Full Text for Galatians- Volume 11 - When and where were Paul's letters written? (Video)

No. 11. >> There are 13 letters from the Apostle Paul that we now have as part of the New Testament. When were they written? Where was Paul when he wrote them? And do you think there were other letters from Paul that we no longer have? Obviously we have what God wanted us to have. But I'm curious, just the same. >>DR. ARTHUR A. JUST, JR.: As we study the Apostle Paul, Eric, it is important to recognize that even though we're having here in our Delta program only a study of Galatians and Romans, there are 11 other letters. And those letters form the corpus of Paul's theology and what he did in writing the churches that he founded during his missionary journeys. Now, there is as was the case with the New Testament always some debate about when things are written and where they are written from. But I have been very taken by a man I mentioned before Bo Reicke who in a another book called "Reexamining Paul's Letters" published after his death. I am very taken in the way by which he dates the letters. As I mentioned, Bo Reicke is sort of a friend of our seminary. And in fact, this book that talks about how the letters of Paul came into being was actually written in order to be given as lecture at other seminary when he became sick and right after that died. So we feel very tied to this it. And I think even scholars today, certainly conservative scholars, are very much taken by what Bo Reicke says in his book. Now, to begin -- and I have a handout on this so you can see the dates and the places. To begin I want to disagree with Bo Reicke. He dates the letter to the Galatians in the year 55. That is called the later dating. I'll talk a little more about that when we get to the Galatian epistle itself. But I would date -- and I think you know this from my previous comments -- I would date the letter to the Galatians before the Apostolic Council so that would be some time in the year 48 or very, very early in 49 before the Apostolic Council in Jerusalem. So that would be one place I would depart from him. But I do think that the rest of his dating is fairly good or at least generally speaking is good. Now, if you look at that handout you'll see that most of the letters, the main letters that we know to be Paul's kind of core, are written during the second and third missionary journeys. Now, during the second missionary journey when he is in Athens is when he writes back to the church in Thessalonica, which is in Macedonia, in the year 52, summer of 52 probably. This is considered by many this and I Thessalonians to be his earliest letters. The other letter, I Thessalonians is probably written from Corinth. Now, if you look at Acts, they are very close together, his time in Athens and Corinth. So these are extremely closely linked. I and II Thessalonians then were really probably the only letters he wrote during the second missionary journey. When you get to the third missionary journey at the very beginning of that journey when he's in Ephesus he writes to the Corinthians what is now called I Corinthians and he also writes I Timothy. When he then goes over to Macedonia in the summer of 57 as you can see on the sheet is where he writes the second letter to the Corinthians. And then in Corinth, Romans. And then in Melitus, Titus. Those are the that he most likely wrote during his third missionary journey. Now, if you study I and a II Corinthians, what we call the Corinthian correspondence, it is very clear that there is probably a third and a fourth letter that were written to the Corinthian Christians that we no longer have. What that tells us is that there are other letters by Paul. Paul probably wrote many other letters to the churches. But in the wisdom of the early Christian communities, the churches to which these letters were sent, as your question states very clearly, the letters that we have in the canon are the letters that God wanted us to have about the theology of Paul in his life in the church during his missionary journeys. And then later on, of course, during the years of captivity. Now, there is a little bit of a debate as to where the captivity letters come from. Because Paul was in prison we think in two places. We know that he was in prison in Caesarea Maritima. That is a certainty. There tends to be a general agreement that he also spent time in prison in Ephesus. So some people think he wrote the captivity letters from Ephesus and others from Caesarea Maritima. I think you can see that Bo Reicke suggests that his letters while he is in jail come from Caesarea. And these are letters that are now written back to Ephesus. Because that is essentially the locale for Philemon, Colossians, Ephesians and II Timothy. Those are all letters that would be written to the Christians in the area of Ephesus because Colossi is in that area. And we think that Philemon and II Timothy would be related to that area. Now, those would be written during that time in captivity, probably 59 and 60. When, if you remember before, he was consulting with Mark and Luke about the writing of their gospels. This was a very fertile time in the church's life. And here Paul had the luxury and the time and -- luxury, I mean the luxury of time -- to write these letters and to consult with his friends. This was not an imprisonment where he was seriously beaten. It was certainly a time when he was in prison. But he had a access to his friends and he clearly could write letters. I think the most telling think about Bo Reicke's theory is the fact he puts Philippians at the very end of Paul's life. Not everybody does. And I think that when Paul was in Rome, realizing that this might be the end for him, he writes his most beloved congregation. The congregation as I said before that I think Luke might have been the pastor of. This magnificent letter to the Philippians that we all know so well. Rejoice in the Lord always. And again I say rejoice. That letter from Rome to the Philippians is Paul's final letter. It is a letter of great passion and great love. It is a letter in which you see he does give them some admonitions. But it's a letter this in which you can see he feels completely and totally at home with them. Because they reflect his mind. They reflect his teaching. And most importantly of all, they reflect the Gospel of Jesus Christ.