The standard form of the initial salutation or prescript in ancient letters was “A to B, greetings.” Cf. Ezra 7:12, “Artaxerxes, king of kings, . . . to Ezra the priest, greetings”); Cicero, Epistulae ad Quintum fratrem, 1.2 (M. Cicero Q. fratri s[alutem], “Marcus Cicero to Quintus his brother, health”); P. Oxy. 119.1 (Θέων Θέωνι τῷ πατρὶ χαίρειν, “Theon to Theon his father, greetings”). Here A comprises the three names Paul, Silvanus and Timothy; B is “the church of the Thessalonians . . .”; the greetings take the form “grace to you and peace.” This is the shortest prescript among the Pauline homologoumena.
1:1. Παῦλος καὶ Σιλουανὸς καὶ Τιμόθεος, “Paul and Silvanus and Timothy.” The same three names appear in the prescript of 2 Thessalonians. It is not unusual to find Paul’s name combined with others in the prescripts of the Pauline letters; cf. Παῦλος . . . καὶ Σωσθένης ὁ ἀδελφός, “Paul . . . and Sosthenes the brother” (1 Cor 1:1); Παῦλος . . . και Τιμόθεος (2 Cor 1:1; similarly Phil 1:1; Col. 1:1; Phlm 1); Παῦλος . . . καὶ οἱ σὺν ἐμοὶ πάντες ἀδελφοί, “Paul . . . and all the brothers with me” (Gal. 1:1, 2). Only in Romans, Ephesians and the Pastoral Letters does Paul’s name stand unaccompanied in the prescript.
Here the sequence of names may reflect seniority. But while Paul was the senior partner, the inclusion of the other two names need not be a matter of courtesy only: both Silvanus and Timothy, and especially Silvanus (see 3:2, with comment), may have participated responsibly in the composition of the letter.
Silvanus is mentioned in 2 Cor 1:19 as having shared with Paul and Timothy in the evangelization of Corinth, and the implication of the repeated “we” in this letter is that he similarly shared in the evangelization of Thessalonica. It is uncertain if he is identical with the Silvanus of 1 Pet 5:12. But it is certain that he is identical with the Silas of Acts. Silas was associated with Paul and Timothy in the evangelization of Thessalonica (Acts 17:1–9) and Corinth (Acts 18:5).
If further evidence may be adduced from Acts to fill in our knowledge of Silvanus, Silas was a member of the Jerusalem church, deputed (along with one Judas Barsabbas) to convey the letter containing the apostolic decree to Antioch (Acts 15:22, 27, 32). Not long afterward, he was coopted by Paul as his colleague for a missionary journey which took them from Antioch through Asia Minor to Alexandria Troas on the northwest coast of the peninsula and from there by sea to Macedonia, where he was involved in the evangelization of Philippi, Thessalonica and Beroea; later he rejoined Paul in Corinth. If it is a reasonable inference from Acts 16:37, where Paul describes Silas and himself as
Ῥωμαῖοι, “Romans,” that Silas was a Roman citizen as well as Paul, then Silvanus might be his Roman cognomen, while Silas is a hypocoristic (as Epaphras to Epaphroditus) or else represents his Aramaic name (cf. Talmudic
, Palmyrene
).
Timothy receives more frequent mention in Paul’s letters. He was plainly an associate in whom Paul had complete confidence, entrusting him with responsible missions, e.g. to Thessalonica (3:2, 6), to Corinth (1 Cor 4:17; 16:10) and to Philippi (Phil 2:19). According to Acts he was a native of a South Galatian city (probably Lystra), the son of a Jewish mother and a Greek father, and was converted to Christianity during Barnabas and Paul’s first visit to that region. When Paul later revisited the region with Silas, he circumcised Timothy and took him along as a junior colleague. Timothy accompanied Paul and Silas on their journey to Macedonia (Acts 16:1–10; 17:14, 15) and later rejoined Paul in Corinth (Acts 18:5). The picture of his companinonship with Paul in Acts is confirmed by Paul’s own account in Phil 2:20–22: “I have no one like him, who will be genuinely anxious for your welfare. . . . But Timothy’s worth you know, how as a son with a father he has served with me in the gospel.”
τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ Θεσσαλονικέων, “to the church of the Thessalonians.” Paul’s earlier letters are explicitly addressed to churches (cf. 2 Thess 1:1; Gal 1:2; 1 Cor 1:2; 2 Cor 1:1), but his later letters to churches are variously addressed to “all God’s beloved . . . , called to be saints” (Rom 1:7); “all the saints” (Phil 1:1); “the saints and faithful brethren in Christ” (Col 1:2); “the saints who are also faithful in Christ Jesus” (Eph 1:1). For “saints” see comment on 2 Thess 1:10.
ἐν θεῷ πατρὶ καὶ κυρίῳ Ἰησοῦ Χριστῷ, “in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.” This phrase probably qualifies τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ Θεσσαλονικέων. Classical usage would require τῇ to be repeated before ἐν θεῷ to maintain the phrase in the attributive position, but Hellenistic usage is less strict. The church of the Thessalonians has its being “in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” (cf. 2 Thess 1:1). We may compare the collocation of God and Christ in a similar expression in 2:14, τῶν ἐκκλησιῶν τοῦ θεοῦ . . . ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ “the churches of God . . . in Christ Jesus”).
The noun
ἐκκλησία, “church, assembly” would not have any sacral association in the minds of recent converts from paganism: hence it is qualified by words which declare plainly whose “assembly” it is to which the converts now belong. Gk.
ἐκκλησία was quickly specialized among Gentile Christians to designate a company of believers in Jesus; its synonym
συναγωγή, “synagogue” was increasingly reserved to denote a Jewish congregation. The phrase
ἐκκλησία κυρίου is found occasionally in LXX to denote the people of Israel as “the assembly of the
Lord” (Heb.
)—repeatedly so in the early part of Deut 23. But God’s
ἐκκλησία in the New Testament age has no national frontiers; it comprises Jewish and Gentile believers without distinction.
Here, however, the believing community in Thessalonica is not called the church of God, but the church “in God.” This is an unusual expression in the Pauline corpus, where otherwise “in God” is used of boasting in God (Rom 2:17; 5:11) or of being hidden in God (Eph 3:9; Col 3:3). On the other hand, “in Christ,” “in Christ Jesus” or “in the Lord” is a characteristic Pauline expression, especially when it has “incorporative” force, pointing to believers’ participation in Christ’s risen life or their membership in his body. If this is the force of the words “in . . . the Lord Jesus Christ” here, then “in God the Father” must be understood in the same way. This is so uncharacteristic of Paul that Best (62) thinks the preposition ἐν must have instrumental force: “the Christian community brought into being by God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.” (The affirmation of Acts 17:28, “in him we live and move and have our being,” perhaps quoted from Epimenides of Crete, refers to the old creation and not to the new order of grace.) Possibly Silvanus rather than Paul is responsible for the present wording, which d...
