1 Timothy (Bible)

1 Timothy or the First Epistle to Timothy is one of the books of the New Testament. It is a letter (epistle), sometimes referred to as one of the Pastoral Epistles, traditionally considered to have been written by the apostle Paul to his pupil Timothy.

Authorship and Date

The traditional view holds that the apostle Paul wrote this letter sometime between AD 62 and 64, shortly after his release from his first imprisonment in Rome. Until about AD 1800, nobody seriously doubted either authorship or date of this letter. However, since the nineteenth century, many scholars have questioned the authenticity of the Pastoral Epistles (1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and Titus). In 1807, Friedrich Schleiermacher rejected 1 Timothy as inauthentic, which had implications for 2 Timothy. Among the most influential critiques of the standard (canonical) view of the authorship and date was The Problem of the Pastoral Epistles by Percy Neale Harrison (1921).

Arguments against the authenticity of the Pastoral Epistles as Pauline letters rest on the following four points:

1. Historical inaccuracies. Critics have pointed out that there are apparent contradictions between the descriptions of Paul's journeys in 1 and 2 Timothy on the one hand and those in Acts.
2. Literary reasons. The style of the letters is said to differ in important points from other letters by Paul.
3. Theology. Some critics have doubted the purity of the letter's theology in comparison with earlier writings by the apostle, while others believe the references to the false teachings which can be found in all the Pastoral Epistles refer to a much later heresy known as Gnosticism.
4. Ecclesiastical reasons. Some believe that the detailed references in 1 Timothy to church offices presuppose a much larger and more developed church hierarchy which would be incompatible with the embryonic church of Paul's days.

More conservative Bible scholars remain unconvinced by these objections and have countered with explanations for any of the supposed problems that have been raised. The historical problems are easily reconciled if a second Pauline imprisonment is supposed, which is not too far-fetched in view of the fact that Luke's description in Acts terminates before the account of Paul's first imprisonment is finished. The literary objections have been rejected as subjective and unprovable; the use of different vocabulary is no proof against identical authorship. The theological and ecclesiastical objections are rejected as reading too much into some of Paul's comments and defenders of the traditional authorship and date see no contradiction in this letter with any other of Paul's writings. For an overview of the arguments surrounding this controversy see Guthrie The Pastoral Epistles (1957; 1990).

References

For Further Reading

• Guthrie, Donald. The Pastoral Epistles: An Introduction and Commentary. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1957. 228 pp. ISBN 0802814131; ISBN 9780802814135; 2nd ed. (revised) 1990, by Leon Morris (ed.). 240 pp. ISBN 0802804829; ISBN 9780802804822.
• Hanson, Anthony Tyrrell. The Pastoral Epistles. New Century Bible Commentary. London: Marshall, Morgan and Scott/ Grand Rapids: W. Eerdmans, 1982.
• Harrison, Percy Neale. The Problem of the Pastoral Epistles. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1921. Full-text PDF
• Metzger, Bruce M. "A Reconsideration of Certain Arguments against the Pauline Authorship of the Pastoral Epistles." In: Expository Times 70 (1958-59), pp. 91-94.
• Nute, Alan G. "The Pastoral Letters." In: F.F. Bruce et al. (eds.) New International Bible Commentary, Grand Rapids, Zondervan, 1979, pp. 1472-1497.