4.14. I cannot suppose that he doth it to them as to men of the Sadducee opinion, denying the resurrection, or as to men that had never heard of the resurrection before, for all the Jews, set the Sadduces aside, did assuredly believe it: but because that the opposers of the Gospel had buzzed to them their lost condition after death, for their revolting from the Jewish Religion, and becoming Apostates [as they reputed it] to the Gospel. The tenth Chapter of the Treatise Sanhedrin that names certain sorts of people that must not inherit the world to come, gives us good cause to suppose that this was no small terrour that those envious opposers would perplex the mindes of those withall, who had forsaken the Jewish Religion, and betaken themselves to the profession of Christ. The Talmudich place cited speaketh thus, All Israel hath a share in the world to come, as it is said, Thy people shall all of them be righteous: But these have no share in the world to come, He that saith, The resurrection is not taught in the Law, and that the Law is not from God, and Epicurus. Now by Epicurus they mean not luxurious one, as the word Epicure is commonly used by us, but as the Gemara explains it there foreign One that despiseth their Doctors: and elsewhere they yoke it with foreign Apostates. foreign Apostates and Epicures. Resh. hashanah per. 1. and so they brought all that started from the vain doctrine of their traditionaries under this title, and under that terrour of having no share in the world to come. 2. They went about to perplex the mind of these converts with urging how near the day of the Lord was. The Scripture, and the Apostl… had spoken of the day of the Lords coming, when he should come to take vengeance of the Jewish Nation for their wickednesse and unbelief: and these would terrifie this Church with inculcating the nearnesse of it, pretending for this, partly revelation, and partly the words or writing of the Apostle. The aim in this terrour was to amaze the new beleevers and to puzzle them about what to hold, and what to do in that sad time, which they pretended was ready to fall upon their heads. The Apostle resolves that there was some good space of time to be before, for there was to be a falling away, and the man of sin to be revealed.
The phrase The man of sin and childe of perdition, is plainly taken from that place, Isa. 11.4. With the breath of his lips he shall slay the wicked one: and the Apostle makes it clear that he referreth to that place, by using the very words of the Prophet, at ver. 8. Whom the Lord shall consume with the breath of his mouth. The Jews put an Emphasis upon that word in the Prophet, The wicked one, as it appeareth by the Chaldee Paraphrast, who hath uttered it foreign He shall destroy the wicked Roman: And so the Apostle puts an Emphasis upon it, and translates it the Man of sin: And in that Christ is introduced in the Prophet, as having a speciall quarrell and vengeance against him, he is called the son of perdition, or he that is so certainly and remarkably to be destroyed. It is true, this meaneth the Roman, as the Chaldee, and our Protestant Divines by the warrant of Iohn in the Revelation do interpret it▪ but in the first place and sense it meaneth the Jewish Nation, which proved Antichrist, as well as Rome ever did, and as far as Rome ever did, and before Rome ever did, and as long and longer then Rome hath yet done. As Iews and Rome joyned in the murder of Christ, so are they joyned in this character of Antichrist, but the Jews to be understood first: See ver. 7. the mystery of iniquity was already working when the Apostle wrote this Epistle, which cannot possibly be understood but of the Jewish Nation, and so it is explained again and again, 1 Iohn 2.18. & 4.3. & 2 Ioh. v. 7, &c.
The severall characters that the Apostle gives of the Man of sinne, agree most throughly to that generation and Nation, and so the Scripture plainly applies them to it.
1. There was a falling away in that Nation of multitudes that had imbraced the Gospel. See Matth. 24.12. Christ foretelling it, and Paul from thence, 1 Tim. 4.1. by the later times that he there speaks of, meaning the last daies of Ierusalem and the Jewish state, as the phrase is used in that sense abundantly. Such apostacy may be observed hinted in the Epistle to the Galatians, to the Hebrews, Colossians, Rev. 2.4. 2 Tim. 1.15. and to spare more, observe the conclusion of that Parable, Matth. 12.43, 44, 45. So shall it be with this wicked generation. The devil once cast out of it by the Gospel, but returned by their Apostacy.
2. How this Nation was the foreign, the great opposer of the Gospel, needeth no instance to any that hath read the new Testament. And he that reades the Jewish Records, shall finde evidence enough of it, of which we have given some brief account at Chap. 13.
3. foreign. Which exalts himself against every thing that is called God or worshipped: were it foreign, Against God, it were most true, to the very letter, their Scribes in the Temple of God it self, sitting and setting up their traditions above the commands of God, Mat. 15.6. But how they exalted themselves against every thing called God, or the Magistracy and those that were set over them, we may observe in such passages as these, 2 Pet. 2.10. They despise government, &c. Iude v.8. They despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities, &c. and in their own stories to endlesse examples.
4. As for the fourth mark mentioned, ver. 9. namely his coming after the working of Satan with all Magicall power and delusion, our Saviour had foretold is of that generation, Matth. 24.24. compared with ver. 34. of that Chapter: and it is abundantly asserted by Scripture, by Iosephus, and other of their own Writers, as we have given some examples before.
Now what the Apostle meaneth when he speaketh of one that letted [ver. 6. And now ye know what withholdeth, and ver. 7. He who now letteth will let] is of some obscurity; we may without offence give this conjecture. As the term The day of the Lord, is taken in Scripture especially in this double sense, for his day of judging the Iewish Nation, and for his day of judging all the world; so are we to understand a falling away, and a Man of sin of the Jewish Nation before the former, and a falling away and Antichrist, betwixt the former and the later. This last is readily concluded upon, to be the Papacy, and he that letted▪ to mean the Imperiall power: but what was he that letted in the former, that the Antichrist among the Jews was not revealed sooner? I should divide this stake betwixt Claudius the Emperour [who by his decree against the Jews in Rome, Act. 18.2. give a check by the appearance of his displeasure, to all the Jews elsewhere that they durst not tyrannize against the Gospel whilest he lived as they had done.] And Paul himself who by his uncessant travelling in the Gospel, and combatting by the truth every where against the Jews, did keep down very much their delusions and Apostacy whilest he was at liberty and abroad, but when he was once laid up, then all went to ruine, as see Act. 20.29. 2 Tim. 1.15, &c.
Paul when he departs from Corinth, leaves a Church fairly planted there, but how soon and how miserably it grew degenerate, we shall meet vvith cause to observe before it be long. He cometh to Ephesus, & striving to get up to one of the feasts at Ierusalem, he leaves Priscilla and Aquila there. Thither, ere long, cometh Apollos, an excellent Scripture-man, but one that knew only the baptism of Iohn, but they instruct him better. Not that these Tent-makers turned Preachers, but that having had so much converse with Paul, they were able in private conference to inform him better then yet he knew, from what they had learned from Paul.