Students of the Pastorals might be interested in two recent presentations from the 2023 Priscilla and Aquila Center Annual Conference at Moore College. Lionel Windsor provides an overview of the issues involved in 1 Timothy 2:8–15 (video and notes), and Claire Smith discusses the household of God in 1 Timothy (video, notes).
Category: Conferences
The 2023 Stone Campbell Journal Conference occurred earlier this month in Knoxville, Tennessee. Interestingly, out of 31 papers listed from study groups and parallel sessions, four were on the Pastorals:
Baldwin, Brian. “Artemis and Wonder Woman: Artemis Ephesia and 1 Timothy 1–2.” Baldwin’s paper is grounded in the work of Sandra Glahn, which will be presented in her forthcoming volume, Nobody’s Mother: Artemis of the Ephesians in Antiquity and the New Testament. The paper is available here.
Hester, David. “Did Paul Accept The Apocryphon of Jannes and Jambres as Scripture?” Hester finds that Paul was not necessarily referring to the Apocryphon as such in 2 Tim 3:8, and that he did not accept the Apocryphon as Scripture. The paper is available here.
Pereira, Mary Ellen. “Antidotes for Treason: Eusebeia and the Themes of 1 Timothy.” Summary available here.
Sedlacek, James. “The Meaning of αὐθεντεῖν: Some Considerations for 1 Tim 2:12.” Summary available here.
A 2019 specialist conference on “Ethics in Titus” was held in Mainz (presentations and abstracts), We posted earlier about the forthcoming publication of its proceedings, which were made available from Mohr Siebeck in late 2022:
Ruben Zimmermann and Dogara Ishaya Manomi, eds. “Ready for Every Good Work” (Titus 3:1): Implicit Ethics in the Letter to Titus. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 484. Kontexte und Normen neutestamentlicher Ethik/ Contexts and Norms of New Testament Ethics 13. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2022.
The conference and collection of essays represents a veritable “who’s who” in Pastorals scholarship; I know of nothing comparable in recent years. More detailed information about the volume is available at Mohr Siebeck, and we have provided the contents of the volume below.
The 2022 SBL/AAR Annual Meeting program lists the following sessions which may be of interest to Pastorals researchers:
Margaret MacDonald, “Flexible Arrangements: Uncovering the Relationship between Space and Education in the Pastoral Epistles”
Victoria Perez Rivera, “Scripturalizing the Pastorals: Exegesis and Power”
Marion Ann Taylor, “Should Women Speak/Preach? Marie Dentière, Calvin, and Farel”
Anna C. Miller and Katherine A. Shaner, “Ensouled Tools and Social Death: Resisting Re-inscription of Aristotelian Natural Slavery in 1 Timothy”
Oluwarotimi Paul Adebayo, “A Socio-rhetorical Understanding of θεόπνευστος in 2 Timothy 3:16–17 in Its Contribution to Scripture Authority”
Judy Kim, “Who is the “Heretic” (Αἱρετικός) to be Shunned?: Origen’s Understanding of the Apostolic Injunction in Titus 3:10–11”
In the ETS Annual Meeting program, the Pastoral Epistles study group is absent for the first time in 11 years. However, several sessions at the annual meeting engage the Pastorals:
Courtney Veasey, “The Function of Καταστολή in 1 Tim 2:9 in the Identification of the Church as a Holy Community.”
David H. Warren, “Negation and Ellipsis in the Pastorals”
Hershel Wayne House, “Why Did Paul Forbid Women to Teach Men in the Church? (1 Timothy 2:11–15)”
I recently came across Todd Still’s report (NTS 68 [2022]: 231–37) of the 2021 SNTS General Meeting, held virtually and hosted by KU Leuven. When I checked the program, I found an unusual number of Pastorals presentations — two of the six main papers and one of the twelve short papers.
Jean-Bosco Matand Bulembat. “Et la femme sera sauvée grâce à la progéniture? Approche contextuelle d’une relecture de Gn 2–3 en 1 Tm 2, 11–15” (main paper)
Simon Butticaz, “De la parenté d’auteurs à la ‘mémoire générationelle’ (P. Nora): L’oeuvre de Luc et les Lettres pastorales en relation” (main paper)
Matthew E. Gordley, “The Role of Hymnic and Epainetic Discourse in First Timothy” (short paper)
The schedule for the SBL 2021 Annual Meeting in San Antonio is now available. The following sessions should be of interest to specialists in the Pastorals. Click here to read abstracts of these presentations.
Carson Bay, University of Bern
“To Instruct, to Rebuke, to Correct”: 2 Timothy 3:16, Josephus Against Apion 1.3, and Hellenistic Apologetic between Christian Epistolography and Jewish Historiography
Greg Beale, Reformed Theological Seminary
“Fight the Good Fight” in 1 Tim. 1:18
Brad Bitner, Westminster Seminary California
1 Timothy and the Confession Inscriptions of Asia Minor
David R. Edwards, Florida State University
“Taken Up in Glory”: Early Christian Traditions of the Ascension of Jesus in Light of 1 Tim. 3:16
Paul Robertson, University of New Hampshire
Cluster Mapping Paul’s Letters: Grouping and Identifying the Location of Stylistic Similarities
Jonathan Sanchez, University of Notre Dame
Making an Example: The Rhetorical Usefulness of Timothy in 1 Timothy
W. Andrew Smith, Shepherds Theological Seminary
Progress towards the ECM of the Pastoral Epistles
Angela Standhartinger, University of Marburg, Germany
Duties of Age: Old Women in the Pastoral Epistles in Context
Adam White, Alphacrucis College
Setting the Boundaries: Reading 1 Timothy and Titus as Community Charters
The preliminary schedule for ETS 2021 is out, and the following sessions should be of direct interest to students of the Pastorals.
Pastoral Epistles study group
The study group is coordinating with the conference theme of “Wealth and Poverty” and includes the following sessions:
Gary L. Shultz Jr., “Wealth, Contentment, and Union with Christ in the Pastorals.”
Martin Sheldon, “Generous Giving as a Means of Storing Up Treasure for the Coming Age (1 Tim 6:17–19).”
Timothy Swinson, “Covetousness or Charity: One Face of the ‘Lawful’ Use of the Law in 1 Timothy.”
Greg A. Couser, “Bondage or Blessing? Resolving the Tension in Paul’s Teaching on Wealth in 1 Tim 6.”
Other sessions
Terry Wilder, “Revisiting Pseudonymity, the New Testament, and the Noble Lie.”
Bruce A. Sabados, “From Whom You Have Learned Them: The Role of Ethos in Paul’s Second Letter to Timothy.”
David R. Wallace, “Paul’s Instruction in 1 Timothy 3:8–13: Men and Women Deacons?”
Philip B. Payne, “Seven Reasons to Identify the πρεσβύτας, πρεσβύτιδας, and νεωτέρους in Titus 2:2–8 as Elders.”
Sandra Glahn, “The ‘Widow’ in the Early Church: Marital Demarcation, Office Title, or Both?”
Greg Stiekes, “The Fall of Eve in the Letters of Paul”
The 2021 Tyndale Fellowship Conference included two presentations on the Pastorals:
Jermo van Nes, “The Letters to Timothy and Titus: Second-Century Writings?”
Abstract: Many contemporary New Testament scholars consider 1-2 Timothy and Titus, collectively known as the Pastoral Epistles (PE), to be pseudonymous writings. Some of them do so on the basis of the PE’s comparatively large number of hapaxes, which they believe is closer to the writings of the Apostolic Fathers and early Apologists dating from the second century AD. The aim of this presentation is to reconsider this influential thesis as once advocated by P.N. Harrison (1921). It will be argued that the (statistical) evidence presented by Harrison is flawed as he gives no proper definition of hapaxes and early Apologists, unevenly compares the PE collectively to individual writings, and does not use any criteria to show how his results are statistically significant. By way of alternative, this presentation will (1) provide a proper definition of hapaxes, (2) count how many of these hapaxes recur in all Greek religious second-century writings listed as such in the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae database, and (3) by means of (simple) linear regression analysis determine whether or not 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and/or Titus in comparison to each of the other Pauline letters share significantly more hapaxes with these second-century writings.
John Percival, “Rhetorical and Theological Strategy in the Narrative Substructure of 2 Timothy”
Abstract: This paper demonstrates that an examination of the narrative substructure of 2 Timothy sheds light on its rhetorical and theological strategy. Narrative approaches to Pauline literature and theology have borne much fruit over the last 35 years, but the letters to Timothy and Titus have, as is often the case, been largely overlooked. Rather than looking at the Pastoral Epistles as a homogenous corpus, in this paper we will consider the distinctive contribution of 2 Timothy. Focus falls on four areas: God’s pre-temporal action, the time of “the Scriptures,” the first appearing of Christ, and the second, eschatological appearing of Christ. By analysing the way these areas are presented, and how they fit together into a coherent, salvation-historical whole, we illuminate the rhetorical and theological strategy employed in 2 Timothy. Addressed to a church leader dealing with false teaching and opposition, the narrative of God’s plan of salvation offers unique resources affirming God’s eternal commitment to his people, culminating in them sharing Christ’s eschatological reign. Problems occur when narrative elements become dislocated, for example, by claiming the resurrection has already occurred.