Now that I’ve given a 50-word summary of the book of 2 Corinthians and a fuller discussion of its contents “in a nutshell,” I can turn to the questions of “Who, When, and Why.”
As with Romans and 1 Corinthians there is not a lot of debate about who wrote the letter: it is one of Paul’s undisputed epistles and there are no real doubts about its authorship among the majority of critical scholars
As to when: the letter dates to some time not long after 1 Corinthians – maybe a matter of months? And so it too is usually dated to the mid 50s.
But the issue is complicated by the fact that we appear to have at least two letters that have been spliced together, and these were written at different times. They were written for very different reasons. And so to make sense of the “why” of 2 Corinthians, I’ve decided to give the play-by-play of the sequence of events that we can reconstruct of Paul’s history of the community – from the time he founded it to the time of his final surviving letter (or at least the final fragment embedded in 2 Cor. 1-9).
I am taking this from my textbook, The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings.
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The History of Paul’s Relationship with the Corinthian Community
We can map out the history of Paul’s interaction with the Corinthians in terms of a sequence of visits and letters. There is, of course, a good deal of information that we do not have, but what we do have, including the bits and pieces that come from 1 Corinthians, falls out along the following lines.
Paul’s First Visit. This was when Paul and Silvanus and Timothy first arrived in Corinth, set up shop, preached the gospel, won a number of converts, and provided them with some rudimentary instruction before leaving for other areas ripe for the mission (2 Cor 1:19).
Paul’s First Letter. Paul evidently wrote a letter to the Corinthians that has been lost. He refers to it in 1 Corinthians 5:9. It appears to have dealt, at least in part, with ethical issues that had arisen in the community.
The Corinthians’ First Letter to Paul. Some of the Corinthians, either in response to Paul’s first letter or independently of it, wrote Paul to inquire further about ethical matters—for example, about whether Christians should have sex with their spouses (1 Cor 7:1).
Paul’s Second Letter: 1 Corinthians. In response to the Corinthians’ queries and in reaction to information that he received from “Chloe’s people,” Paul wrote 1 Corinthians from Ephesus. In it he announced his plans to travel through Macedonia south to Corinth, where he hoped to spend the winter (1 Cor 16:5–7). He apparently sent the letter back with Stephanas and his two companions, who were members of the Corinthian church (1 Cor 16:15–17).
Paul’s Second Visit. In 2 Corinthians 2:1–4, Paul indicates that he does not want to make “another” painful visit; this suggests that his most recent visit had been painful. It appears, then, that after the writing of 1 Corinthians, Paul fulfilled his promise to come to Corinth for a second time. But he was not well received. Someone in the congregation did something to cause him pain and possibly public humiliation (2 Cor 2:5–11). He left, uttering dire threats that he would return in judgment against them (2 Cor 13:2).
The Arrival of the Superapostles. Either prior to Paul’s departure or soon thereafter, other apostles of Christ arrived in town, claiming to be true spokespersons of the gospel. These “superapostles” (as Paul calls them; 2 Cor 11:5) were of Jewish ancestry (11:22) and appear to have appealed precisely to that aspect of the Corinthians’ views that Paul found most repugnant: their notion that life in Christ was already an exalted, glorified existence. For these superapostles, it was; that was why they could do the spectacular deeds that established their credentials as apostles. Clearly they and Paul did not see eye to eye. At some point the attacks became personal: the superapostles evidently maligned Paul for his clear lack of power and charismatic presence (“his bodily presence is weak and his speech contemptible”; 10:10); he in turn claimed that they were ministers of Satan rather than apostles of Christ (11:13–15). Paul argued that his gospel message would be totally compromised if the Corinthians accepted the claims of his opponents (11:4).
Paul’s Third Letter (the “Painful” Letter, Partly Embodied in 2 Corinthians 10–13). After his second visit, Paul wrote a letter in which he went on the attack against the superapostles. He continued to insist that the life of the believer is not the glorified, exalted existence that Christ presently enjoys. Believers live in an age of evil and suffering in which God’s enemy Satan is still active and in control. Those who boast of their power and wisdom do not understand that the end has not yet come, that this is an age of weakness in which God’s wisdom appears foolish. Apostles, in particular, suffer in this age, since they are the chief opponents of the cosmic powers of evil who are in charge (11:20–31). Even though apostles may have had a glimpse of the glory to come (12:1–4), they are still subject to pain and suffering, which keeps them from boasting of their own merits and forces them to rely totally on the grace of God for what they can accomplish (12:5–10). In light of these criteria, the superapostles are not apostles at all. Paul also used this letter to attack the person who had publicly humiliated him and to warn the congregation to deal with him prior to his arrival in judgment, for Paul himself would not be lenient when he came (13:1–2).
Part of this letter, principally the part that deals with the superapostles, is found in what is now 2 Corinthians 10–13. The letter was sent with Paul’s companion Titus, and it evidently had its desired effect. The Corinthians punished the one who had insulted Paul (2 Cor 2:5–11), repented of the pain they had caused him, and returned to his fold (2 Cor 7:5–12). Paul in the meantime canceled his plan to make another visit to the congregation (2 Cor 1:15–2:2).
Paul’s Fourth Letter (the “Conciliatory” Letter, Partly Embodied in 2 Corinthians 1–9). After hearing the good news from Titus, Paul wrote a friendly letter to express his pleasure at the Corinthians’ change of heart (2 Cor 2:5–11, 7:5–16). He also wanted to explain why he had not come for another visit, to assure them that he was not simply being fickle in making and revising his plans (1:15–2:4). Part of this letter (without, at least, its closing) is found in 2 Corinthians 1–9, or possibly only chapters 1–7, since some scholars think that chapters 8–9 are part of another letter, or possibly even two letters
After someone edited the two (or three or four or five) letters into the one book that we call 2 Corinthians, we lose sight of Paul’s relationship with this congregation. Thus, we can never know whether all the problems were solved, or whether any more stormy incidents occurred. Nor can we determine whether the Corinthians decided to adopt Paul’s point of view and reject the perspectives brought in by others from the outside.
Clearly, however, the basic message that Paul tried to convey in 1 Corinthians is very much in evidence in the collection of letters we are investigating here. Consider first the fragment of the “painful letter” (2 Cor 10–13), written in part to address the claims of superiority made by the superapostles. Rather than simply attacking them on their own terms, for example, by arguing that he could do better miracles than they, Paul dismisses their very grounds for considering themselves apostles. This is reminiscent of the way he treated the leaders of the divisive factions in 1 Corinthians 1–4, where he denies that earthly wisdom and power are signs of the divine. For him, the credentials of an apostle are not the glorious acts that he or she can perform, as if this were an age of exaltation and splendor. The true apostle will suffer, much as Christ suffered. The end has not yet come, and those who rely on spectacular acts of power must be suspected of collusion with the cosmic forces that are in charge of this age, namely, Satan and his vile servants (11:12–15).
This is why Paul goes to such lengths to “boast in his weaknesses” in this letter (2 Cor 12:5), principally by detailing all the ways that he has suffered as Christ’s apostle (11:17–33). It may not seem like much to boast about—being beaten up regularly, living in constant danger and in fear for one’s life—but for Paul, these are signs that he is the true apostle of Christ, who himself suffered the ignominious fate of crucifixion. In particular, Paul claims that God has kept him weak so that he would be unable to boast about any work that he himself has performed. Anything good that comes of his ministry has necessarily been performed by God (12:6–10). The same cannot be said of the superapostles.
Paul’s apocalyptic message stresses in the strongest terms that believers are not yet glorified with Christ. They live in a world of sin and evil and must contend with forces greater than themselves, until the end comes and Christ’s followers are raised into immortal bodies to be exalted with him. For reasons that are ultimately unknown, the Corinthians came to agree with Paul on precisely this point. It is hard to imagine what changed their minds. Was Paul (or his representative Titus) simply too persuasive to refute? Were the superapostles discredited in some other way? We will never know.
We do know that after their reconciliation, Paul wrote another letter in which, along with his gratitude for the church’s change of heart, he expressed in somewhat more subdued fashion his basically apocalyptic view of life in this world. He begins the letter, now embodied in 2 Corinthians 1–9 (or 1–7), by stressing his own suffering and the grace of God that was manifest through it (1:3–11). This is to some extent the message of the entire epistle. The gospel is an invaluable treasure, even though it has not been fully manifested in this age of pain and suffering. The body has not yet been glorified, and believers are not yet exalted. As a result, “we have this treasure in clay jars” (4:7). Believers themselves are lowly and their bodies of little worth, but the gospel message that they proclaim is a treasure for the ages. As Paul puts it later, in the body the believer groans, longing to be clothed with a heavenly, glorified body (5:1–10). The present age is therefore one of suffering and of longing for a better age to come.