Author:

Keywords:

comfort, New Testament, Letters of Paul, 2 Corinthians, St. Paul, Arts & Humanities, Religion, 2204 Religion and Religious Studies, 5004 Religious studies, 5005 Theology

Abstract:

In recent ethical discussion, comfort/consolation was discovered as an important ethical theme. In this article, we shall investigate this question in the letters of Paul, with special attention to 2 Corinthians. We first give an overview of the usage of παρακαλέω/παράκλησις and of the semantic field of comfort in the letters of Paul and in 2 Corinthians in particular. In a second step we study the LXX background Paul may have been indebted to, especially Deutero- and Trito-Isaiah, and investigate the implications for 2 Corinthians.