Several modern writers have dated 2 Thessalonians earlier than 1 Thessalonians. The grounds for this view are the references in this Epistle to the teaching lately given by St. Paul while at Thessalonica. But although these references would be natural in any Epistle written first after his departure from that place, they do not necessarily imply that 2 Thessalonians was the first. Moreover, ii. 2 probably contains a reference to the First Epistle, and this letter was apparently written to clear up a difficulty which the First Epistle did not solve. Persecution had continued at Thessalonica, and higher excitement and wider confusion prevailed. The Thessalonians were more sure than ever that Christ's advent was coming immediately, on the strength, perhaps, of some words in St. Paul's earlier letter to them, {131} supported by a forged letter which pretended to be his and by feigned revelations. The result was entire neglect of daily duties. "There is no reason," men said, "why I should work for my living or try to be provident, because the Lord is sure to come to-day or to-morrow." As the circumstances are so similar to those in the First Epistle, and as Silvanus (otherwise Silas) and Timothy are still with the apostle, we may be sure that 2 Thessalonians was written during St. Paul's first stay at Corinth. [Sidenote: Character and Contents.] The Epistle consists of instruction and exhortation. The most characteristic passage is ii. 1-12. The apostle declares that he never taught that the day of the Lord is about to dawn immediately (ii. 2). It must be preceded by several events. There will be an apostasy, the revelation of "the man of sin, the son of perdition," who will assume equality with God and sit in the temple of God. Over against this "man of sin" we find placed "one that restraineth now." Many strange interpretations of these two phrases have been devised, and the fancy of commentators has ranged over various historical monsters from Mohammed to Napoleon Bonaparte. One favourite idea is that the description of the man of sin "setting himself forth as God" refers to the worship offered to the Roman emperors, and to the attempt made by Caligula in A.D. 39 to place his statue in the temple at Jerusalem. But it seems far better to regard the man of sin as hostile Judaism, personified in an Antichrist who pretends to be the representative of God foretold in Mal. iii. 1. The other force which St. Paul personifies is the curbing power of a strong government as then seen in the administrative system of the Roman empire. The power of Rome protected him against Jewish fanaticism at this period (Acts xix. 35-41; xxii. 22-29), but in this truly irreligious fanaticism he discerned a latent mysterious evil (ii. 7) which would afterwards reveal itself in hideous excesses. While "the man of sin," or {132} "wicked one," thus wreaks his will, Christ will come and consume him with the breath of His mouth.