'In every letter'? Some possible evidence for the authorship of Epehesians

Conference item

A neglected passage in Ignatius of Antioch may be significant evidence for Pauline authorship of Ephesians. Ignatius of Antioch writes to the Ephesians that Paul remembers them ἐν πάσῃ ἐπιστολῇ. This has generally been translated ‘in every letter’. I submit however that it should actually be rendered ‘in a whole letter’ and that this whole letter is the canonical letter to the Ephesians. The general rule for this πᾶςconstruction suggests that my proposed reading is wrong, but there are a number of relevant exceptions to this general rule. It is also implausible that Ignatius intended the meaning ‘in every letter’, since Paul rarely mentions the Ephesians in his writings. Foster identifies references to Ephesus or the Ephesians in four letters in the Pauline corpus and argues that Ignatius is referring to these four letters. I argue that Ignatius cannot be alluding to the references identified by Foster, since these references are mostly negative. Other scholars suggest that Ignatius is exaggerating. I argue that my proposed reading is a more plausible exaggeration, since, on my reading, Ignatius genuinely thought that Paul had written an entire letter to the Ephesians, even though Paul does not ‘remember’ specific details of their life. I argue that Ignatius is likely to have known the canonical letter to the Ephesians, because he seems to allude to it. I also argue that he is likely to have known it as a letter to the Ephesians, since he must have been able to distinguish it by name from the other letters of Paul with which he was clearly familiar. I thus suggest that this passage in Ignatius’ letter to the Ephesians is an early ascription of the New Testament Ephesian letter to Paul.

Authors: Dormandy, M

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Peeters Publishers
• Host title: Studia Patristica. Vol. C - Including Papers Presented at the Sixth British Patristics Conference, Birmingham, 5-7 September 2016
• Pages: 39-50
• Series: Studia Patristica
• Series number: 100
• Publication date: 2020-05-19
• Acceptance date: 2017-03-13
• Event title: Sixth British Patristics Conference
• Event location: Birmingham, UK
• Event website: http://cal-itsee.bham.ac.uk/itseeweb/conferences/britishpatristics2016/
• Event start date: 2016-09-05
• Event end date: 2016-09-07
• EISBN: 9789042940420
• ISBN: 9789042940413
• Language: English
• Keywords: FFR