Honor Discourse and Social Engineering in 1 Thess - David DeSilva

[JSNT 64 (1996) 49-79]
'WORTHY OF HIS KINGDOM': HONOR DISCOURSE AND SOCIAL

ENGINEERING IN 1 THESSALONIANS
David A. deSilva
Ashland Theological Seminary, 910 Center Street, Ashland, OH 44805
Discussion of 1 Thessalonians has tended to disregard the importance of

the thanksgiving sections within Paul's strategic response to the situation
of the believers in Thessalonica. For example, the commentaries of
Wanamaker and Morris leave ch. 1 out of their discussion of the occasion and purpose of this letter.1 I propose that the thanksgiving section
functions as much more than a captatio benevolentiae} assuring the
addressees of the authors' good will and putting them in a receptive
frame of mind. Rather, it addresses a real concern of Paul's for the
congregation(s), namely that they should be insulated from the effects of
1. C.A. Wanamaker, The Epistles to the Thessalonians: A Commentary on the
Greek Text (NIGTC; Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1990), pp. 60-63; L. Morris,
The First and Second Epistles to the Thessalonians (NICNT; Grand Rapids, MI:
Eerdmans, 1991), pp. 6-11; E.J. Richard, First and Second Thessalonians (Sacra
Pagina, 11; Collegeville, MN: Michael Glazier, 1995), p. 31. Wanamaker does
recognize, however, that the 'theme of praise' introduced in 1 Thess. 1.2-3, 6-9 has
'a paranetic goal throughout the letter' (Epistles, p. 49), which sought to 'maintain
the boundaries and distinctive features of the Christian world that the Thessalonians
had come to inhabit through their conversion' (Epistles, p. 47, citing S.K. Stowers,
Letter Writing in Greco-Roman Antiquity [Library of Early Christianity, 5;
Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1986], pp. 77-81). Richard (Thessalonians, p. 31)
understands the 'paraenetic task' to begin only 'after a thanksgiving'. This is an error
repeated in the investigation of the occasion for 2 Thessalonians, which focuses
largely on the doctrinal error concerning the 'Day of the Lord' in ch. 2 and the 'idle'
in ch. 3. See Morris, Thessalonians, pp. 11-12; Richard, Thessalonians, pp. 28, 31.
2. So R.F. Collins, The Birth of the New Testament (New York: Crossroad,
1993), pp. 136, 153 on 1 Thess. 1.2-10.
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Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 (1996)
the negative opinion of outsiders toward the Christian group and should
act only with a view toward their honor and security before God and
the supra-local Christian community.
In the opening thanksgiving section, Paul uses considerations of honor
and dishonor to secure the community's commitment to its alternative
way of life in the face of society's own social-engineering program of
shaming the deviants back into conformity with the dominant cultural
values.3 Paul seeks to reinforce boundary-maintaining and group-preserving mechanisms such as the new court of reputation which consists
of God and the churches of God throughout the world, to disarm the
sting of society's displays of disapproval of the believers' new loyalties
and values, and to incite the believers to continue in their present course
through appeals to the promise of their future honor and safety in the
kingdom of God. This work is by no means limited to the thanksgiving
sections, but unites them with the other parts of each letter under this
overarching concern which first prompted Paul to send Timothy to
encourage the converts, whose work Paul seeks to consolidate and
advance in 1 Thessalonians.4
1. Honor Discourse as a Group-Maintaining Device
In the light of the multiplication of discussions about honor and shame in
the Mediterranean world as 'codes' or 'pivotal values' which provide
the correct lens for reading New Testament texts, it seems prudent to
lay here a firmer foundation for understanding how ancient orators and
writers actually used these concepts and to what end.5 For our purposes
in reading the Thessalonian letters, this means looking more closely at
3. That the society's opposition weighed heavily on the minds of the new converts, causing them to question the correctness and validity of their new commitments, has been noted by W. Neil (The Epistle of Paul to the Thessalonians
[Naperville, IL: Allenson, 1957], p. 64) and affirmed by R. Jewett (The Thessalonian
Correspondence: Pauline Rhetoric and Millenarian Piety [Philadelphia: Fortress
Press, 1986], pp. 93-94).
4. This program is sharpened still further in 2 Thessalonians, although this must
await treatment in a separate article. The strongest connections will be noted in the
footnotes to establish a sense of trajectory.
5. For a fuller discussion of honor and shame in the ancient world, and the
rhetorically strategic uses of this realm of discourse in ancient rhetorical theorists and
literary texts, see D.A. deSilva, Despising Shame: Honor Discourse and Community
Maintenance in Hebrews (SBLDS, 152; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1995), chs. 1-3.
DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom*
51
how honor and shame language might be employed in the literature of

minority cultures as a means of enhancing adherence to the group and
defusing the positive appeal of other groups or the negative pressure put
on the minority group by the larger society.6
a. Honor and Group Values
Honor and dishonor represent the primary means of social control in the
ancient Mediterranean world. A society upholds its values by rewarding
with greater degrees of honor those who embody those values in pro
portionately greater degrees. Dishonor represents a group's disapproval
of a member based on his or her lack of conformity with those values
deemed essential for the group's continued existence. The concept of the
honorable and disgraceful are given content and meaning only within a
specific culture in a specific period.7 An individual has self-respect on the
basis of his or her perception of how fully he or she has embodied the
culture's ideals; that individual has honor on the basis of the society's
recognition ofthat person's conformity with essential values.8
6. This is closely related to the work of P. Berger and T. Luckmann (The Social
Construction of Reality [Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1967], pp. 166-67) in their
description of how minority cultures form their own counter-definitions of reality
which turn upside down the dominant culture's view of them, and how the ongoing
social processes of life together as a group continue to maintain and refine those
group-sustaining counter-definitions.
7. This has, of course, been noted by J. Pitt-Rivers, 'Honour and Social Status',
in J.G. Peristiany (ed.), Honour and Shame: The Values of Mediterranean Society
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1966), pp. 21-77, p. 38, and by B.J. Malina
in his revised edition of The New Testament World (Louisville, KY: Westminster/
John Knox Press, 1993), pp. 53-54. Acknowledging this, however, should have led
Malina to rely much more heavily upon classical authors from the ancient
Mediterranean rather than twentieth-century cultural anthropologists of the modern
Mediterranean in his investigation.
8. This seems to me to be a more precise formulation of the relationship of selfworth and publicly acknowledged honor than, say, the equation which one finds in
B. Malina and J. Neyrey, *Honor and Shame in Luke-Acts: Pivotal Values in the
Mediterranean World', in J.H. Neyrey, The Social World of Luke-Acts (Peabody,
MA: Hendrickson, 1991), pp. 25-65, pp. 25-26: is the positive value of a
person in his or her own eyes plus the positive appreciation of that person in the eyes
of his or her social group. In this perspective, honor is a claim to positive worth
along with the social acknowledgement ofthat worth by others.'
This latter formulation is closely linked with a model of the Mediterranean
personality as dyadic, or other-oriented (see B. Malina and J. Neyrey, 'First-Century
52
Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 ( 1996)
The threat of dishonor supports a society's prohibitions of socially disruptive behavior. For example, adulterythe violation of the sanctity
and peace of a bond which is foundational to societycarries with it the
promise of disgrace (cf. Prov. 6.32-33). Concord and unity, essential
values for the orderly life of the polis, are lauded as honorable, while
dissensions and strife bring the threat of disgrace for the city (cf. Dio,
Or. 48.5-6). Similarly, courage in battle (necessary for a city's survival)
wins honor and lasting remembrance (cf. Pericles' Funeral Oration in
Thucydides, War 2.35-42). In a society which had as its basic building
block the patron-client relationship (Seneca, De benef. 1.4.2), the threat
of irrevocable dishonor, and therefore exclusion from future patronage,
supports the value of showing gratitude to one's patron (or a city's
benefactors; Dio, Or. 31).
'Honor' becomes the umbrella which extends over the complex of
behaviors, commitments, and attitudes which preserve a given culture
and society; the desire for honor becomes the means by which one can
motivate the members of that society to seek the good of the larger
group as the path to self-fulfillment. In a collection of advice To
Demonicus, ascribed pseudonymously to Isocrates (a Greek orator from
the fourth and third centuries BCE), one finds many actions connected
either with the positive sanction 'noble' or 'honorable', or labelled with
the negative sanction 'disgraceful'. By such means, the author sets before
his reader a model of existence which acts always in the best interest of
the public trust, which honors the established authorities on which the
state rests (gods, parents, laws), and restrains the expenditure of
resources on that which brings pleasure only to the self and not benefit
to others as well. Those who follow such a model will be rewarded with
society's approval and affirmation, that is, honor.
Epideictic rhetoric, associated with praise and censure in the classical
rhetorical handbooks, serves the social function of reinforcing the
society's values, holding up as praiseworthy those who have exemplified
those values, thus rousing emulation in the hearers.9 Thucydides expresses
Personality: Dyadic, not Individual', in Neyrey, Social World, pp. 67-96), which has
been rightly contested and nuanced by such classicists as Bernard Williams.
Classical texts are replete with characters who act out of a sense of their own selfrespect which is entirely independent of the opinion of others (Shame and Necessity
[Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993], pp. 81-91).
9. Cf. G. Kennedy, New Testament Interpretation through Rhetorical Criticism
(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1984), p. 19.
DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom9
53
the intriguing notion that 'eulogies of other people are only tolerable in
so far as each hearer thinks that he too has the ability to perform any of
the exploits of which he hears' (War 2.35.2). This, together with the frequent incorporation of some call to imitate the subject of the encomium
(Thucydides, War 2.43.1-4; 4 Mace 18.1; Dio, Or. 29.21), shows that
praise of some virtue or some person on account of virtue was calculated
to rouse emulation, to encourage the hearers to seek to exemplify the
values being praised, and so to attain honor and a praiseworthy remembrance themselves. Similarly, invective or censure have the opposite effect,
moving those who agree with the censure to eschew such behaviors
which bring on disgrace, blame, and loss of esteem.
b. Defining the Court of Reputation
A person in an honor culture is oriented from birth toward seeking the
approval of the significant othersthis is how the culture maintains its
essential identity and values across generational lines. In a simple society
(wherein one culture is shared by all the group members), this process
results in a fairly consistent method of social control and predictable
adherence to the society's values. The situation becomes more interesting
in a complex society, in which onefindscompeting cultures, or, at least,
alternative cultures within a dominant culture. Such, of course, was the
Mediterranean world of thefirstcentury CE, where one finds voluntary
subcultures and countercultures, such as philosophical schools and religious sects, striving to maintain their values and group boundaries against
competing minority cultures, as well as fighting assimilation back into
the dominant culture.
In such a setting, the definition of who comprise one's group of
significant others becomes essential. If one seeks status in the eyes of the
larger society, one will seek to maintain the values and fulfill the expectations of the dominant or majority culture (which may be different).10 If
one has been brought into a minority culture (e.g., a philosophical
school, or a voluntary association like the early Christian community), or
10. I am indebted here to V.K. Robbins, who demonstrated to me that 'dominant
culture' and 'majority culture' might represent two very different systems of value.
The important characteristic of the dominant culture is its ability to use power and
coercion to enforce their system of values. Aristotle, for example, teaching the young
Alexander, was certainly set apart from majority culture (on which he often comments with thinly-veiled contempt) and is better identified as representing an elite
culture, a dominant culture.
54
has been born into an ethnic subculture (such as Judaism), then one's
adherence to the group's values and ideals will only remain strong if one
redefines the constituency of one's circle of significant others. The 'court
of reputation' must be limited to group members, who will support the
group values in their grants of honor and censure. Including some suprasocial entity in this group (e.g., God, Reason, or Nature) offsets the
minority (and therefore 'deviant') status of the group's opinion. The
opinion of one's fellow group members is thus fortified by, anchored in,
and legitimated by a 'higher' court of reputation, whose judgments are
of greater importance and more lasting consequence than the opinion of
the disapproving majority or the dominant culture.1 x
Where the values and commitments of a minority culture differ from
those of a dominant (or other alternative) culture, members of that
minority culture must be moved to disregard the opinion of non-members about their behavior. All groups will seek to use honor and disgrace
to enforce the values of their particular culture, so each must insulate its
members from the 'pull' of the opinion of non-members. Those who do
not hold to the values and the construals of reality embodied in the group
are excluded from the 'court of reputation' as shameless or errant
approval or disapproval in their eyes must count for nothing, as it rests
on error, and the representative of the minority culture can look forward
to his or her vindication when the extent of that error is revealed.12
11. Plato thus speaks of living so as to achieve honor in the sight of God's court
(Plato, Gorgias 526D-527D), as does Epictetus: 'When you come into the presence
of some prominent man, remember that Another looks from above on what is taking
place, and that you must please Him rather than this man' (Diss. 1.30.1). This is a
familiar device in the Jewish subcultural literature as well (cf. Sir. 23.18-19). Since
God's opinion is mirrored in the group's evaluation (or, since the group's values
provide access to information about God's opinion), the minority group becomes a
more reliable, more important court of opinion. It matters more to have the approval
of the group than of the wayward society (even if they are the majority, and even if
they have the power to inflict temporary hardship on the group). 4 Maccabees also
makes much use of this device. The martyrs encourage one another by looking to the
honor they shall enjoy before their ancestors in the faith (13.17) and are praised in
regard to the esteem they enjoy before God (17.4-5).
12. Plato frequently contrasts the opinion of the many, who are not guided by a
commitment to philosophical inquiry, and the opinion of those few who do examine
reality in the light of philosophical truth. Approval of one's life by the latter group
alone is important (Crit. 44C; 46C-47A). Seneca, thefirst-centuryStoic and politician,
likewise teaches his pupil that the person seeking to 'live according to nature', and to
gain 'imperturbability' (the chief ends of Stoic philosophy), will not give any weight
DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'
55
c. Reinterpreting the Opinion of Outsiders

Society's displays of disapproval (whether in the form of insult, abuse,
shunning, or more severe marginalization, e.g., martyrdom) seek to
'shame' those whom society regards as deviants into falling back in line
with society's values. Dishonor and persecution are, in the first place,
attempts to rehabilitate the deviant. This social pressure carries tremendous weight, especially as it continues over time. How might a minority
group insulate itself from these negative sanctions, these attempts to
erode group-commitment and promote a return to the values and ideals
of the dominant or majority culture?
The attack on society's ability to form a reliable opinion about the
group members is, of course, the first step in this direction. We find,
however, that minority cultures were able to develop an even more
durable insulation against the effects of society's assaults. Those very
actions by which society hoped to shame the deviants back into conformity become a source of honor within the group. We see this particularly in the use of athletic and military imagery by writers from minority
cultures. Two arenas in which honor from the majority and/or dominant
culture is regularly won now provide metaphors for understanding the
society's hostility.
Since athletes are known for their endurance of pain and hardship in
order to win at the games, the metaphor of the athletic contest becomes
a natural one for all minority cultures which suffer pain or hardship at
to the honor or disgrace which the uninitiated show the student of philosophy (De
constantia 13.2, 5). Indeed, the uninitiated majority are like children, whose behavior
one does not regard as insulting since it stems from immaturity and ignorance (De
constantia 11.2-12.1). Against those who insist on the ultimacy of the dyadic
personality in the ancient world, Seneca offers us the picture of one whose selfrespect is independent of all save one's own awareness of living in line with Virtue
(De constantia 16.3). Cf. also Epictetus, who claims that the lay person's negative
judgment of the philosopher only condemns the lay person (Diss. 1.29.50-54).
Jewish authors of the second and first centuries BCE (e.g., the authors of Wisdom
of Solomon and 4 Maccabees) employ the same procedures when seeking to motivate their readers to maintain their Jewish identity and fidelity to the Torah, rather
than succumb to the pressurs to Hellenize. For a fuller discussion of the use of
honor and shame language in Jewish minority cultural writings, the interested reader
may refer to D.A. deSilva, The Wisdom of Ben Sira: Honor, Shame, and the
Maintenance of Minority Cultural Values', CBQ 58 (1996), pp. 433-55 and The
Noble Contest: Honor, Shame, and the Rhetorical Strategy of 4 Maccabees', JSP 13
(1995), pp. 29-55.
56
the hands of the host society.13 The use of contest or athletic imagery
leads to the minority culture's appropriation of topics of courage or
endurance, which are now made to serve minority cultural values.
Courage is defined as 'the reaching for great things and contempt for
what is mean; also the endurance of hardship in expectation of profit'
(Rhet. ad Her. 3.2.3). Hardship is thus no longer a sign of society's
rejection and the group member's deviance and dishonor, but merely
that which must be endured in order to gain a greater end. Similarly,
military imagery achieves the same end, as the language of conquering
in Revelation attests.14
13. Epictetus favors athletic imagery as a means of encouraging the aspiring
Stoic to endure hardships with courage and without dismay, since these are but the
result of Zeus matching one up with a wrestling partner for training, the result of
which will be a great victory (Diss. 1.24.1-2). Reputation, abuse, and even praise are
among the obstacles which can be thrown in the athlete's way, but which are
despised and passed by on the way towards becoming 'the invincible athlete' (Diss.
1.18.21). The Cynic philosopher was often subject to society's disapprovalall the
more as Cynics confronted society with the meaninglessness of many of its norms
and values. The self-appointed hardships which Cynics enduresigns of their
depravity and shamelessness to the larger societyare the means by which they are
exercised by Zeus (Diss. 3.22.56) for an Olympic victory. The Cynic may lose his
reputation in the eyes of the society, but remains a 'noble person' contending in a
noble contest (Dio, Or. 8.15-16).
Jewish authors used athletic imagery to transform the disgraceful and statusdegrading experiences of Jews suffering persecution for their refusal to conform to
the dominant (Hellenistic) culture into a 'noble contest' (cf. 4 Mace. 16.16) resulting
in acclamation before God and the ancestors. 4 Maccabees is especially rich in these
metaphors. The martyrs' tortures become a contest () and the tyrant's hall an
'arena' of hardships ( , 11.20). They are lauded as 'athletes'
() of religion and 'contestants' () competing for virtue. They are
summoned to an honorable contest in which even to compete is noble (16.16). An
extended athletic metaphor is used to summarize the story and its end resultthe
crown of victory for the abused youthsin 4 Mace. 17.11-16. For a detailed discus
sion of the use of contest imagery, see V. Pfitzner, Paul and the Agon MotifTraditional Athletic Imagery in the Pauline Literature (Leiden: Brill, 1967).
14. Cf. the frequent promises for 'the one who conquers' (Rev. 2.7, 11, 17, 26;
3.5, 12, 21; 21.7) as well as the 'victory' achieved over the dragon and the beast and
its image through enduring marginalization and martyrdom (12.11; 15.2). The
metaphor of the military battle and victory is also prominent in 4 Maccabees (1.11;
7.4; 9.30; 11.27; 13.2; 16.14). Notably, the second brother applies to his own
suffering the familiar dictum 'how sweet and proper it is to die for one's homeland':
'How sweet is any kind of death for one's ancestral religion' (9.29).
57
Another strategy in minority cultural rhetoric focuses on society's

abuse as a form of educative discipline, by which God fits the individual
for the prize of virtue, or immortality, or holiness.15 This is especially
frequent in the Jewish subcultural tradition (cf. Wis. 3.5; Heb. 12.4-12),
where the disgrace suffered at the dominant culture's hands becomes a
sign of acceptance by God, and endurance of those hardships becomes
the process by which God forms the believer's character, even as an
earthly parent might use strict means to cultivate his or her young.16
The impact of such rhetoric is that society's attempts at reclaiming the
deviants are now read as signs of divine approvalnot only do they fail
to have their desired impact, they actually serve to confirm the deviants
in their new loyalties and commitments.
d. Actualizing the Court of Reputation
Once the basic distinctions have been drawn, and the new court of
reputation isfirmlyestablished, the one who would maintain a minority
culture must encourage frequent and meaningful interaction within the
groupinteraction which promotes adherence to the group's values and
ideals, which stimulates the desire for honor as the group defines what is
honorable, and which maintains the plausibility of the group's counterdefinitions of reality (including its evaluation of outsiders).
Peter Berger has written that
worlds are socially constructed and socially maintained. Their continuing
reality...depends upon specific social processes, namely those processes
that ongoingly reconstruct and maintain the particular worlds in question.17
In a pluralistic society of competing world-constructions, each worldconstruction is always in danger of being disconfirmed by the availability
of other world-constructions. It becomes all the more necessary, therefore, and particularly within minority cultures, for the members to reflect
15. On educative suffering as the background to 2 Thess. 1.5, see J.M. Bassler,
'The Enigmatic Sign: 2 Thessalonians 1.5', CBQ 46 (1984), pp. 496-510.
16. See the comprehensive discussion of this interpretation of suffering in the
Jewish and Graeco-Roman literature of the period, and its application in Heb. 12.113, in N. Clayton Croy, 'Endurance in Suffering: The Example of Christ and the
Educative Function of Suffering. A Study of Hebrews 12.1-13 and its Religious and
Philosophical Context' (PhD Dissertation, Emory University, 1995; forthcoming in
the SNTS Monograph Series).
17. P. Berger, The Sacred Canopy: Elements of a Sociology of Religion (New
York: Doubleday, 1967), p. 44.
58
back to one another the reality of the group's counter-definitions of the

world, and to encourage the sort of activity which promotes the individual
member's sense of 'owning' those counter-definitions. Maintenance of
the plausibility structure calls for the investment of energy, time, and
resources. The minority world-view is rendered ever firmer and more
real by the degree of one's participation in it, and through the member's
continually being held accountable by one's significant others to the
ethos created by that world-view.
Encouragement within the group, in short, must outweigh the discouragement which comes to the individual from outside the group.
Relationships within the groupthe sense of connectedness and belonging
so essential to the social beingmust offset the sense of disconnectedness and alienation from the society which formerly provided one's
primary reference group.
e. Rhetoric of Honor and Advantage Grounded in the Group's
Counter-Definitions
Within the group, orators and other community-shapers may employ the
forms and genres of classical rhetoric in order to motivate members to
choose the course of action which results in honor or advantage (the
classical aims of deliberative rhetoric).18 This honor or safety, however,
will be construed in terms of the group's counter-definitions, for example,
'safety' in regard to the future judgment of the wicked, or 'honor'
through conformity to the pattern of the Son of God, disgraced by
humans, vindicated by the Deity. Epideictic rhetoric (encomia, use of
exempla for emulation, and the like) may also be employed, now holding
up as praiseworthy those who have given of themselves for the good of
the group or who have resisted society's attempts to deprive them of
their crown of victory.
18. Cf. Rhetorica ad Herennium 3.2.3. Aristotle (Rhet. 1.3.5) appears to suggest
that deliberative rhetoric takes up topics of 'the expedient' and 'the harmful', but he,
too, sees a much closer relationship between honorable behavior and the process of
persuasion in deliberative rhetoric: 'Praise and counsels have a common aspect; for
what you might suggest in counselling becomes encomium by a change in the
phrase... Accordingly, if you desire to praise, look what you would suggest; if you
desire to suggest, look what you would praise' (Rhet. 1.9.35-36). Quintilian goes
even further, asserting that the 'honorable' is the true aim of deliberative oratory,
such that one counsels and persuades others mainly through considerations of what
will preserve and augment honor (Inst. 3.8.1). He held that only what was honorable
could be expedient, and nothing dishonorable could ever be expedient.
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2. Identifying Honor Discourse in 1 Thessalonians

What topics or rhetorical tactics are relevant to the investigation of the
social-engineering which Paul effects in 1 Thessalonians? What sorts of
language or concepts should jump out at us as signals of Paul's concern
for the group's endurance in commitment to the Christian community
and its values in the face of society's disapproval of its new loyalties?
The foregoing discussion should lead us to look closely for the following:
1. Language which establishes or reinforces the constituency of the
court of reputation as the members of the group and its leaders by: (a)
explicitly naming those persons for whose opinion and approval one
should have regard; (b) stressing the differences in lifestyle, proximity to
truth, ethos, and even ontology or origin between group members and
outsiders; (c) censuring outsiders as unreliable guides to conduct, as
shameless or dishonorable, as influences which ultimately jeopardize the
well-being of individuals; (d) affirming the character of group members,
particularly group leaders, strengthening the group's inner-directed
focus on such people as reliable, honorable guides to right knowledge
and conduct, bolstering the leaders' authority to delineate the group's
norms and to grant honor or ascribe blame within the group.
2. Language which establishes or affirms the honor of the group or its
members before the alternate court of reputation by: (a) detailing the
honor the individual now possesses and the basis for this honor as
defined by the group's world-construction; (b) praising the group for its
adherence to the minority culture's values, and giving expression to
their honor and reputation within the larger body of significant others
(the supra-local minority culture, e.g., 'the Church of God in every
place', the supra-temporal minority culture, e.g., 'the ancestors in the
faith', and the supra-social minority culture, e.g., God and the myriads of
God's angels); (c) reinterpreting the group's experience of dishonor or
disapproval at society's hands, defusing the dominant culture's deviancycontrol techniques or even turning them to advantage vis--vis group
honor and commitment; (d) promising future honor and vindication for
the group and dishonor for the group's opponents, advising individuals
to follow as the path to their own honor and security the course which
will promote the survival of the group and preserve the group's distinctive
world-construction and values.
60

3. Analyzing the Data
a. The Exigencies of the Community's Situation

Paul expressly refers to the Thessalonian believers' situation as
(1 Thess. 1.6; 3.3-4; 2 Thess. 1.4, 6), and speaks of the believers as
'suffering' (: 1 Thess. 2.14; 2 Thess. 1.5). While social scientists
have shown that 'suffering' may be real or perceived, objective or
subjective, we should not too hastily disregard these references to the
negative, disconfirming, discouraging experiences of the believers in
Thessalonica.19
Thessalonica was the capital of the Roman province of Macedonia with
a long history of devotion to the emperor. This concern to show loyalty
to Rome began in earnest after Antony's defeat at Actium in 31 BCE,
since the city had previously sided with Antony and needed to express
quickly and enthusiastically its loyalty to Augustus. The emperor cult
and a cult 'of Rome and Roman benefactors' were both prominent cults
in the city, such that civic events were even dated by the terms of the
priests of these cults. The cults of the traditional Graeco-Roman gods are
also well attested in this city.20
Recent decades of scholarship have helped us appreciate the meaning of
these cults for the participants, and the importance of participation.21 The
specters of enforcement of emperor worship from above, or of the 'sham
religion' of the idolatrous cult, have given way to a new understanding
19. As does A. Malherbe (Paul and the Thessalonians: The Philosophic
Tradition of Pastoral Care [Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987], pp. 44-48), who is
rightly challenged on this point by Morris (Thessalonians, p. 48) and Wanamaker
(Epistles, v. 81).
20. See the impressive body of evidence gathered in H. Hendrix, Thessalonicans
Honor Romans' (ThD Thesis, Harvard University, 1984); C. Edson, 'Macedonia, II.
State Cults in Thessalonica', Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 51 (1940),
pp. 127-36; C. Edson, 'Macedonia, III. Cults of Thessalonica', HTR 41 (1948),
pp. 105-204.
21. Cf. especially S.R.F. Price, Rituals and Power: The Roman Imperial Cult in
Asia Minor (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984); G.W. Bowersock,
The Imperial Cult: Perceptions and Persistence', in B.F. Meyer and E.P. Sanders
(eds.), Jewish and Christian Self-Definition (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1982), III,
pp. 170-82; L.L. Thompson, The Book of Revelation: Apocalypse and Empire
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990), pp. 95-170. These developments are
summarized in D.A. deSilva, The "Image of the Beast" and the Christians in Asia
Minor: Escalation of Sectarian Tension in Revelation 13', TrinJ 12 NS (1991),
pp. 185-208.
61
of the local and grassroots motivation for such cultic activity. Participation
in the cults of Rome, the emperor, and the traditional pantheon showed
one's pietas or , one's reliability, in effect, to fulfill one's
obligations to family, patron, city, province, and empire. Participation
showed one's support of the social body, one's desire for doing what
was necessary to secure the welfare of the city, and one's commitment
to the stability and ongoing life of the city.
Groups which had never participated, such as the majority of the
Jewish population, were never free from suspicion and slandertheir
devotion to the One God reflected their concern for the one people, the
Jews, and their lack of concern for the public welfare (cf. 3 Mace. 3.3-7;
Est. 13.4-5 LXX). While usually enjoying official grants of toleration,
Jews were nevertheless frequently the objects of the dominant culture's
hostility on account of these threatening differences, which were usually
subsumed under theheading of , 'hatred of outsiders'.22
People who withdrew from participation were subject to even greater
suspicion, for it is always more threatening to find one's own coreli
gionists withdrawing their support from one's world view and ethos than
to deal with a group which has never supported these.23 It should not be
22. This is the complaint against the Jewish people which reverberates through
out the Greek and Latin literature. Diodorus of Sicily (34.1-4; 40.3.4), Tacitus (Hist.
5.5), Juvenal (Sat. 14.100-104), and Apion (Josephus, Apion 2.121) all accuse the
Jewish people of supporting their fellow-Jews but showing no good will to those
who are not of their race. The dietary laws and restrictions on social intercourse prac
ticed by Jews loyal to Torah, while an effective means of maintaining group
boundaries and cohesion, gave rise to anti-Jewish slander from outsiders.
23. The author of 1 Peter bears witness to this phenomenon, when he speaks of
the origin of the society's hostility in the unbelievers' surprise that their former
colleagues no longer join them in their accustomed rituals and practices (4.3-5).
While 1 Peter censures these activities as 'excesses of dissipation', these activities
included the 'lawless idolatry' (4.3) which was the foundation of civic loyalty and
solidarity. Pliny the Younger (Ep. 10.97) provides an intriguing view from the Other
side', as he looks upon the renewed interest in traditional religious activity as a posi
tive outcome of his investigation of the Christian movement in Bithynia. Those who
had withdrawn from these healthy activities are now returning to fulfill their social
and civic obligations. The initial direction of the Hasmonean revolution toward
apostate Jews (cf. 1 Mace. 2.24, 42-46) and the intense hostility depicted between
apostates and faithful Jews (Wis. 1.16-3.19; 3 Mace. 2.32-33; 3.23; 7.10-15) may
also be understood as an exemplification of the rule that 'apostasy' from within is
often more threatening and more intensely opposed than the encounter with foreign
ideologies from without.
62
surprising, therefore, that there should be a fair amount of local resentment, suspicion, and even hostility directed at the potentially anti-Roman,
anti-establishment proclamation of Jesus, the messiah crucified by the
Romans, as the coming ruler and judge. This was a proclamation which
threatened Roman order and the security posited in the ideology of
Roma Aeterna. It was, moreover, a proclamation which moved formerly
reliable citizens of Thessalonica to withdraw from cultic displays of gratitude towards the city's most important benefactors and cultic displays of
loyalty and dedication to the welfare of the city.24 The group gave all the
warning signs of becoming a source of disunity, a cancer in the social
body requiring treatment.
While officially sanctioned persecution of the church was extremely
rare in the first century, this did not mean that deviant groups like Jews
or Christians would not be subject to unofficial acts of hostility and
abuse. A believer suffered affliction even if the persecution only took the
form of frequent cold shoulders, of hearing some term of abuse while
passing a former colleague, or conspicuous exclusion from circles of
former friends. We know from Josephus and Philo, however, that such
unorganized persecution could take more violent formsa phenomenon
not unknown in our own recent history. There is no mention of martyrdom in the letter (which would have led to a different sort of assurance
about the dead believers' destiny)25only the natural deaths of
believersso we may surmise that the persecution was the sort which
was normally levelled at people whose lifestyles were now considered
24. Cf. discussions of suspicion towards such self-separating groups in
R.A. Markus, Christianity in the Roman World (London: Thames & Hudson,
1974), pp. 24-47.
25. I disagree here with J. Chapa's suggestion ('Is First Thessalonians a Letter of
Consolation?', NTS 40 [1994], pp. 150-60, p. 156) that the deaths which have
troubled the believers in 4.13 may have resulted from the society's persecution of the
group. This has been advanced more forcefully by R. Collins, The Birth of the New
Testament (New York: Crossroad, 1993), p. 112. If this were the case, one would
expect some clearer connection to be made by Paul between the affliction and the
removal of beloved sisters and brothers from the congregation, as well as the use of
such traditions as the eschatological vindication of the martyr who has died for the
sake of his or her loyalty to God (cf. 2 Mace. 7 and Wis. 2-5). Such images would
have provided more vigorous encouragement about the fate of the dead members,
not to mention encouragement to face death through martyrdom oneself. Tailing
asleep', moreover, is a rather passive image for such a violent departure from this
Ufe.
DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom '
63
deviant and a threat to the city's way of life.26

Persecution was therefore society's way of expressing disapproval for
the believers' new loyalties, of reaffirming its own commitment to the
traditional religious expressions of duty toward family, city, province,
and empire, and of attempting to draw the deviants back from the error
of their ways by the power of shaming. This technique of social
engineering accounts for much of the persecution of believers which one
finds in the New Testament, as in, for example, Heb. 10.32-34 and
1 Pet. 4.1-4 (where the Gentiles' own cognitive dissonance is posited as
the cause of the believers' suffering).27
b. Timothy's Visit
Paul was concerned lest this device of shaming should work in society's
favor, drawing the believers away from their newfound, costly faith.
This is particularly evident in 2.13-16 and 3.1-5, which introduce and
explain Paul's motivation for sending Timothy back to visit the new
community.28 Paul appears by both the account in 1 Thessalonians and
26. Richard ('Contemporary Research on 1 [&2] Thessalonians', BTB 20 [1990],
pp. 107-15, p. 109) poses a stark opposition between 'alienation, a social issue' and
'persecution'. This seems to me to be a false dichotomy. While it is indeed advisable
to steer clear of the images of rounding up Christians for the arena at this stage, there
are no grounds for limiting the 'affliction' to the more subjective experience of
feeling cut off from one's former social relationsthose former social relations had
a nasty way of letting the deviant know their feelings in this matter, too. Collins
(Birth, p. I l l ) provides some useful corroborating evidence for the objective,
observable nature of this affliction from 2 Cor. 8.2.
27. For a detailed investigation of the social pressures at work on the community
addressed by Hebrews, and the author's strategy for overcoming society's negative
sanctions, see deSilva, Despising Shame, chs. 4-7.
28. There is much debate concerning the inclusion of all or part of 2.14-16,
which is often considered an anti-Jewish interpolation. The subject matter, however,
is not out of place in this letter, particularly as an introduction to Paul's attempts at
explaining the afflictions which the Thessalonian believers suffered at the hands of
their fellow-citizens (2.14) in 3.3-5. While our sensitivities to Jewish-Christian relations provide ample motivation to excise 2.15-16 (and, in our contemporary
situation, these verses are indeed a stumbling block), we should recall the necessity
in Paul's situation of drawing clear lines between the new group and the outsiders
(both non-Christian Jews and non-Christian Gentiles). In this setting, 2.15-16 (which
B. Johanson [To All the Brethren: A Text-Linguistic and Rhetorical Approach to
I Thessalonians (Uppsala: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1987), p. 97] labels a vituperano,
an invective which serves a specific rhetorical goal in a specific rhetorical setting) is a
64
Acts to have left before he would have wished1 Thess. 2.17 uses the
image of being 'bereft', a metaphor of mourning over a separation that
is not willed by the parties involved.29 Concerned on account of the
troubled circumstances of that church, and frustrated with not being able
to return himself to see them (2.17-18), he sent Timothy to encourage
them in the midst of their afflictions (3.2-5), to do whatever he could to
offset the influence of the dominant culture on the new community. Paul
did not want the believers to be 'shaken' (3.3) by their loss of honor,
that is, to doubt their choices because of society's disapproval. Society
itself is depicted as the agent of the 'tempter', and society's attempts at
reintegrating the deviant as the 'temptation' itself (3.5) which could lure
them away from the path which leads to safety 'from the wrath that is
coming' (1.10).
Paul apparently received a positive report from Timothy about the
state of the congregation. Nevertheless, Paul prays 'earnestly night and
day that we may see you face to face and supply what is lacking in your
faith' (3.10). That is, Paul understands that Timothy's work in reaffirming
the group's values and encouraging renewed commitment in the face of
society's negative sanctions was only the first step in the ongoing work
of maintaining the group's integrity. What Paul desires to do 'face to face'
is here as elsewhere accomplished through the letter itself, the epistolary
replacement for the apostle's presence. From Timothy, moreover, he
has learned of any concerns which the believers hadwhich left chinks,
as it were, in the armor of the world-construction Paul calls his 'gospel'.
1 Thessalonians responds to both needs and serves as a whole to further
cement the community's commitment in the face of society's hostility.
c. 1 Thessalonians and Paul's Social-Engineering Program
Paul is addressing people whose honor, whose basic measure of worth,
has been challenged by societyindeed, has been questioned and negated
by society. This is the effect of the 'affliction' which they have endured.
fitting parallel to 4.4-5, a vituperation against Gentile outsiders which persists in
2 Thess. 1.8-9; 2.10-12; 3.2. God's wrath comes down upon all who hinder or reject
the gospel of Jesus, who show themselves to be displeasing to God by that very
rejection and hostility, irrespective of ethnic origin (1 Thess. 1.10; 2.15-16; 4.1-5;
2 Thess. 1.8; 2.11-12), while God's favor rests on all who respond positively to the
gospel, irrespective of ethnic origin (cf. Gal. 3.26-28; Rom. 3.21-31; 1 Cor. 1.22-24;
Col. 3.11).
29. The fact that Paul was 'left behind at Athens' (3.1) lends further support to
the Acts itinerary at this point (cf. Acts 17.15).
65
These are people who realize that attachment to Jesus and this new
community has cost them the respect they formerly enjoyed from their
neighbors, and to that extent has made them question their own selfworth. How does Paul build upon the work already done by Timothy to
address this problem? Using the typology of honor discourse developed
above, Paul's strategy in 1 Thessalonians, in all its intricacy and
complexity, becomes transparent.
1. Reinforcing the Court of Reputation. First, we may look at Paul's
negation of the validity of the opinion of outsiders regarding the believers'
commitment to Jesus and the new social entity, the .
We have already noted how society's pressures, effected through the
'affliction' suffered by believers, have been set by Paul within the frame
work of the activity of the tempter, the primaeval enemy of God and
God's cosmos (3.5). The Thessalonian believers' neighbors are replicating
the same sort of hostility against God as did the Jewish believers' neigh
bors in Judaea (2.14). The 'persecutors' are therefore also displeasing
God, hindering God's purpose.
The unbelieving Gentiles are censured as given over to shameful lust
and ignorance of Goda familiar pair in Hellenistic Jewish anti-Gentile
polemic (cf. Rom. 1.18-32; Wis. 13.1-9; 14.22-27; Eph. 4.18-19). This
contrast of lifestyle between the (Gentile!) believers and the (unbelieving)
Gentiles was a common feature of early Christian rhetoric, serving to
mark the different values served by the two groups, and the incompati
bility and inferiority of the unbelievers' values with the enlightened ethos
of the Christian group (cf. 1 Pet. 4.1-4; Eph. 4.17-20). Here, too, such a
contrast serves to censure the unbelievers as base and therefore also to
denigrate their ability to form a reliable judgment about what is honorable
or not (since they themselves live dishonorably). The focus in this context
on 'sanctification' (, 4.3)being 'set apart' for God, empha
sizes further the boundary between the Christian community and the
unbelieving world.30 This is a boundary anchored in the very will of God
( , , 4.3), assuring
the believers of the ultimate legitimacy of their new group loyalties and
the illegitimacy of society's resistance to this group formation.
30. Cf. L. Johnson, The Writings of the New Testament (Philadelphia: Fortress
Press, 1986), p. 263: 'God's holiness is marked by his complete difference from the
world; what can be thought is not God. The task of the Thessalonians is to express
their "differentness" behaviorally while remaining very much part of the world.'
66
1 Thess. 5.3-8 constructs an even more elaborate contrast between the

believers and the outsiders:
When they say, There is peace and security', then sudden destruction will
come upon them... But you are not in darkness, brothers and sisters, for
that day to surprise you like a thief. For you are all children of light and
children of the day; we are not of the night or of darkness. So then let us
not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober. For those who
sleep sleep at night, and those who get drunk are drunk at night. But, since
we belong to the day, let us be sober...
The outsiders are the deluded proclaimers of peace (an ironic reference
to the pax Romanal), but they shall be utterly surprised and overturned
on the 'day of wrath' which is in many ways a cornerstone of the
Christian minority culture's world construction. The believers are as
different from outsiders as day is from night, light from darkness, wakefulness from sleeping, sobriety from drunkenness. Outsiders, moreover,
fare badly in each contrastive pairthis is not a matter of apples and
oranges, of differences without value-laden evaluations. Paul also creates
a sort of genealogical distinction between the group members and
outsiders. They are two different families or races nowthe offspring of
light and the offspring of darkness.
A final blow is dealt to the opinion of outsiders in Paul's contrast
between how the believer is to face death (i.e., the death of significant
others) and how the unbeliever faces death. The unbelievers grieve as
those without hope (4.13)their perception of reality crumbles in the
face of death and cannot adequately answer this threatening phenomenon. Indeed, Paul's discussion in 4.13-18 is meant to strengthen the
believers' world-construction at precisely this point, so that the death of
members of their court of reputation, their significant others, will not be
taken as disconfirmation of the group's distinctive counter-definitions of
reality.31 Paul therefore provides them with the necessary information to
integrate even this most marginalizing of experiences.
31. Cf. P. Berger, Sacred Canopy, pp. 43-44, 80: 'Death radically puts in
question the taken-for-grantedness, "business as usual" attitude in which one exists
in everyday life... Insofar as the knowledge of death cannot be avoided in any
society, legitimations of the reality of the social world in the face of death are decisive
requirements in any society... Unless anomy, chaos, and death can be integrated
within the nomos of human life, the nomos will be incapable of prevailing through
the exigencies of both collective history and individual biography.'
67
While Paul, through a number of deliberate contrasts with outsiders,

reinforces the group's boundaries and gives believers ample cause to
disregard the opinion of unbelievers as unreliable and erring,32 he also
devotes considerable attention to reminding the addressees of who does
constitute their court of reputation, and to whom they should look for
their honor and confirmation of their self-worth. The primary significant
other in this letter is, of course, God. The thanksgiving section of the
Pauline letter consistently functions as an admirable reminder of this
basic fact: it is before God that the authors and addressees are conducting their lives and ministries, so that giving thanks to God or remembering the addressees before God both serve to raise again to consciousness this One in whose sight one lives and before whom one seeks
remembrance, recognition, and reward (1.2-3; cf. 2 Thess 1.3). The
authors drive this point home in the recollection of their personal example
to the Thessaloniansthe very example the believers have imitated (1.6)
and are called to imitate further in order also 'to please God' (4.1): 'just
as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so
we speak, not to please human beings, but to please God who tests our
hearts' (2.4). Ultimately, it is God's evaluation which counts far more
than society's, for on the Day of the Lord God's evaluation and its
eternal effects will be made manifest: it is always with a view to that
'court' that one seeks to live in the present, preferring temporary
danger and loss from human courts of opinion to the eternal danger and
loss from God's court (1 Thess. 1.5; 2.19-20; 3.13; 5.9; 2 Thess. 1.6-9).
Believers are called to seek to please God, not people: seeking human
approval leaves one susceptible to the seduction of society's call to the
deviant to return; seeking God's approval, however, leads to the approval
of one's fellow believers who are also seeking to please God. Paul and
his co-authors are concerned that there be strong social reinforcement of
God's approval or disapproval, and so he continually calls each hearer's
attention to the company of the 'brothers and sisters' who now form
their primary reference group. This is a limited group defined by God's
choice (1.4) reflected in their positive response to the gospel (1.5). It is
these 'brothers and sisters' which become the group of significant
others for each individual member as they enact Paul's injunctions to
32. This strategy is also evident in 2 Thess. 2.1-12, where the people who have
not committed themselves wholly to the 'truth' of the gospel (2.10, 12) are liable to
the eschatological deception yet to be perpetrated by the 'man of lawlessness', and so
to be led to their own destruction.
68
'exhort one another' (5.11; cf. 5.14), 'build one another up' (5.10), 'love
one another' more and more (4.9-10),33 and 'comfort one another' (4.18).
The strong, meaningful bonds between group members forged through
this level of interaction will strengthen individual believers' commitment
to the group and insulate them from the negative opinion and treatment
of outsiders.34 Feelings of attachment and experiences of encouragement
within the group outweigh feelings of disconnectedness from society and
experiences of discouragement at the hands of outsiders. Care for, and
being cared for by, the brothers and sisters leads to an increased desire
to conform to the values of the group so as to be held in esteem by those
who are important for one's daily life.35 Even though Paul will also
exhort the believers to 'abound in love for one another and for all' and
to 'do good to one another and to all' (3.12; 5.13), thus admirably moving
the group to reach out beyond group lines as benefactors of the com
munity, the very form of this exhortation reinforces (with the mention
first of 'one another') the meaningfulness of those group boundaries.
The local court of reputation formed by the church in Thessalonica is
consciously extended by Paul to include the churches of God in all of
Macedonia, Achaia, and Judaea, thus connecting the members of the
local 'chapter' of this minority culture to a larger network of believers
throughout the world.
Finally, Paul's directions to honor local church leadership and to
follow their instructions, as well as his affirmations of his team's honor
and exemplary conduct, also helps provide a focus for the believers as
they seek affirmation and reliable guides to honor before God's court.
This provides a positive counterpart to his denigration of outsiders, his
censure of their conduct and ignorance, and therefore the unreliability of
33. Paul uses the more limited term , a term reserved for speaking of
love within the kinship group, rather than , 'love for humanity' and
beneficence in general. This is not because Paul is uninterested in acts of love and
benevolence which reach beyond the group (cf. 3.12; 5.13), but because he needs to
promote, in the first place, that which will lead to the solidarity of the group and the
recognition by the individual member that these relationships are the most significant
(hence the construction of a fictive kinship within the group).
34. Indeed, this group-building leads eventually to the group's ability to use the
device of shaming deviants within the group to conform more fully to the group's
norms (2 Thess. 3.6, 14-15)the very device society had used to attempt to bring
the Christians back into conformity with the ideals of Graeco-Roman civic culture.
35. This is also a likely effect of Paul's own use of affective language in 2.7b12a; 2.17-3.1; 3.6-10.
69
their evaluation of Christians and their new commitments. It is in this

light that we may make sense out of Paul's 'defense' of his apostleship
in 1 Thess. 1.5; 2.1-12. It is not as though Paul and his team's integrity
was openly called into question or challenged (as in Galatia or Corinth).
It is rather part of a larger strategy of equipping beleaguered and possibly
wavering converts to continue trusting thefigureswho have called them
out from the society into this minority group and to continue resisting
the chastisement of their former compatriots.
Ethos was an essential component of the art of persuasion, and Paul
must here reaffirm the reliability of his character not against the slander
of opponents36 but in a vital contrast with the character and reliability of
the other voice which threatens to seduce the believers away from the
truth (3.3-5). This contrast is made clearer by the juxtaposition of the
example of Paul's team in 4.1 with the pattern of conduct of the
(unbelieving) Gentiles in 4.4. As a corollary to this, Paul exhorts the
believers to respect the local Christian leadership which was left in
charge of the new congregation by Paul and his teamtheir regard for
thesefigureswill give moment to the leaders' approval or admonition of
the group members, for they play an essential role in maintaining the
group's values and conduct (5.12-13).
Throughout 1 Thessalonians, therefore, we find Paul concerned with
delimiting and reinforcing the 'court of reputation' before which the
believers are to live, and whose opinion they are to regard. The
unbelieving society acts out the role of Satan, the tempter; it lives
shamelessly without regard for God or God's standards; it belongs to
the darkness, and its members even constitute a different order of being.
The opinion of unbelievers, therefore, is not to be regarded as meaningful,
and hence should be in no way determinative of the believer's choices
and values. The believer is called to live so as to please God, to gain
God's approval: this is mirrored in the interaction of the believing
community, as its reliable and ethical leaders offer admonition and praise,
and as the group members reflect back to one another the group's
values and ideals. In this way, the minority culture is freed from the
dominant culture's social-control techniques to pursue the goals deemed
honorable within the group.
36. Since ethos was an essential element of every oration, indeed, every act of
communication, it is unnecessary to posit through excessive mirror-reading attacks
on Paul's character wherever Paul speaks about his character (against, e.g., Jewett,
Correspondence, p. 102).
70
2. Affirming and Augmenting the Self-Respect of the Group. As Paul

reinforces the boundaries of the believer's 'court of reputation', he also
labors to assure the believers of their honor before that court in a variety
of ways. The loss of esteem they have suffered in society's eyes receives
ample compensation in the honor they now enjoy within the group of
those who are better equipped to evaluate what is truly honorable.
First, Paul gives clear indications of the believers' worth in the eyes of
the group. They receive praise from Paul for their 'work of faith and
labor of love and steadfastness' (1.3), for their reception of the gospel in
the face of society's opposition (1.6; 2.13-14). Paul's giving thanks to
God for these aspects of the community's life shows his team's approval
of the believers' progress, and also assumes God's approvalindeed,
God's agency in effecting this progress. 'Election' itself serves the goal
of strengthening commitment to the community, since it becomes a
mark of God's choice and approval to be a part of the church, as well as
obedience to God to remain a part of the church (1.4; 2.12; cf. 2 Thess.
1.11-12; 2.14). Paul also affirms them in their mindfulness of seeking so
to live as to please God (presumably here with regard to Paul's ethical
instructions; 4.1), their expressions of love toward their fellow-believers
(4.9-10), and their preservation of the Christian view of reality through
mutual encouragement in pursuing group ideals (5.11).
Paul also greets them with a declaration of their growing reputation
among the churches throughout the regions of Macedonia (of which
Thessalonica was the capital) and Achaia.37 They enjoy a supra-local
honor because of their eager reception of the gospel, their welcome of
God's emissaries, and their endurance of affliction. Within the larger
network of Christian communities, they enjoy fame, a good report:
You became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you received the word in
much affliction, with joy inspired by the Holy Spirit; so that you became
an example to all the believers in Macedonia and in Achaia. For not only
has the word of the Lord sounded forth from you in Macedonia and
Achaia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere, so that we need
not say anything. For they themselves report concerning us what a
37. That Paul is discussing here the believers' honor is by no means neglected in
the literature (cf. Richard, Thessalonians, pp. 50-51), but appears without any discussion of its social significance or its relation to a larger rhetorical strategy within
the letter (or letters). Wanamaker (Epistles, p. 80) does better in that he at least
recognizes the existence of rhetorical strategy behind 1.6, *a subtle piece of parnesis
inculcating perseverance in all circumstances through imitation of Paul and the Lord
Jesus'.
71
welcome we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols, to
serve a living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom
he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come
(1.6-10, emphasis mine).38
This is comparable to a city's delight in achieving pre-eminence among

the other cities of a given province, or for fame among those cities and
beyond for some peculiar civic virtue or achievement.39
Paul here begins to reinterpret society's attempts to disgrace Christians
as actually leading toward honor within the alternate court of reputation.
Indeed, the society's main complaint against the Christians is their neglect
for the traditional Graeco-Roman gods and benefactors and therefore
their political and civic unreliability. What causes them to lose approval
and esteem from their non-Christian neighbors, however, becomes the
believers' claim to fame among all the churches in Greece (1.9-10).40
Moreover, Paul assures them that such hostility was 'normal', only to
be expected from the unbelieving world: 'You yourselves know that this
is to be our lot. For when we were with you, we told you beforehand
that we were to suffer affliction; just as it has come to pass, and as you
know' (3.3-4). It befell Paul (1.6; 2.1-2); it befell the churches in Judaea
at the hands of their neighbors (2.14); it happens now to the Thessalonians
(1.6; 2.14). This emphasis on normalcy is important, since the society
is trying to get the believers to see themselves as deviant and in need
of change. As Paul inverts this, society's rejection actually assures the
believers, more or less, that they are right where they should be, and not
'out of line'. Indeed, Paul also transforms his team's own experience of
dishonor at society's hands as an occasion to display courage, to act
nobly in the face of great opposition (2.2).
Finally, we see Paul throughout the letter urging the believers to
shape their behavior ever with an eye toward attaining the honor and
38. This strategy appears again in 2 Thess. 1.3-4.
39. One might compare, for example, Dio's attempts to persuade Rhodes to take
a certain course of action in order to preserve their civic reputation among other cities
and provinces (Or. 31), as well as competition between cities for the provincial
honor of being named neokoros ('temple warden') of the imperial cult (cf. Price,
Rituals, pp. 126-32).
40. Another common strategy for transforming disgrace in the eyes of the dominant culture into honor within the minority culture is attested in 2 Thess. 1.5, where
society's hostility becomes the educative discipline which fits the believers to be
worthy recipients of the destiny God has prepared for them (cf. Wis. 3.5; Heb. 12.413).
72
security which Jesus will provide to his faithful clients on the Day of the
Lord. The opinion of outsiders during these days of struggle is inconsequential compared to the opinion God forms of the believers on that
Day of Visitation. Indeed, the gospel has given the Thessalonian believers
an incomparable advantage: 'But you are not in darkness, brothers and
sisters, for that day to surprise you like a thief (5.4). Unlike the
unbeliever, the Christian has received advance warning, and is in a privileged position to prepare for that day by seeking to please God in the
present.
The certainty of that day, and its promise of wrath and disgrace for all
who have not sought to please God through responding to God's favor
in the gospel message,41 provides a powerful motivation to the believers
to endure the temporary dishonor and danger of marginalization in
order to attain the greater honor and security of being approved on that
day. Paul appreciates the strategic value of elevating, therefore, the Day
of the Lord throughout the letter:
You turned to God from idols, to serve a living and true God, and to wait
for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who
delivers us from the wrath to come (1.9b-10).
We exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to
lead a life worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory
(2.11-12).
May the Lord...establish your hearts unblamable in holiness before our
God and Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his holy ones
(3.12-13).
God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our
Lord Jesus Christ (5.9).
May the God of peace himself sanctify you wholly; and may your spirit
and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord
Jesus Christ (5.23).
The ethic of the Christian communitythe new kinship relations and the
associated obligations, the admonitions toward continence, the response
to deathis focused toward this future event, this day of reversal on
which their faith will be vindicated and their honor as children of God
manifested. Paul applies this focus even to his own missionary work:
Tor what is our hope or joy or crown of boasting before our Lord
Jesus at his coming? Is it not you? For you are our glory and joy' (2.1941. 2 Thess. 1.6-10 presents a development of this perspective from the side of
God's visitation of judgment and disgrace upon the outsiders who have harassed and
abused the Thessalonian Christians.
73
20). On that day, Paul's only claim to honor will be his faithfulness in
carrying out his commission to call together for God a sanctified people:
knowing this, he seeks no other claim to honor before the unbelieving
world. His self-respect comes from his preparedness for that day.
It should be noted, however, that Paul does not give in to the impulse
to withdraw and shut out unbelievers completely, nor does he allow his
converts to do so. This response was far from unknown in the ancient
world, as the literature of Qumran, for example, attests. Rather, believers
are urged to reach out not only to fellow believers (though, of course,
this must be the primary arena of support) but also to all people:
May the Lord make you increase and abound in love to one another and to
all (3.12).
See that none of you repays evil for evil, but always seek to do good to
one another and to all (5.13).
The exhortation to 'seek to do good to all' orients the believers toward

the society as potential benefactors of their local community: by acting
as benefactors, they will be able to dispel, to some extent, society's
suspicion of them, and perhaps even begin to regain respect42 (although,
of course, their behavior must remain detached from the opinion of
outsiders). Their lifestyle is not to confirm society's opinion of them as
disruptive, dissentious, non-contributing parts of the social body. While
freed from concern for society's opinion, they are nevertheless called to
'behave becomingly toward outsiders' (4.12), in order to make known
the noble character which they have received from God.
d. The Issue of the Literary Integrity of 1 Thessalonians
Much of 1 Thessalonians reflects Paul's attempt to do precisely what he
wished to do through a personal visit, namely, to 'supply what is lacking
in your faith' (3.10). 'Faith' in that context clearly refers to the believers'
perseverance in their commitment to the new social reality called the
in the face of the dominant culture's resistance and
disapproval. He does this by delineating the court of opinion before
whom the believers are to seek approval, giving them a claim to honor
before that court, and providing a group-maintaining agenda to fulfill
their , their desire for esteem.
This understanding of a major goal of the letter may help clarify
several issues in the discussion about the integrity of 1 Thessalonians. We
42. So Malherbe, Paul, p. 107.
74
have noted above that 2.14-16 fits well into Paul's program for this
letter. Indeed, it should not even be relegated to the status of digression
This section picks up on the mimetic pattern announced in 1.6, where
the Thessalonian Christians responded to the word in faith despite
society's resistance, even as Paul and his team carry out their response
of faithfulness to the word in the face of 'great opposition' (2.1-2). So
also, the Thessalonians imitate the pattern of the churches in Judaea,
where the movement had its start (2.14), so that Paul's claim regarding
the normalcy of society's oppositionthat this is a pattern which has
been established and should actually affirm the Thessalonian Christians
has a firm basis in the experience of believers worldwide. Secondly, it
belongs to Paul's strategy of emphasizing group boundaries (reinforcing
the closed circle of significant others or 'court of reputation'), drawing
the clear distinction between the outsiders who displease God (2.15)
both Jews (2.15-16)44 and Gentiles (2.14b;45 4.3-6; 5.3-8)and the
43. Wanamaker, Epistles, p. 49.
44. Johanson (Brethren, pp. 170-71) and F.D. Gilliard (The Problem of the
Antisemitic Comma between 1 Thessalonians 2.14 and 15', NTS 35 [1989],
pp. 481-502, pp. 498-501) seek to limit Paul's remarks to those specific groups
within the Jewish people who were actually responsible for Jesus' death (i.e., 'some
Sadducees of the Sanhdrin' [Gilliard, Troblem', p. 499]) and those who actively
oppose Paul's mission to the Gentiles. Again, in the contemporary setting, it is
important to separate the ethnic category 'Jews' from the polemic category 'who
displease God'. In Paul's setting, however, all outsiders were guilty of displeasing
God. This is true of the 'Gentiles' who 'live in fleshly passion, not knowing God'
(4.4) as it is true of the Jews who 'displease God' and remain under 'wrath' (2.1516): all who have not entered the new community formed by trust in Jesus are
'under wrath' (1.10), even as all who have responded to God's favor revealed in
Christ, whether Gentile or Jew (cf. 1 Cor. 1.24), are delivered from wrath. The
polemic in 2.15-16 is primarily against non-Christians who happen to be Jews, just
as 4.1-4 is against non-Christians who happen to be Gentiles. Paul approaches it
from both sides because these two ethnic categories are so deeply etched in his mind,
appearing frequently throughout his writings as a binary pair.
Perhaps a more helpful approach to this text in the modern situation would be to
allow Paul's boundary-forming vituperations to stand and acknowledge them for
what they are, but then also to acknowledge the very different social location of the
respective groups then from the social location of those groups after the third century
CE. Christianity was a minority culture, removed from the channels of power, which
was increasingly marginalized for its failure to be fully Jew or Gentile and live
according to the accepted norms within that ethnic subculture or that dominant
culture. In such a setting, clear boundaries and the reinterpretation of outsiders'
hostility against the group as a mark of the outsiders' depravity, rebelliousness
75
insiders who do seek to please God (4.1). Excising this passage from the
letter is not the only way to express our contemporary commitment to
respectful dialogue and cooperation rather than vituperation in our
relationships with Jews.
The theory that 1 Thessalonians is itself to be divided into an 'earlier
missive' (2.13-4.2) and a later letter (1.1-2.12 + 4.3-5.28) has been
recently revived by Earl Richard.46 Richard asserts that 'the presump
tion of integrity is an assumption unless it explains satisfactorily serious
structural and temporal anomalies'.47 While it would be out of place to
against God, and the like, was a matter of group survival. When the cultural rhetoric
changedthat is, when Christianity became the dominant culture (even before it
became the majority culture)the group no longer needed such vituperation for the
preservation of its identity. Only in the new situation does the rhetoric become
dangerous and censurable. Indeed, Christianity has been guilty on many occasions of
using the minority cultural rhetoric of its origins within its new location as dominant
power, as a tool for expanding its cultural hegemony. To combat this, however, we
should focus on responsible hermeneutics, rather than let the current needs drive our
exegesis.
45. K.P. Donfried ('Paul and Judaism: 1 Thessalonians 2.13-16 as a Test Case',
Int 38 [1984], pp. 242-53, pp. 246-47) asserts on the basis of the Acts 17 narrative
that Jews in Thessalonica were prominently involved in the hostility against the
believers there, which explains Paul's comment on the non-Christian Jews' historic
commitment to resist the gospel of God. This puts too much weight on the evidence
of Acts at a point where Acts clearly has a theological agenda (namely the systematic
rejection of the gospel by Jews), a problem pointed out by Johnson (Writings,
p. 261). Collins (Birth, p. I l l ) provides a better view of the situation, seeing the
believers' Gentile neighbors as the source of the antagonism in 2.14.
does point to people of the same 'tribe', which is much closer to ethnic
identity, rather than to, say, fellow-citizens () which might be Jews or
Gentiles.
This does not leave Paul's vituperation in 2.15-16 'quite unmotivated and tangen
tial to his present theme' (LH. Marshall, I and 2 Thessalonians [NCB; Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 1983], p. 78). Paul's 'theme'the logical flow of discourseis
not the only consideration, but also Paul's social-engineering program for the
community, which insists on sharp group boundaries and delegitimating the activity
of outsiders (stressing that they, not the believers, are the ones who are out of line
with the truth or the will of God).
46. Richard, Thessalonians, pp. 11-19.
47. To accept a partition theory as the solution to such anomalies, however,
requires a cogent explanation of the editor's purpose in cutting, pasting, and
rearrangingsomething that is lacking in Richard's introduction.
76
discuss all the pertinent arguments,481 should like to venture some sug
gestions which might help explain the anomalies without sacrificing the
shape of the letter as it has come down to us in the manuscript tradition.
Richard calls attention to
49
distinct differences in tone in 2.13-14 (where Paul had feared he had

'labored in vain' and expresses joy, relief, and warmth) and in 1.2-3 and
4.3-4 (where he knows that the preaching has not been 'in vain' and treats
in a more circumspect way the problems experienced and the issues
raised by a maturing community).50
Two suggestions may alleviate this difficulty. First, Paul writes this letter
both after he experienced anxiety over the Thessalonians and after he
received the news from Timothy that his anxiety was overwrought.
From this perspective of renewed confidence he writes both to the
community as it stands (i.e., with confidence) and about his anxieties
prior to the sending of Timothy (i.e., about his anxiety over not knowing
their condition, and his relief at Timothy's responsethe same relief and
joy which allows him to write the thanksgiving of 1.2-10). Richard
appears to make a groundless objection here, since from Paul's vantage
point in writing he may reflect back both on the anxieties and his relief.
Secondly, that Paul begins and ends with words of assurance about the
congregation's steadfastness, and only speaks of his anxiety (again, not
'fear' as if he had cause to distrust the Thessalonians' commitment) in
the middle section in retrospect, is rhetorically appropriate and wellplanned. One can motivate commitment in others better by opening and
closing with a strong show of confidence in them rather than opening
with one's former doubts about their commitment and moving forward
from there for the sake of chronological presentation. As I have argued
above, Paul's earnest desire to 'supply what is lacking' in the Thessalonian
48. See the extensive survey of this discussion in R. Collins, Propos the
Integrity of 1 Thess.', ETL 55 (1979), pp. 67-106; Marshall, Thessalonians, pp. 1116; Wanamaker, Epistles, pp. 29-37.
49. This passage actually begins with a 'thanksgiving' for the Thessalonians'
reception of the word as God's word to them, active in their lives (2.13), and so is
not so distinctively negative in tone as Richard suggests.
50. Richard, Thessalonians, p. 11. Actually, the Greek does not have a reference
to Paul's 'fear'3.5b simply reads 'lest somehow ( ) the tempter had tempted
you and our labor should have been for nothing'. It was Paul's 'not knowing' which
was bothering himhe did not have grounds for fearing the worst except his lack of
knowledge that the community was still strong.
77
Christians' faith (3.10)a need which remains even after his reception of
Timothy's positive reportis precisely what is accomplished throughout
1 Thessalonians.
Richard also postulates that 2.13-4.2 was written shortly after Paul's
visit to Thessalonica (with which I do not disagree), but that 1.1-2.12 +
4.3-5.28 'presumes a lapse of time following the mission' because 'by
now the community's faith commitment, activities, and missionary
assistance are well known to the other communities of the Greek main
land and beyond' (Macedonia and Achaia).51 First, we should note that
the report about the Thessalonians which goes out concerns only their
reception of Paul and his team ('they themselves report concerning us
what a welcome we had among you', 1.9a) and their initial response to
the gospel ('and how you turned to God from idols, to serve a living
and true God', 1.9b). That is, people are talking only about the first
weeks of the Thessalonian believers' experiencenot necessarily about
months of active service.
We have explored the strategic aim of Paul's report of the believers'
fame above, and we should perhaps allow the apostle to employ hyper
bole for the sake of encouraging the Thessalonian congregation (hence
the 'in every place', 1.8).52 Making some allowance for this, Paul's des
cription in 1.8-9 does not necessitate so very great a lapse of time
between founding the congregation and writing this thanksgivingat
least no more time than it would take Paul to come to the end of his
patience, send Timothy from Athens back to Thessalonica, receive word
back from him. This is particularly plausible if, following the Acts
itinerary (which seems remarkably reliable in its basic outline in chs. 1617, being confirmed by details in 1 Thess. 2.2 and 3.1), Paul goes on to
Corinth from Athens, and is there met by Timothy and from there
53
writes 1 Thessalonians. As Paul takes the word of the Lord on from
the Thessalonians (' , 1.8) through the regions of Macedonia and
Achaia, he encounters unconverted people who have heard from other
54
news-bearing travellers about the activity in Thessalonica. We should
51. Richard, Thessalonians, pp. 11, 14.
52. Wanamaker, Epistles, p. 83.
53. This is a sequence of events which Richard (Thessalonians, p. 9) approves.
54. Johanson (Brethren, p. 83) suggests that believers bore this report, but Paul
was at this time spearheading the mission to Macedonia and Achaia. The report of
what was happening in Thessalonica was spreading ahead of the gospel, and not
necessarily through Christian news networks.
78
remember that the initial hostility in Thessalonica was remembered as

being quite public and disruptive, so that it should not be surprising that
news of this Christian movement would spread to the concerned citizens
of other regions even before Paul has arrived to evangelize. After, or
during, Paul's successful evangelism, the Thessalonians about whom the
former unbelievers have heard with suspicion now become a meaningful
model of courageous response to this message of salvation in the face of
hostility from 'those who are perishing'.55
4. Conclusions
Due to stronger opposition to this fledgling community in Thessalonica
than in other cities, Paul devotes much of 1 Thessalonians to the prob
lem of social-engineering: strengthening the boundaries of the group,
delegitimating the opinion (and thus the social pressure to conform) of
outsiders however this is actualized (the shape of 'affliction'), and pro
moting the course of action which leads to the survival and growth of
the group. Society's vigorous application of social control techniques,
like shaming through insult, exclusion, and abuse, calls forth a more
vigorous counter-program from Paul's team (both Timothy's visit and 1
Thessalonians). Honor discourse, as an essential component of social
control in the ancient Mediterranean, is thus a prominent feature of this
correspondence. Attention to honor and shame discourse does not by
any means exhaust the meaning and purpose of the epistles, nor does it
account for the whole correspondence, but it does highlight a prominent
concern of Paul's team running throughout their relationship with the
community. Paul's group-maintaining techniques, while highly critical of
outsiders, do not result in a contra-cultural movementa group which
seeks deliberately to violate the dominant culture's values. While there
are certain non-negotiable areas, such as all forms of idolatry as opposed
to the single-hearted devotion to the one God, Paul's advice in both
55. This view may resolve the problem Wanamaker perceives between 1 Thess.
1.8 ('we need not say anything') and 2 Thess. 1.4 ('we boast concerning you').
When Paul initially encountered those who would become his converts, they had
already heard about the row in Thessalonica caused by the there; only
after the churches had been established in the rest of Macedonia and Achaia did
Paul 'boast' of news concerning the Thessalonian congregation's steadfastness. This
difficulty, then, does not seem so troublesome as to necessitate (or even support) a
theory of the priority of 2 Thessalonians.
79
letters moves the group also toward the possibility of future rapproche
ment with the dominant culture. Paul guards against the criticism that
Christians are not contributing parts of the larger society, that they lack
the basic virtues of and generosity. While their citizenship
is indeed in heaven (Phil. 3.20), and their primary duty is toward their
fellow-citizens of the kingdom of God, Paul also includes the exhorta
tions to extend their works of love and well-doing beyond the primary
reference group to 'all' (1 Thess. 3.12; 5.13).
Attention to honor and shame discourse, guided by observations of
how this language is used in the ancient world to reinforce cultural iden
tity and boundaries, has opened up a new dimension of the rhetorical
strategy of 1 Thessalonians. Judiciously employed, such analysis may be
used throughout the canonical and non-canonical literature of the period
to investigate how a group relates to other subcultures and to the domi
nant culture, thus contributing to a social history of early Christianity
and other movements in the Hellenistic and Graeco-Roman worlds.
Attention to this language also assists our attempts to understand the
correlations between theological expression (world-construction) and
social location, as in our correlation of eschatology with strong sectarian
boundaries and distinctive ethos in this letters.
ABSTRACT
An ancient proponent of a minority culture met the challenge of sustaining commit
ment to the group through a number of distinct uses of honor discourse. The first
half of this article establishes a method for analyzing the rhetorical impact of honor
discourse in a text from the Graeco-Roman period and its potential for sustaining
group values and commitment; the second half shows the method at work in
1 Thessalonians. Paul insulates the readers from concern for the opinion and
approval of the non-believing world by censuring outsiders as unreliable guides to
honorable behavior: society's censure of the believers thus should carry no weight.
Paul directs their ambitions to the eternal honor to be gained by securing God's
approval. The group members are called to reinforce one another's commitment to
those distinctive Christian values that will result in honor on the last day.
^ s
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Honor Discourse and Social Engineering in 1 Thess - David DeSilva

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Honor Discourse and Social Engineering in 1 Thess - David DeSilva

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[JSNT 64 (1996) 49-79]

'WORTHY OF HIS KINGDOM': HONOR DISCOURSE AND SOCIAL

Discussion of 1 Thessalonians has tended to disregard the importance of

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 (1996)

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom*

how honor and shame language might be employed in the literature of

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 ( 1996)

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom9

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 ( 1996)

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'

c. Reinterpreting the Opinion of Outsiders

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 (1996)

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'

Another strategy in minority cultural rhetoric focuses on society's

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 (1996)

back to one another the reality of the group's counter-definitions of the

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'

2. Identifying Honor Discourse in 1 Thessalonians

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 ( 1996)

a. The Exigencies of the Community's Situation

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 (1996)

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom '

deviant and a threat to the city's way of life.26

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 (1996)

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 (1996)

1 Thess. 5.3-8 constructs an even more elaborate contrast between the

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'

While Paul, through a number of deliberate contrasts with outsiders,

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 ( 1996)

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'

their evaluation of Christians and their new commitments. It is in this

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 (1996)

2. Affirming and Augmenting the Self-Respect of the Group. As Paul

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'

This is comparable to a city's delight in achieving pre-eminence among

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 (1996)

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'

The exhortation to 'seek to do good to all' orients the believers toward

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 (1996)

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 ( 1996)

distinct differences in tone in 2.13-14 (where Paul had feared he had

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'

Journal for the Study of the New Testament 64 ( 1996)

remember that the initial hostility in Thessalonica was remembered as

DESILVA 'Worthy of his Kingdom'

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