Though often neglected among readers of Paul's letters, his two surviving letters to the church in Thessalonica are highly valuable sources for reconstructing the theology of Paul and the history of the earliest Christian churches. First and Second Thessalonians also stand out for their intensely personal nature and provide a rare glimpse into Paul's methods of pastoral care. This practical commentary interacts with the best scholarship on the Thessalonian letters while offering fresh new ...

A bold new reading of 1 Corinthians in light of Greco-Roman philosophyThe First Letter to the Corinthians begins with Paul admonishing his addressees over their internal division and reliance on human wisdom. But what exactly occasioned Paul's warning? Many New Testament scholars have asserted that Paul disapproved of the Corinthians' infatuation with rhetoric. Yet careful exegesis of the epistle problematizes this consensus.Timothy A. Brookins unsettles comm...

Enjoy a fascinating exploration of the Greek philosophical tradition from its inception in the Classical period until the final stages of its evolution.Greek and Roman Philosophy covers:The first part of Late AntiquityPre-SocraticsClassical philosophersMajor schools of the Hellenistic period (the Stoics, Epicureans, Academics)Rise of Roman philosophyDevelopments and revivals in the post-Hellenistic period...

Previous scholarship that has examined Paul's letters in light of Greco-Roman rhetoric has focused predominantly on their argumentative strategies (inventio) and overall arrangement (dispositio). In this book Brookins turns attention to the heretofore underexplored area of style (elocutio). With complete coverage of ten of the thirteen letters in the Pauline corpus, the book evaluates these letters according to the standards of the major stylistic virtues taught in rhetorical theory: corre...

This work re-examines the divisive wisdom that Paul addresses in 1 Corinthians. Challenging the recent consensus that the Corinthians' wisdom was rooted primarily in the Greco-Roman rhetorical tradition, Timothy A. Brookins offers a revisionary thesis centered on discourse similarities between the perspective of the Corinthian 'wise' and the Stoic system of thought. Brookins argues that several members of the church, after hearing Paul's initial gospel message, construed that message in te...