1 Thessalonians 4:15

1 Thessalonians 4:15 . For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord — By a particular revelation from him. No words, as Dr. Doddridge observes, can more plainly assert that, in what follows, the apostle declares precisely what God revealed to him, and consequently that there can be no room for any such interpretation of this passage, as supposed him to be at all mistaken in any circumstance of the account he gives. That we who are alive and remain — This manner of speaking intimates the fewness of those who will be then alive, compared with the multitude of the dead. It is well observed, says Whitby, by the Greek scholiasts, that the apostle speaks these words, not of himself, but of the Christians that should be found alive at the second coming of Christ: so Chrysostom, Theodoret, Œcumenius, and Theophylact; for he well knew that he was not to live till the resurrection: yea, he himself expected a resurrection, saying to the Corinthians, He that raised up the Lord Jesus, shall raise up us also by Jesus, and present us with you, 2 Corinthians 4:14 . He laboured that he might attain to the resurrection of the dead, Php 3:11 . Yet some divines have inferred, from this and some other places in the epistles, that the apostles themselves thought and taught, that they might live until the second coming of Christ; and that St. Paul afterward changed his opinion on this subject, and admonished the Thessalonians of it, 2 Thessalonians 2:2-6 .

But this certainly is a dangerous mistake, and highly prejudicial to the authority of the apostles, and therefore to the Christian faith. Indeed, if the churches of Christ had once received this doctrine from them, and afterward had understood, even from their own confession, that it was a mistake, this would naturally have led them to conceive that the apostles might have been mistaken also in any other doctrine, and to suspect the truth of all that was contained in their epistles. This the apostle seems to insinuate, 2 Thessalonians 2:1-2 . But that this apostle taught no such doctrine in either of his epistles to the Thessalonians, will be exceeding evident, 1st, From the following words in that chapter, 1 Thessalonians 4:3 , Let no man deceive you by any means, declaring them deceivers who either taught this doctrine, or imposed it on them as taught by the apostles; and also having said, in opposition to such an opinion, that day was not to come till there was a falling away first, adding, Remember you not that when I was yet with you I told you these things?

1 Thessalonians 4:15 . Ὑμῖν ) To you, who are worthy of knowing this.— λέγομεν ἐν λόγῳ Κυρίου , we say by the word of the Lord ) The Lord, the Christ, has spoken to us; we have spoken to you: comp. 1 Kings 20:35 , בדבר יהוה , ἐν λόγῳ Κυρίου , by the word of the Lord. Phrases such as these are used in respect of a matter which is now for the first time opened up (disclosed), [Many matters connected with an altogether extraordinary subject, which would be in vain sought for elsewhere, are here discussed.—V. g.]— ἡμεῖς , we) The saints, by speaking thus in their own age, have greatly added to the obligation resting on those of following ages to look for the Lord. The we is presently explained by the following words, who are alive, and further on, who remain.— οἱ ζῶντες οἱ περιλειπόμενοι , who live, who remain [who live, surviving]) So also 1 Thessalonians 4:17 . This is equivalent to an apposition. Who live, is an antithesis to, who sleep. There is at the same time intimated the small number of those who live, compared with the multitude of the dead; likewise the good condition of those who are asleep, so that the living may desire to be gathered to them.

Men of all ages conjointly have a lively anticipation of [realize to themselves the immediate fulfilment of] some one thing;[20] and so believers, who are now long waiting, and who regard themselves in the light of persons who are to live at the coming of the Lord, have spoken in accordance with this their character (spake in the manner that became the character they represented, viz. those who shall be alive at the Lord’s coming). Those who live , and those who remain till the coming of the Lord , are the same, and these are denoted by the pronoun we . Each generation, which lives at this or that time, occupies, during that period of their life, the place of those who are to live at the time of the coming of the Lord.[21] So the we is put here, as elsewhere the names Cajus and Titius ,[22] and that, too, with the greater propriety, because believers of that age [ i.e. of each successive past age] have not yet been allowed distinctly to know the vast period of time to elapse till the end of the world. The present tense in both participles is in reference to [ i.e. in order to suit] the coming of the Lord itself, as in Acts 10:42 [ παρήγγειλεν κηρῦξαι ὅτι αὐτός ἐστιν ], and elsewhere frequently. Hence Paul has not hereby asserted that the day of Christ is so near; see 2 Thessalonians 2:2-3 .

{13} For this we say unto you by the {f} word of the Lord, that {g} we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. (13) The manner of the resurrection will be in this way: the bodies of the dead will be as it were raised out of sleep at the sound of the trumpet of God. Christ himself will descend from heaven. The saints (for he is referring to them) who will then be found alive, together with the dead who will rise, will be taken up into the clouds to meet the Lord, and will be in perpetual glory with him. (f) In the name of the Lord, as though he himself spoke to you. (g) He speaks of these things, as though he should be one of those whom the Lord will find alive at his coming, because the time of his coming is uncertain: and therefore every one of us ought to be in such a readiness, as if the Lord were coming at any moment.

1 Thessalonians 4:15 . κυρίου . On the tendency of the N.T. writers to reserve κύριος , with its O.T. predicates of divine authority, for Jesus, cf. Kattenbusch, op. cit. , ii. 522. Paul’s use of the term goes back to Christ’s own claim to κύριος in the higher sense of Mark 12:35 f.— λέγομεν . Contrast the οἴδατε of 1 Thessalonians 5:2 and the language of 1 Thessalonians 4:1 . Evidently Paul had not had time or occasion to speak of such a contingency, when he was with them.— ἐν λόγῳ κυρίου may mean either ( a ) a quotation (like Acts 20:35 ) from the sayings of Jesus, or ( b ) a prophetic revelation vouchsafed to Paul himself, or to Silvanus ( cf. Acts 15:32 ). In the former case (so, among modern editors, Schott, Ewald, Drummond, Wohl.), an ἄγραφον is cited (Calvin, Koch, Weizsäcker, Resch, Paulinismus , 238 f.; Ropes, die Sprüche Jesu , 153 f.; M. Goguel; van der Vies, 15–17; O. Holtzmann, Life of Jesus , 10; von Soden) but it is evidently given in a free form, and the precise words cannot (even in 1 Thessalonians 4:16 ) be disentangled. Besides we should expect τινι to be added. Unless, therefore, we are to think of a primitive collection (Lake, Amer. Journ. Theol. , 1906, 108 f.) or of some oral tradition, ( b ) is preferable.

The contents of Matthew 24:31 (part of the small apocalypse) are too dissimilar to favour the conjecture (Pelt, Zimmer, Weiss) that Paul was thinking of this saying as current perhaps in oral tradition, and the O.T. analogy of λόγος Κυρίου (= God’s prophetic word), together with the internal probabilities of the case (Paul does not remind them of it, as elsewhere in the epistle) make it on the whole more likely that Paul is repeating words heard in a vision ( cf. 2 Corinthians 12:9 ; so Chryst., Theod., etc., followed by Alford, de Wette, Ellicott, Dods, Lünemann, Godet, Paret: Paulus und Jesus , 53 f., Simon: die Psychologie des Ap. Paulus , 100, Findlay, Lightfoot, Milligan, Lueken). Cf. the discussion in Knowling’s Witness of the Epistles , 408 f., and Feine’s Jesus Christus u. Paulus , 178, 179. Later in the century a similar difficulty vexed the pious Jew who wrote Fourth Esdras (5:41, 42: I said, But lo, O Lord, thou hast made the promise to those who shall be in the end: and what shall they do that have been before us …? And He said to me, I will liken my judgment to a ring; as there is no slackness of those who are last, so shall there be no swiftness of those who are first ). His theory is that the previous generations of Israel will be as well off as their posterity in the latter days.

By the word of the Lord (ἐν λόγῳ κυρίου) Or in the word. Λόγος of a concrete saying, Romans 9:9; Romans 13:9. We do not say this on our own authority. Comp. 1 Corinthians 7:10, 1 Corinthians 7:12, 1 Corinthians 7:25. No recorded saying of the Lord answers to this reference. It may refer to a saying transmitted orally, or to a direct revelation to Paul. Comp. Galatians 1:12; Galatians 2:2; Ephesians 3:3; 2 Corinthians 12:1, 2 Corinthians 12:9. Remain (περιλειπόμενοι) Po. and only in this Epistle. The plural we indicates that Paul himself expected to be alive at the parousia. Shall not prevent (οὐ μὴ φθάσωμεν) The A.V. misses the force of the double negative - shall in no wise prevent. Prevent in the older sense of anticipate, be beforehand with. See on Matthew 17:25, and see on 1 Thessalonians 2:16. The living shall not share the blessings of the advent sooner than the dead in Christ.