In a recent post, we looked back at the last year’s publications on the Pastorals. Here, we’ll take a look at some forthcoming titles — expected publications whose date of release ranges from less than a month away to over a decade in the future. Most are monograph-length publications, with a few others sprinkled in for good measure. My deep thanks goes to a number of authors who helpfully were able to provide a short description of their work, and publishers who responded to inquiries about forthcoming titles! If you are aware of other forthcoming academic work on the Pastorals, please leave a comment.

The list given below is provided in pdf format (hyperlinks included) here.

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Beale, Gregory K., and Christopher Beetham. Volume on the Pastorals in the Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, forthcoming 2022. From the author: “The contribution of the commentary will be in the area of the use of the OT in the Pastoral Epistles.”

Blazosky, Bryan. The Law’s Universal Condemning and Enslaving Power. BBRSup 24. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, forthcoming [June] 2019. Publisher’s synopsis. From the author: “In spite of the wealth of literature on Paul’s view of the Mosaic law’s relationship to Gentile Christians, little has been written about how the law relates to Gentile unbelievers. This book examines whether Paul teaches that Gentiles are condemned by and enslaved under the law. Furthermore, this study explores the logic of Paul’s approach and compares his view on this issue to views found in the Old Testament and Second Temple Jewish literature. As far as the contribution of this book to the Pastoral Epistles, on the one hand, I only cover one section of the Pastoral Epistles (1 Timothy 1:8–11) in part of one chapter (the chapter on Pauline writings outside of Galatians and Romans). On the other hand, I intentionally address 1 Timothy 1:8–11 because it is so relevant to the topic of Gentile condemnation and the law of Moses and also because this text is so often overlooked in Paul and the law studies simply because it’s in the Pastoral Epistles. In my treatment of this text, I examine what Paul means by νομίμως in 1 Timothy 1:8, Paul’s extensive allusion to the Decalogue in 1 Timothy 1:9–10, and Paul’s argument that one of the proper uses of the Mosaic law is to use it to expose and condemn the lawless.”

Bray, Gerald. Bray’s work on the Pastorals will appear in the International Theological Commentary, a newer series produced as a sort of companion series to the International Critical Commentary. ITC series webpage.

Brown, Michael I. 2 Timothy. Lectio Continua Expository Commentary on the New Testament. Dallas, GA: Tolle Lege, forthcoming.

Dodson, Joseph R. “Paul, the Pastor, and the Gift.” In Christian Origins and the Formation of the Early Church. Edited by Stanley Porter and Andrew Pitts. TENTS/ECHC 5. Leiden: Brill, forthcoming 2019 or 2020. From the author: “This essay is a modified version of a paper I delivered in San Antonio at ETS in 2016. It is a response to John M. G. Barclay’s Paul and the Gift. In that monograph, Barclay admits that his conclusions might be different if he included all of the letters ascribed to Paul, and perhaps Barclay’s promised sequel will include these other epistles. Until then, I offer this essay as an initial attempt to apply Barclay’s heuristic model beyond the undisputed letters. Therefore, I select the most relevant passages from the Pastoral Epistles regarding God’s grace-gift (1 Tim 1:12–17; 2 Tim 1:8–12; and Titus 2:11–3:8) and investigate them in view of Barclay’s six perfections on the one hand and in light of Barclay’s conclusions on the other.” 

Ebojo, Edgar Battad. “A Scribe and His Manuscript: An Investigation into the Scribal Habits of Papyrus 46 (p. Chester Beatty ii – p. Mich. Inv. 6238).” PhD thesis, University of Birmingham, 2014. The question of whether the LTT could have been part of P46 receives extended attention on pp. 204–35.
The author plans to publish the work, though no immediate plans have been made for publication; the quality of the work, however, suggests there will be no problem in finding a publisher. In the meantime, the thesis is publicly available here and supplemental information here.

Fitzgerald, John T. The Pastoral Epistles: A Commentary. Hermeneia. Minneapolis: Fortress, forthcoming. Fitzgerald’s work will replace the important Dibelius/Conzelmann volume in Hermeneia, and is slated for release in the late 2020s, over 50 years after its predecessor’s publication. Anyone familiar with Fitzgerald’s previous publications will rightly expect his Pastorals commentary to give special attention to the letters as distinctly Christian documents within the broader context of the Greco-Roman world.

Gatiss, Lee, and Bradley G. Green. These two scholars are preparing the volume on the Pastorals in the Reformation Commentary on Scripture series. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, forthcoming 2019.

Hall, David W. 1 Timothy. Lectio Continua Expository Commentary on the New Testament. Dallas, GA: Tolle Lege, forthcoming.

Herzer, Jens. “The Epiphany of God and the Coming of the Messiah: Reading the Septuagint with the Pastoral Epistles.” In Epiphanies of the Divine in the Septuagint and the New Testament: V. International Symposium of the Corpus Judaeo-Hellenisticum Novi Testamenti, 14–17 May 2015, Nottingham. Edited by Roland Deines and Mark Wreford. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, forthcoming 2019. Publisher volume description.

Houwelingen, P. H. R. (Rob) van. “Power, Powerlessness, and Authorised Power in 1 Timothy 2:8–15.” Forthcoming in Power in the New Testament. Edited by A. B. Merz and P. G. R. de Villiers. Leuven: Peeters, 2019 or 2020 projected. This essay is presently available here, along with a summary of its contents.

Hultgren, Arland J. “The Pastoral Epistles and the Scriptures of Israel.” In Paul and Scripture. Edited by Stanley E. Porter and Christopher D. Land. Pauline Studies 10. Leiden: Brill, [February] 2019.

Hutson, Christopher R. The Pastoral Epistles. Paideia Commentaries. Grand Rapids: Baker, forthcoming [November] 2019. Publisher’s description: “Among commentaries on the Pastoral Epistles, this one is distinctive for its emphasis on ministerial formation. While considering the particular features of each individual letter, Hutson reads these three letters collectively as an epistolary handbook for young ministers. The ‘Theological Issues’ sections often discuss how aspects of these letters inform Christian ministry.
“Hutson’s exegetical analysis explores how the letters reflect an early Christian community still close to its Jewish roots and living in a Greco-Roman society that is always uncomprehending and often hostile. He applies James Scott’s ‘hidden transcript’ theory to show how Pastoral Paul’s advice helped Christian communities deflect suspicion and establish positive engagement with the wider society. Hutson’s approach is fruitful for understanding ethical issues in these letters, including teachings about slavery, women, and the ethical expectations of Christian leaders. At the same time, Hutson resists a hermeneutic of suspicion that views these letters as hopelessly patriarchal and written to inculcate Roman domestic values as normative for Christian churches. Hutson mounts robust arguments against discrimination on the basis of gender, ethnicity, or social class, but he does so from the Christological and eschatological warrants that he finds to be driving the letters.
“Theological reflections are broadly ecumenical, drawing insights from Orthodox, Catholic, Anglican, Methodist, Reformed, Pietist, Pentecostal, and other traditions to show how Christians from various periods and contexts have understood and applied these letters. The goal is to open up a deep well of resources from which ministers can draw as they seek to engage new challenges in the twenty-first century.”

Jeon, Paul. 2 Timothy. Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2020 projected.

Langford, Andrew M. Langford’s 2018 University of Chicago dissertation, “Diagnosing Deviance: Pathology and Polemic in the Pastoral Epistles,” was supervised by Margaret M. Mitchell. Several factors suggest its eventual publication, so I include here the abstract provided at ProQuest: “This dissertation argues that the single, post-Pauline author of the Pastoral Epistles crafts a stigmatizing depiction of his theological opponents by spatializing, demonizing, and pathologizing their alleged deviance in order to provide an authoritative model for how to address unwanted diversity in teaching, community norms, church governance, and the interpretation of Paul’s letters in the post-Pauline era. It demonstrates that the Pastor creatively synthesizes diverse sources, pursuing his agenda both through creative acts of authorial fiction that draw upon key themes and terms from the Pauline homologoumena and through the appropriation of language and ideas from contemporary philosophical and medical discourses. This dissertation contributes new insights on the traditional problem of opponents in the Pastorals by 1) identifying and interpreting hitherto under-appreciated narrative devices like the spatializing of deviance and obedience, 2) demonstrating through research in ancient medical literature that the Pastor’s use of medical imagery is more pervasive and cohesive than previously thought, 3) arguing for the necessity of interpreting the Pastor’s pathologizing of deviance in light of ancient disease etiologies and models of corporeality, 4) demonstrating the pervasiveness and function of the rhetoric of mental illness (itself a culturally constructed category drawn upon polemically by the Pastor) with insights from disability studies, and 5) drawing upon recent interpretive insights about the function of authorial fiction and “corrective composition” to demonstrate that the Pastor is self-consciously appropriating particular moments in the Pauline epistolary in order to craft a backwards and forward-looking approach to the problem of opponents per se in the Pastoral Epistles. This dissertation constitutes another contributing argument for the unified composition of these letters as a mini-corpus designed to supplement an emerging corpus of Paul’s letters.”

Lappenga, Benjamin, and David Downs. These authors have a chapter-length treatment of 2 Timothy in a forthcoming [September] 2019 volume on pistis in connection with the exalted Christ in Paul’s writings. From Lappenga: “The opening chapter on 2 Timothy introduces the volume by showing the overwhelming consensus among interpreters who hold to a subjective element of the phrase pistis Christou that Jesus’s pistis is demonstrated principally, if not exclusively, in his suffering and death on the cross. We establish the first challenge to this consensus through a close reading of 2 Tim 2:8-13. Here we demonstrate that to speak of the faithfulness of Christ in 2 Timothy is primarily to speak of the fidelity of the risen Lord, who will ensure the eschatological salvation of those who are ‘in Christ.'”

MacLean, Malcolm. Titus and Philemon. Lectio Continua Expository Commentary on the New Testament. Dallas, GA: Tolle Lege, forthcoming.

Maier, Harry. “The Entrepreneurial Widows of 1 Timothy.” In Women, Christianity, and Judaism. Edited by Ilaria Ramelli and Joan Taylor. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020 projected. An early draft of the essay may be found here, along with a summary description. From the author: “This essay revisits the instructions in 1 Timothy concerning the exhortations for widows (a term in Greek that designates both previously married and unmarried women) younger than 65 to (re)marry. It locates the instruction in the Roman economy in which women were artisans who controlled their assets and it argues that the Pastor’s concern is that women not function as patrons of meetings. Consideration of laws of inheritance and control of property in marriage helps in understanding the instruction single and widowed women to (re)marry. The pastor wants to assure that the control of property be ceded to husbands, in this case to Christian men whom the Pastor entrusts with sole authority to lead Christ assemblies. The essay thus seeks to understand the rule concerning (re)marriage through consideration of the creation of social agency the economy of the Roman Empire offered businesswomen.”

Merz, Annette. “‘New’ Woman? Bruce W. Winters These und ihre Rezeption in der exegetischen Diskussion kritisch beleuchtet.” Pages 209-34 in Frauen im antiken Judentum und frühen Christentum. Edited by Jörg Frey and Nicole Rupschus. WUNT 2. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, forthcoming [May] 2019. Publisher volume description.

Merz, Annette. Merz is preparing for publication an expanded English-language version of her article “Gen(de)red power: Die Macht des Genres im Streit um die Frauenrolle in Pastoralbriefen und Paulusakten.” HTS Teologiese Studies 68.1 (2012): 71–80.

Nel, Marius. 1–2 Timothy, Titus. The Story of God Bible Commentary. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, forthcoming.

Pao, David W. Volume on the Pastorals in the Brill Exegetical Commentary Series. Leiden: Brill, forthcoming 2020 or 2021. According to Brill, this new commentary series is projected to launch at the end of 2019, so Pao’s volume should be one of the first published in the series. From the author: “There will be five major sections for each paragraph of biblical text: translation, text-critical analysis, grammatical analysis, historical analysis, and theological analysis. Unique to this series is close interaction with the Greek text, informed by recent developments in the study of the Greek language.”

Porter, Stanley E. Pastoral Epistles. Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament. Grand Rapids, Baker: forthcoming. From the author: “This commentary approaches the Pastoral Epistles as letters written by the apostle Paul. Several of the distinctives are consideration of issues surrounding time and place of authorship, appraisal of the influence of context upon interpretation of what Paul writes, and a fuller consideration of issues of language than contained in most commentaries. As a result of such considerations, there are a number of new readings of passages offered that attempt to break out of some interpretations that are grounded more in tradition than they are in the language of the text.”

Smith, Andrew. Smith is working on the Pastorals in the Editio Critica Maior project. He contributed this information about his work: “I estimate the editorial work for the ECM edition of the Pastoral Epistles should take 3-5 years. However, there are a number of factors that make an estimate difficult: (1) we are using a larger data set than the other ECM project teams (~300 manuscripts), at least for the collation step (i.e., not all of these manuscripts will make it to the apparatus); (2) the schedules for the versionists’ work may not align well with this project (that may cause a delay); and (3) we’re the first project team that has no central meeting place for an editorial board (such as the INTF).”

Stanley, Steve. 1 & 2 Timothy, Titus. Evangelical Exegetical Commentary.

Van Neste, Ray. Van Neste is working on the Pastorals volume in the Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament series. Nashville: B&H Academic, forthcoming.

Wieland, George. “Sin and Its Remedy in the Pastoral Epistles.” Wieland will be contributing this chapter to a publication (edited by John Goodrich and Nijay Gupta) which collects and supplements the work of a recent IBR study group on Sin and Its Remedy in Paul. Projected publication date: 2019.

Zamfir, Korinna. “Eusebeia, Sōtēria and Civic Loyalty in the Pastoral Epistles.” In “Make Disciples of All Nations”: The Appeal and Authority of Christian Faith in Hellenistic-Roman Times. Edited by Loren T. Stuckenbruck, Beth Langstaff, and Michael Tilly. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 2/482. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, forthcoming [March] 2019. Publisher volume description.

In addition to the above publications, Jermo van Nes is editing the presentations from the recent conference held in Leuven, Belgium (program) titled “The Pastoral Epistles: Common Themes, Individual Compositions?” They are forthcoming in an issue of Journal for the Study of Paul and His Letters.

Additionally, the proceedings of the Mainz “Ethics in Titus” conference, organized by Ruben Zimmermann and Dogara Ishaya Manomi, are planned for publication in the WUNT series.