Ken Berding explains some evidence gleaned from Polycarp’s Letter to the Philippians (c. AD 120) supporting Paul’s authorship of 1 & 2 Timothy; and as a disciple of John the Apostle (who would have been a reliable source of early church history), it certainly seems likely Polycarp had the oldest understanding of where the Pastoral Letters came from:
Polycarp clusters allusions to Paul’s writings around each of the three times that he mentions Paul’s name explicitly (in chapters 3, 9, and 11). You see, Polycarp is like some elderly Christians you may have met in your life who are so immersed in the Bible that they almost talk like the Bible. Polycarp had huge sections of the Old and New Testaments committed to memory. His letter could almost be described as a pastiche of allusions to various writings, about half of which are originally Paul’s. (His connection to Paul in this letter makes sense, of course, since he is writing his letter to a Pauline congregation….the Philippians!) Polycarp pretty randomly mixes allusions to Paul’s writings (half of his total allusions) with allusions to other writings (e.g., Psalms, Matthew, 1 Peter, 1 John). But there is one significant exception: when he mentions “Paul,” he clusters allusions to Paul right after the mention of his name. He does this all three times he mentions Paul, showing that this is a pattern….
In the first “cluster” of Pauline allusions are two clear allusions to 1 Timothy (1 Tim. 6:10 and 6:7 found in Pol. Phil. 4.1) and in the second “cluster” is one clear allusion to 2 Timothy (2 Tim. 4:10 found in Pol. Phil. 9.2). There are none from the Pastoral Letters in the third cluster….
This, of course, doesn’t prove that Polycarp is correct in his assessment. But, as Koester writes, Polycarp was “doubtlessly the most significant ecclesiastical leader of the first half of II C. E.” If anyone in the post-apostolic church was in a position to know the answer to this question, Polycarp of Smyrna was.
I trust that we won't see any follow-up post uncritically presenting the evidence that Paul did not write the Pastorals.
Posted by: Malebranche | July 13, 2012 at 06:24 AM
Good input, Malebranche.
Posted by: Daron | July 13, 2012 at 07:57 AM
Amy,
I don't think it's controversial that Polycarp knew 1 and 2 Tim. So it's a little odd that this Ken Berding fellow is presenting the evidence as some kind of remarkable discovery on his part.
Indeed the evidence from Polycarp is important for dating the Pastorals to before his death, which apparently occurred about 155 CE. I would be wary of dating them much earlier than that though. And anyway, this isn't going to get us Pauline authorship. For that, we need to weigh the evidence pro and con.
On the pro side are the majority of ancient witnesses like Polycarp who either apparently or explicitly accepted the Pastorals as authentic. (On the other hand, ancient Christians were often mistaken regarding issues of authorship, and writings which disagreed with the orthodox position tended not to survive as often.) Also we have the internal evidence that the author claimed to be Paul, and made mundane observations which are uncharacteristic of forgery. (On the other hand, it's not as if forgers made zero effort to trick their readers.)
On the con side are other ancient witnesses like Marcion and Tatian who rejected their authenticity. (Though these are in a minority, and again, ancient Christians were often mistaken about authorship issues.) Moreover, forgery in general was rife in the ancient Christian world, more the rule rather than the exception. In modern times, scholars have found the vocabulary and style of the Pastorals to differ from the other Pauline epistles (though this is perhaps mitigated by Paul's use of amanuenses in his other works). Furthermore, Paul's language in the Pastorals seems to paint a picture of a more well-developed Church hierarchy than we find in the undispited epistles, thereby suggesting a later date. (On the other hand, it might just be a coincidence that Paul failed to allude to the Church hierarchy in his other epistles, and even if not, Paul may simply have written the Pastorals later in his life.)
For my own part, I find the majority ancient witnesses compelling, and I'm not terribly impressed by the linguistic arguments against authenticity. I'm not ruling out forgery by any means---it was very common in ancient Christian circles, after all---but given the weight of the evidence I think the Pastorals are probably authentic to Paul.
Biblical scholars tend to disagree with me. So what do I know?
Posted by: Ben | July 13, 2012 at 08:10 AM