Thursday, November 07, 2019

Canon and copies

If one agrees, at least in principle, with David Trobisch’s and Porter’s views of the Pauline letter collection (they agree in some ways and disagree in other ways), Paul himself was involved in the collecting and gathering of his letters as a letter collection and that he may possibly have written multiple copies of his letters. Porter posits that Paul may have made a copy for the individual or group he addresses his letters to, and then made a copy (or copies?) for himself. I think there is a high likelihood—as well as opportunity, especially given the amount of time he spent in prison—that Paul (and/or his amanuensis) did just that. I think that when Paul tells Timothy to send the parchments (2 Tim 4:13), he’s referring to his own letter collection (up to that point, of course). 

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