Israel-Vergessenheit in den Pastoralbriefen: Ein neuer Vorschlag zu ihrer historisch-theologischen Verortung im 2. Jahrhundert n. Chr. unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Ignatius-Briefe by Michael Theobald (review)

This is a brick of a book. Those familiar with the usual length of the Stuttgarter Bibelstudien will find Michael Theobald's work has doubled it—but to good effect. Quite apart from its thesis (more aptly stated in the subtitle than in the title, since the absence of Israel and of any Pauline relationship to Jerusalem in the Pastoral Letters is only the spark for the investigation), this volume is a mine of precious information and analysis.

Michael Theobald succeeded Gerhard Lohfink in the professorship of NT at Tübingen. T. is a Pauline and Johannine specialist. Lohfink's primary focus was on the Lucan writings, but he also did some work on the Pastorals. (I should note that, as Lohfink's doctoral student 1984–1988, I was a minor participant in some of that work.). T. uses Lohfink's essays on the subject, especially "Die Vermittlung des Paulinismus zu den Pastoralbriefen" (first published in BZ 32 [1988] 169-88), and collected the following year in his Studien zum Neuen Testament (Stuttgarter biblische Aufsatzbände 5; Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1989) as a springboard for his opening analysis, which agrees with his predecessor in general but not in some details.

The present book opens with the statement that "forgetfulness of Israel" is a mark of many ancient Christian writings, including some of the "late" NT writings. From that starting point T. proceeds to a detailed examination of the (very much related!) content and dating of the Pastorals. Having written three volumes on Paul's letter to the Romans, T. is well qualified to discern the interrelationship between the Pastorals and that Pauline letter, which (in a fourteen-chapter form) he considers the model from which the author of the Pastorals worked.

Theobald's second chapter, after the introduction, deals in rapid fashion with the "one-vs. two-imprisonments of Paul in Rome theory." In the third chapter he sets out some preliminary methodological decisions: (1) that the Pastorals are pseudonymous; (2) that the original order was Titus, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy; (3) that the author's concept was one of concealed pseudepigraphy, with materials from genuine Pauline letters used to integrate the pseudepigraphical "letters" into the Corpus Paulinum; (4) that the Pastorals are independent of Acts (which raises further interesting questions about the date and early circulation of that work). T. considers Eusebius to be the first known witness to a "canonical" reading of the Pastorals, and it may be worth noting at this point that he concludes his volume with a vigorous attack on the practice of "canonical" reading among today's exegetes.

Two subsequent chapters (4 and 5) detail the relationship between the Pastorals and Romans; Paul's real, supposed, and projected itineraries are examined in detail, and the book contains a map of these. In chap. 6, T. relates the Pastorals to the Corpus Paulinum as it appears to have circulated in the period when the Pastorals were composed. In chap. 7, he examines early witnesses to the existence of a Pauline corpus (Marcion, the Muratorian fragment, Tertullian, p⁴⁶). In chap. 8, he discusses the relationship of the Pastorals to the "apostolic fathers"—1 Clement briefly, and the Ignatian letters at some length, because T. is at pains to demonstrate that the latter are late and pseudepigraphical. Polycarp's letter to the Philippians is found to be the oldest witness to the Pastorals, in the early second half of the second century.

In chap. 9, T. compares the itineraries of Paul in the Acts of Paul with those in the Pastorals and finds them remarkably similar. They focus on Asia Minor with a westward extension to Rome; again, there is no mention of a Pauline journey to Jerusalem, and this observation leads to...