The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible New Testament (235 page)

2:8 Jesus will slay him:
Christ will descend from heaven as a divine Warrior to destroy the man of lawlessness with a word and trample the last remnants of evil underfoot (1 Cor 15:24).
the breath of his mouth:
Or, "the Spirit of his mouth". • Paul is alluding to Is 11:4, where the Messiah appears as a judge who vindicates the poor and oppressed and slays the wicked with his powerful word. 
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2:9 activity of Satan:
Suggests the man of lawlessness is an instrument in the hands of the devil.
pretended signs:
Displays of demonic power that will captivate sinners and lead them blindly astray. These are not miracles in the strict sense, which are properly the work of God, but illusions that make sinners think the power of God is being witnessed. 
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2:11 a strong delusion:
God will respond to the wicked by worsening their problem. Because they will defy God and willfully reject the truth, he will permit them to love their evils and errors without the merciful restraint of his grace (Is 6:9-10; 29:9-10).
See note on Rom 1:24
. • Paul says "God will send" because, by his own just judgment, God will permit the devil to do these things. Being judged in this way, sinners will be deceived; and being deceived, they will be judged (St. Augustine,
City of God
20, 19). 
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2:13 God chose you:
By an eternal decree of love (Eph 1:5).
sanctification:
The processes of becoming "holy", which Paul naturally links with the Holy Spirit's work within us.
See note on 1 Thess 4:3
. 
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2:15 the traditions:
The teaching that Paul handed over to his readers, whether in writing or by oral instruction. This was the standard against which doctrinal claims (2:5) and moral behavior (3:6) were to be measured and judged. Even Paul's personal example was a form of apostolic catechesis (3:79; 1 Cor 11:2; 2 Tim 1:13) (CCC 75-76, 82). • The apostles did not hand down everything in writing; many unwritten things were handed down as well, and both written and unwritten are worthy of belief. So let us also regard the tradition of the Church as worthy of belief (St. John Chrysostom,
Homilies on 2 Thessalonians
4). 
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3:1-2
Paul requests intercession for the progress of the gospel and the protection of missionaries entrusted with it. It is because Paul lived and worked in the midst of constant danger that he relied on his churches to pray for a safe and successful ministry (Rom 15:30-31; 2 Cor 1:11; 1 Thess 5:25). 
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3:1 the word of the Lord:
The gospel message itself.
See note on 1 Thess 2:13
. 
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3:4 which we command:
Whether in person (3:10) or in writing (3:6, 12). 
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3:6-15
Paul addresses an embarrassing situation in the Thessalonian Church. Certain believers, perhaps enamored with the idea that Christ could return at any moment, became
idlers,
who stopped working for a living,
freeloaders,
who relied on the charity of others to support themselves, and
busybodies,
who started meddling in the affairs of everyone else. Paul insists they should return to work, earn their own living, and mind their own business (3:12). He urges the Church to get involved in correcting this problem by warning such brothers (3:15) and, if necessary, shunning them if they refuse correction (3:14). See introduction:
Purpose and Themes.
 
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3:8 toil and labor:
Paul and companions supported themselves with a trade or some other form of employment on top of their missionary work. Paul was teaching the Thessalonians by example about the dignity and necessity of human labor (CCC 2427). See notes on 1 Thess 2:9 and 4:11. 
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3:10 when we were . . . with you:
Suggests idleness was already an issue when Paul ministered among them. This is why his earlier letter urges the Church to "admonish the idle" (1 Thess 5:14).
let him not eat:
I.e., let him not live off the labor of others without contributing efforts of his own. • Manual labor aims at obtaining food, removing idleness, curbing fallen desires, and enabling almsgiving. As a means of acquiring food, work is commanded as a precept, so that one who has no other means of livelihood is bound to work. This is signified by the words of the apostle (St. Thomas Aquinas,
Summa Theologiae
II-II, 187, 3). 
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3:14 may be ashamed:
Disciplinary exclusion from the life and liturgy of the Church would serve
(1)
to deter others from living or contemplating a life of idleness and
(2)
to induce repentance from the offenders in the hope of restoring them to full fellowship. 
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3:17 I, Paul, write this:
Paul takes up the pen to write the final greeting with his own hand, having dictated the rest of the letter to a secretary. His personal signature and remarks authenticate the epistle as a genuine apostolic work (1 Cor 16:21; Col 4:18). He stresses the point here because the Thessalonians may have received a forged letter that alleged to be from Paul but was not (2 Thess 2:2).
every letter of mine:
Implies that Paul was in the habit of sending out letters. The statement strikes many scholars as odd, since the Thessalonian letters are the two earliest NT writings that come from Paul. Some take this as evidence that someone other than the apostle—most likely a later disciple, familiar with the corpus of Pauline epistles—must be the real author of this letter. The argument is ingenious, but it must be remembered that not all of Paul's correspondence necessarily made its way into the collection of NT books. It is possible that some of his letters were neither canonized nor preserved (see, e.g., 1 Cor 5:9 and Col 4:16). The existence of noncanonical letters written during Paul's early ministry is not established with certainty, but it cannot be ruled out. 
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INTRODUCTION TO

Author
 First Timothy purports to be a letter from the Apostle Paul (1:1), as do the letters of 2 Timothy (2 Tim 1:1) and Titus (Tit 1:1). These three epistles, closely related to one another in theme and purpose, are collectively known as the Pastoral Epistles. From earliest times, Christians accepted these letters as authentic compositions of Paul. Bishops such as Clement of Rome (
A.D.
95) and Polycarp (
A.D.
120) allude to the Pastoral Epistles as genuine Pauline writings, and later theologians such as Irenaeus (
A.D.
180), Tertullian (
A.D.
200), and Clement of Alexandria (
A.D.
200) make direct assertions to this effect.

Despite the constancy of this view in early Christian times, the tradition of Pauline authorship came under fire in the nineteenth century. Increasingly scholars began to regard the Pastoral Epistles as pseudepigraphical letters that were written in Paul's name by one or more of his disciples several decades after his death. This position, which continues to dominate much of modern scholarship, contends that the Pastoral Epistles are conspicuously different from Paul's undisputed letters in vocabulary, style, and emphasis, and for this reason, they cannot be regarded as genuine writings of the apostle. Regarding their historical content, some insist these writings bear witness to an advanced stage of Church government that did not exist in Paul's day and that the details they claim to provide of Paul's missionary efforts are inconsistent with his travels known from the Book of Acts and the other Pauline epistles. These and other arguments provide the basis for the pseudepigraphical hypothesis.

That being said, the distinctiveness of the Pastoral Epistles is a factor that must be weighed carefully, for the evidence can be interpreted in different ways. For instance, even critics who deny Pauline authorship generally recognize traces of Paul's thinking throughout these letters, and this leaves open the possibility of a closer relationship to the apostle than that envisioned by pseudepigraphical advocates. Stylistic differences between the Pastorals and Paul's undisputed writings, while undeniable, probably have more to do with differences in purpose and subject matter than anything else. After all, the Pastoral Epistles are written to pastors (Timothy and Titus) who are already well-seasoned and educated leaders in the Church, while Paul's other letters are written to instruct young congregations in the basics of Christian faith. Allegations that the ecclesiastical hierarchy outlined in the Pastorals was unknown to the Church of Paul's day are likewise overdrawn, since several passages in the undisputed letters of Paul point to a structured system of leadership already in place during the earliest days of the Church (1 Cor 12:28; Phil 1:1; 1 Thess 5:12; cf. Acts 14:23; 20:17). As for Paul's travel itinerary, one must admit that these letters claim to give us information about Paul's career that is otherwise uncorroborated in the NT. Nevertheless, this can be taken as an earmark of Pauline authorship, since it is more likely that a literary forgery would stay within the outline of Paul's life set forth in the Book of Acts and his genuine letters rather than depart from it. Otherwise, the attempt to pass off these letters as authentic Pauline writings would surely fail to convince the original recipients that they were reading the words of the apostle. In the end, the case against Pauline authorship is neither airtight nor immune to criticism, and the tradition that Paul himself composed the Pastoral Epistles can still be critically and convincingly defended.

Date
 Proponents of Pauline authorship generally date 1 Timothy in the mid 60s, between Paul's first Roman imprisonment (
A.D.
60 to 62) and his martyrdom at the hands of Emperor Nero (ca.
A.D.
67). It is likely that during this intervening time Paul resumed his missionary activities in the eastern parts of the Roman world and then turned his attention west toward a new mission in the province of Spain (Rom 15:24). Timothy's placement in "Ephesus" and Paul's movements in "Macedonia" put the letter somewhere in the eastern phase of this period (1 Tim 1:3). Scholars who deny the Pauline authorship of 1 Timothy date it much later, between
A.D.
80 and 110.