The Apocryphal Epistle to the Laodiceans: An Epistolary and Rhetorical Analysis (Texts and Editions for New Testament Study)

Challenging nearly two centuries of scholarship, this book offers the first close analysis of the apocryphal epistle to the Laodiceans. A near consensus in scholarship has emerged in which Laodiceans is dismissed as a random collection of phrases plucked from the undisputed Pauline letters, which lacks any organizational structure or theological sophistication. In The Apocryphal Epistle to the Laodiceans, Philip Tite offers a detailed analysis of this Latin letter by exploring the epistolary conventions utilized by the letter writer. What emerges is a pseudonymous text that is a carefully crafted paraenetic letter with a discernible rhetorical situation. By highlighting Laodiceans use of Paul as a literary culture hero, Tite situates the letter within second-century Christian identity formation. Introduction -- Epistolary Analysis I : The Prescript -- Epistolary Analysis Ii : The Thanksgiving Period -- Epistolary Analysis Iii : The Letter Body -- Epistolary Analysis Iv : The Paraenesis -- Epistolary Analysis V : The Letter Closing -- A Theological Synthesis Of Laodiceans -- Concluding Comments. By Philip L. Tite. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [135]-146) And Index. Challenging nearly two centuries of scholarship, The Apocryphal Epistle to the Laodiceans offers the first close analysis of Laodiceans. Philip Tite offers a detailed study of this Latin letter by exploring the epistolary conventions utilized by the letter writer.