1–2 Thessalonians

Florence Morgan Gillman is professor of biblical studies, coordinator of the Classical Studies Program, and former chair of the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at the University of San Diego. Following completion of the BA and MA at The Catholic University of America, she received her STL, PhD, and STD from the Katholieke Universiteit te Leuven (Belgium). The author of numerous books and articles, she is especially interested in the Pauline churches, women in early Christianity, and the world behind the text of New Testament literature.Mary Ann Beavis is professor emerita of religion and culture at St. Thomas More College (Saskatoon, Canada). She received MA degrees from the University of Manitoba and the University of Notre Dame; she holds a PhD from Cambridge University (UK). Her areas of interest and expertise include Christian origins, feminist biblical interpretation, Christianity and Goddess spirituality, and religion and popular culture. She is the author of several single-author and edited books as well as many peer-reviewed journal articles, book chapters, and book reviews. HyeRan Kim-Cragg (ThD, University of Toronto) is Lydia Gruchy Professor of Pastoral Studies at St. Andrew’s College, Saskatoon, Canada. Her academic interests include postcolonial theory, feminist theology and liturgy, anti-racist education, and intercultural ministry. Her most recent book is The Authority and Interpretation of Scripture in The United Church of Canada and her most recent articles appear in Liturgy in Postcolonial Perspectives, and Church in the Age of Migration: A Moving Body.Barbara E. Reid, general editor of the Wisdom Commentary series, is a Dominican Sister of Grand Rapids, Michigan. She is the Carroll Stuhlmueller, CP Distinguished Professor of New Testament Studies, and president emerita of Catholic Theological Union (the first woman who held the position). She has been a member of the CTU faculty since 1988 and also served as vice president and academic dean from 2009 to 2018. She holds a PhD in biblical studies from The Catholic University of America and was president of the Catholic Biblical Association in 2014–2015. Her most recent publications are Luke 1–9 and Luke 10–24, co-authored with Shelly Matthews (WCS 43A, 43B; Liturgical Press, 2021); and At the Table of Holy Wisdom: Global Hungers and Feminist Biblical Interpretation (Paulist, 2023).Mary Ann Beavis is professor emerita of religion and culture at St. Thomas More College (Saskatoon, Canada). She received MA degrees from the University of Manitoba and the University of Notre Dame; she holds a PhD from Cambridge University (UK). Her areas of interest and expertise include Christian origins, feminist biblical interpretation, Christianity and Goddess spirituality, and religion and popular culture. She is the author of several single-author and edited books as well as many peer-reviewed journal articles, book chapters, and book reviews. Maria A. Pascuzzi, CSJ, STD, teaches Scripture at the University of San Diego.

"The Wisdom Commentary is no ordinary commentary. It brings together gender, feminism, and the voices of diversity in a completely new way. Both firmly historical and methodological, this commentary on the Thessalonian correspondence combines traditional exegesis with surprising new insights to present a refreshingly new reading of these Pauline letters."Carolyn Osiek, RSCJ, Charles Fischer Professor of New Testament Emerita, Brite Divinity School

• ContentsList of Abbreviations   viiList of Contributors   ixForeword: “Come Eat of My Bread . . . and Walk in the Ways of Wisdom”   xiElisabeth Schüssler FiorenzaEditor’s Introduction to Wisdom Commentary: “She Is a Breath of the Power of God” (Wis 7:25)    xvBarbara E. Reid, OP1 ThessaloniansAcknowledgments    3Author’s Introduction: Context and Musing about Women and Thessalonica    51 Thessalonians 1   The Women and Men Who “Turned to God from Idols” (1:9)    231 Thessalonians 2   Your Abandoned Nursing Goddess Has Been Replaced    411 Thessalonians 3   Forget Demeter and Isis—Even if Most Women Rely on Them    57 1 Thessalonians 4   Exhortations for the Living and about the Dead    691 Thessalonians 5   A Warning about Coming Destruction: As Sudden and Inescapable as Labor Pains    83Afterword: Courage and Complexities in Believing in “the Gospel of God” (2:2)    952 ThessaloniansAuthors’ Introduction: Feminism, Apocalyptic, and 2 Thessalonians 1012 Thessalonians 1   Resistance and Suffering    1192 Thessalonians 2   Eschatological Birth Pangs    1412 Thessalonians 3   Idle No More    163Afterword: Finding Hope in 2 Thessalonians    1851 Thessalonians Works Cited    1872 Thessalonians Works Cited    193Index of Scripture References and Other Ancient Writings    201Index of Subjects    205