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1Th_5:27. This command has not its reason in any distrust of the rulers of the church; nor, as Chrysostom, Oecumenius, and Theophylact think, in the yearning love of the apostle, who, in compensation of his bodily absence, wished this letter read to all; nor, as Hofmann supposes, in the anxiety of the apostle lest they should not properly value a mere epistle which he sent, instead of coming in person to Thessalonica: but simply because Paul regarded the contents of his Epistle of importance for all without exception. How, moreover, Schrader can infer from 1Th_5:27 that the composition of the Epistle belongs to a time when already a clerus presided in the churches, surpasses comprehension. Completely groundless and untenable is also Baur’s opinion (p. 491), that “the admonition so emphatically given in 1Th_5:27 was written from the opinions of a time which no longer saw in the apostolic Epistles the natural means of spiritual communication, but regarded them as sacred objects, to which due reverence was to be shown by making their contents known as accurately as possible, particularly by public reading. How could the apostle himself have judged it necessary so solemnly to adjure the churches, to which his Epistles were directed, not to leave them unread? An author could only say this who did not write from the natural pressure of existing circumstances, but in writing placed himself in an imagined situation, and sought to vindicate for his pretended apostolic Epistle the consideration which the apostolic Epistles received in the practice of a later age.” But does the author adjure the church to leave his Epistle not unread? What a mighty difference is there between such a command and his urgent desire that the contents of the Epistle should be made known to all the members of the church! If the former were objectionable, the latter is natural and unobjectionable. And further, how is it possible that 1Th_5:27 is the reflex of a time in which the apostolic Epistles were valued as sacred objects, and to which due honour must be paid by public reading, since ἀναγυωσθῆναι is in the aorist, and accordingly a single and exclusive act of reading is referred to! And what a wrong method would the post-apostolic author have employed to secure for his letter the consideration of an apostolic Epistle, when he did not select the infinitive of the present, and did not fail to add πασῖν !
τὸν κύριον ] Comp. Mar_5:7; Act_19:13; LXX. Gen_24:3. See Matthiae, p. 756. On the Greek idiom ἐνορκίζω , see Lobeck, ad Phryn. p. 360 ff.
ἀναγνωσθῆναι ] that it be read to (Luk_4:16; 2Co_3:15; Col_4:16), not that it be read by. Incorrectly also Michaelis, appealing to 2Th_2:2 (!): there is here intended the recognition of the Epistle as a genuine Pauline Epistle, by means of a conclusion added by his own hand.
τὴν ἐπιστολήν ] comp. Rom_16:22; Col_4:16.
πᾶσιν τοῖς ἀδελφοῖς ] to the whole of the brethren, sc. in Thessalonica; not also in all Macedonia (Bengel, Flatt); still less also in neighbouring Asia (Grotius), or even the churches of all Christendom (Seb. Schmid).