Bart D. Ehrman's Blog, page 10

The Pastoral Epistles of 2 Timothy and Titus in a Nutshell

I continue now with my nutshell overviews of the Pastorals by summarizing 2 Timothy and Titus.  I begin with a 50-word overview of the book Timothy. 2 Timothy, a more intimate letter (allegedly) by Paul to Timothy, recounts their past relationship, expresses hope that his disciple will come to visit him in prison in Rome, [...]

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The Pastoral Epistle of 1 Timothy in a Nutshell

In this series providing summaries of each book of the New Testament “in a nutshell” I have dealt with three of the letters that claim to be written by Paul but probably were not: Colossians, Ephesians, and 2 Thessalonians.  We now come to the three letters that are grouped together and called the “Pastoral Epistles,” [...]

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In the Weeds with the Author of 2 Thessalonians

I thought it migh be interesting for readers who like on occasion to get down into the weeds of scholarship to see a more detailed argument for how the *similarity* of 2 Thessalonians to 1 Thessalonians suggests not that Paul wrote both of them but that a later author (of 2 Thessalonians) was imitating Paul's [...]

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2 Thessalonians, The Modern State of Israel, World War III, and the Return of Jesus

An obscure verse in 2 Thessalonians may conceivably lead to World War III.  OK, it sounds sensational and implausible, but hear me out. The following is taken from my book Armageddon (Simon & Schuster, 2023), edited for this occasion. ****************************** Evangelical Christians historically have believed that the Bible predicts the future, that many prophecies are being fulfilled [...]

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2 Thessalonians: For Further Reading

Here is an annotated list of books on 2 Thessalonians, most of them relevant to all the Deutero-Pauline epistles (that is, the letters that are assigned a “secondary” standing in the New Testament collection of Paul’s letters because scholars doubt they were actually composed by Paul himself) with a couple of commentaries that deal with [...]

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Time to Vote: Help Choose the Next Platinum Post!

Dear Platinum Members, Let’s call this a humble moment of accountability: we’ve fallen behind on something important. As many of you know, one of the special privileges of Platinum membership is the opportunity to submit guest posts to the blog — and then, every four submissions, we open it up for a Platinum vote. The [...]

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2 Thessalonians: Who Wrote It, When, and Why?

In my previous post I explained the major theses and emphases of 2 Thessalonians, and pointed out that in many ways it is very similar in its concerns and themes to 1 Thesssalonians.  But I also said that it is commonly considered by scholars to be "Deutero-Pauline," that is, written by a later author only [...]

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2 Thessalonians in a Nutshell

In this series of “nutshell” overviews of each of the books of the New Testament, we move now to one of the most intriguing instances of a book that claims to be written by Paul, but was apparently, instead, written by someone else who wanted his readers to think he was the apostle. 2 Thessalonians [...]

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Interesting Questions from Readers (5/27/2025)

Here are some particularly sticky questions I've gotten recently, with expanded answers to share with all of you:   QUESTION: Bart, what should we understand by “exousia” in I Cor 11.10?   RESPONSE: Ah, right. A woman is to have an "authority" (exousia) on her head. It’s a confusing verse in a confusing passage.  The [...]

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1 Thessalonians and the Coming Rapture

One of the most intriguing passages of 1 Thessalonians is also  both the most widely referred to (these days) and the most universally misread.  It is the passage that conservative Christians cite to support the idea of the coming “rapture,” when Jesus will allegedly arrive from heaven to take his followers out of the world [...]

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