312 philip l. tite
the second-person type of greeting, however, functions, as Weima
states, to express “a stronger sense of public commendation”47 for those
greeted. however, laodiceans does not specify a particular individual
or faction within the laodicean church, a specification that could have
served as a pseudepigraphic device. Instead, the greetings are passed on
from Ps.-Paul to the entire laodicean community via the entire laodicean
community. thus, from a discursive perspective Ps.-Paul underscores the
unity and positive relations that the community already enjoys. this
positive social condition is the fulfillment of v. 9 (ut eandem dilectionem
habeatis et sitis unianimes) and is the basis for Ps.-Paul’s thanksgiving in
v. 3. the addition of the osculum pacis (“kiss of peace”) certainly adds to
that stress on unity.48
the kiss becomes a focal point of social propriety, including the inverse
danger of impropriety, a point also present in lucian’s treatment of alex-
ander. thus it becomes an appropriate descriptor for distinguishing the
charlatan and the true philosopher or teacher. In laodiceans, the holy kiss
is extended to the entire community but not to the false teachers. they
are excluded from proper fellowship, as they are outside the truth and
thus the unity of the church.
the philophronetic quality of the epistolary “good-bye” is central to
laodiceans’ letter closing. this quality is further reinforced by the horta-
tory section that brings the letter closing to its finale at v. 20 (Et facite legi
[Colosensibus et] Colosensium vobis).
nearly every scholar who has commented on laodiceans points to this
final verse as the key pseudepigraphic clue to the motivation for the pro-
duction of laodiceans; that is, it serves as a reference to Col 4:16, lifting the
verse from Colossians and simply inverting the two churches.49 although
47 Weima, “sincerely, Paul,” 328.
48 Weima, “sincerely, Paul,” 331. Cf. stephen Benko, “the kiss,” in his Pagan Rome and
the Early Christians (Bloomington: Indiana university Press, 1984), 79–102, especially 98,
who holds a similar interpretation: “[the kiss] could be simply an expression of friendship
and good will, but among Christians it assumed a deeper meaning; it symbolized the unity,
the belonging together of Christians, in the church of Jesus Christ” (also cited by Weima).
Benko further notes the problems, and advantages, associated with the early Christian kiss:
“although the holy kiss gave rise to false rumors among non-Christians as well as tempta-
tions among the faithful, the church did not abandon it. the idea of the mystical union
with god was so supremely important in this rite that it overrode all other considerations.
the holy kiss maintained the unity of the church” (86).
49 on Col 4:16 and laodiceans, see especially Pink, “die Pseudo-Paulinischen Briefe II,”
especially 182: “das älteste Zeugnis für das Bestehen eines laodbr. gibt uns der hl. Paulus
selbst in der oben angeführten stelle kol. 4, 16. er spricht von einer ἐπιστολὴ ἐκ Λαοδικίας.”
Cf. kilian rudrauff (and Johannes henricus leuslerus), “exercitatio academica de epistola