dusting off a pseudo-historical letter 291
and third, the letter is unworthy of scholarly attention. only when the
letter is perceived as holding derivative value for another research focus
has laodiceans been given serious attention.4 In this essay, I would like
to challenge this scholarly consensus, arguing that the letter does have a
[1987]), 31; Collins, Letters That Paul Did Not Write: The Epistle to the Hebrews and The
Pauline Pseudepigrapha (good news studies 28; Wilmington, de: Michael glazier, 1988),
150; adolf Jülicher, An Introduction to the New Testament (trans. Janet Penrose Ward; lon-
don: smith, elder & Co., 1904), 544; John eadie, A Commentary on the Greek Text of the
Epistle of Paul to the Ephesians (2nd ed.; new york: robert Carter and Brothers, 1861), xxiv;
M. r. James, New Testament Apocrypha (oxford: Clarendon, 1924; repr., Berkeley, Ca:
apocryphile Press, 2004), 478; Wilhelm schneemelcher, New Testament Apocrypha. Vol-
ume 2: Writings Relating to the Apostles; Apocalypses and Related Subjects (rev. ed.; trans.
r. Mcl. Wilson; louisville: Westminster John knox Press/Cambridge: James Clarke, 1992),
- Mackay, “Content and style,” 226, recognizes the irony of laodiceans’ use of Paul’s
letters: “Whereas 3 Corinthians was suspect because it contained too many non-Pauline
words and constructions, laodiceans is at the other extreme. here everything is a quote
from Paul; the epistle is more Pauline than Paul.”
4 such derivative value is found in gregory s. Magee, “exalted apostle: the Portrayal
of Paul in Colossians and ephesians” (unpublished Phd diss., trinity evangelical divinity
school, 2009), esp. 120–31; régis Burnet, “Pourquoi avoir écrit l’insipide épître aux laodi-
céens?” NTS 48 (2002): 132–41; James a. kelhoffer, Miracle and Mission: The Authentication
of Missionaries and their Message in the Longer Ending of Mark (Wunt 2.112; tübingen:
J. C. B. Mohr, 2000), 150–51; the exchange between Philip sellew (“Laodiceans and the
Philippians fragments hypothesis,” HTR 87 [1994]: 17–28; “Laodiceans and Philippians
revisited: a response to Paul holloway,” HTR 91 [1998]: 327–29) and Paul a. holloway
(“the apocryphal Epistle to the Laodiceans and the Partitioning of Philippians,” HTR 91
[1998]: 321–25; Consolation in Philippians: Philosophical Sources and Rhetorical Strategy
[Cambridge: Cambridge university Press, 2001], 9–11), and most significantly the Marcion-
ite hypothesis articulated by harnack, Apocrypha; harnack, Marcion, das Evangelium vom
fremden Gott (2nd ed.; leipzig, 1924, esp. appendix 3; et: Marcion: The Gospel of the Alien
God [trans. John e. steely and lyle d. Bierma; durham, nC: labyrinth Press, 1990], though
lacking the appendices). harnack’s reading found support with gilles Quispel, “de Brief
aan de laodicensen een Marcionitische vervalsing,” Nederlands Theologisch Tijdschrift 5
(1950–1951): 43–46 (et: “the epistle to the laodiceans: a Marcionite forgery,” in Johannes
van oort [ed.], Gnostica, Judaica, Catholica: Collected Essays of Gilles Quispel [nhMs 55;
leiden: Brill, 2008], 689–93); and dmitri obolensky, The Bogomils: A Study in Balkan Neo-
Manichaeism (Cambridge: Cambridge university Press, 1948), 39, 47. the additional note
by Quispel to the english translation of his article indicates that he continued to hold his
reading of laodiceans to the end of his life, though with an added view that laodiceans
may have contended with the Pastoral epistles or the views on the church expressed in
the Pastorals (693). note also the alternative understandings of a Marcionite connection
in Bart ehrman, Lost Scriptures: Books that Did Not Make it into the New Testament (oxford:
oxford university Press, 2003), 165, and repeated in ehrman, Lost Christianities: The Battles
for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew (oxford: oxford university Press, 2003), xiii,
213–15; donald n. Penny, “the Pseudo-Pauline letters of the first two Centuries” (unpub-
lished Ph.d. diss., emory university, 1979), 330; karl Pink, “die Pseudo-Paulinischen Briefe
II: (2) der laodizenerbrief,” Biblica 6 (1925): 179–93, see 192; firpo, Apocrifi del Nuovo Testa-
mento, 1722; and Blackman, Marcion and His Influence, 62. harnack’s hypothesis, however,
has found little support in scholarship due to the lack of clearly definable Marcionite ele-
ments in the letter as well as problems with using the Muratorian Canon and the Church
fathers to make such a claim.