The life and work of St. Paul

THE SECOND EPISTLE TO THE THE8S1.LONU.N8. 347
Beginning the practical section of the Epistle, he asks their prayers that
the Gospel may have free coarse among others as among them, and that ha
may be delivered from perverse and wicked men ;
l and expressing his trust
in God, and his confidence in them, prays that the Lord may guide their
hearts into the love of God and the patience of Christ. 2 That patience was
lacking to some of them who, he had been told, were walking disorderly, not
following the precepts he had given, or the example he had set. The rule he had
given was that a man who would not work had no right to eat, and the example
he had set, as they well knew, had been one of order, manly self-dependence,
strenuous diligence, in that he had voluntarily abandoned even the plain right
of maintenance at their hands. 3
He therefore commands and exhorts* in the name of Christ those who
were irregular, and whose sole business was to be busybodies, 6 to be quiet
and diligent, and earn their own living ; and if, after the receipt of this letter,
any one refused obedience to his advice, they were to mark that man by avoiding
his company that he might be ashamed ; not, however, considering him
as an enemy, but admonishing him as a brother. As for the rest, let them
6 and he again concludes with a prayer that the
not be weary in fair-doing ;
Lord of Peace Himself may give them peace perpetually, and in every way.
The Lord be with them all ! J
And having dictated so far probably to his faithful Timothy the Apostle
himself takes the pen, for the use of which his weak sight so little fitted him,
and bending over the papyrus, writes :
" The salutation of me Paul with my own hand, which autograph salutation
8
is the proof of genuineness in every Epistle. This is how I mite. The Grace
of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you alL"j*
. y?-. p-fvp'.' ,.; ,. _j c _, j ^ _ TtiA Fr.fTr-' -T
1 An allusion to his struggles with the Jews at Corinth.
v
" Synagogas Judaeorum
fontes persecutionum " (Tert.
aroiros
Scorp, 10). only in Luke xxiii. 41, and Act*, xxviii. 6.
2
i.e., a patience like His patience. The "patient waiting for Christ," of the E.V.,
though partially sanctioned by Chrysostom and Theophylact, can hardly be tenable, and
they prefer the meaning here given.
5
iii. 111.
4 These injunctions are more emphatic, authoritative, and precise than thoie of the
First Epistle ; another sign that this followed it. n-apayyf'AAw, o much stronger than
POJTU>, occurs four times in this Epistle (iii. 4, 6, 10, 12), and only elsewhere, of hia
Epistles, in 1 Thess. iy. 11; 1 Tim. ri. 13; 1 Cor. vii. 10; xi. 17.
5
2 Thess. iii. 11,
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