Passage

2 Thessalonians 2.1

Book: 2 Thessalonians · ASV / WEB / KJV / YLT

Immediate context (±2 verses)

ASV

1. Now we beseech you, brethren, touching the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and our gathering together unto him;

to the end that ye be not quickly shaken from your mind, nor yet be troubled, either by spirit, or by word, or by epistle as from us, as that the day of the Lord is just at hand; 3. let no man beguile you in any wise: for it will not be, except the falling away come first, and the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition, (2 Thessalonians 2:1-3, ASV)

WEB

1. Now, brothers, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and our gathering together to him, we ask you

not to be quickly shaken in your mind, nor yet be troubled, either by spirit, or by word, or by letter as from us, saying that the day of Christ had come. 3. Let no one deceive you in any way. For it will not be, unless the departure comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of destruction, (2 Thessalonians 2:1-3, WEB)

KJV

1. Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, ^{unto him: or, around him}

That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. 3. Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; (2 Thessalonians 2:1-3, KJV)

YLT

1. And we ask you, brethren, in regard to the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of our gathering together unto him,

that ye be not quickly shaken in mind, nor be troubled, neither through spirit, neither through word, neither through letters as through us, as that the day of Christ hath arrived; 3. let not any one deceive you in any manner, because, if the falling away may not come first, and the man of sin be revealed, the son of the destruction, (2 Thessalonians 2:1-3, YLT)

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Setting

Speaker: Paul the Apostle, turning from thanksgiving to the correction that occasioned the letter.
Audience: The church at Thessalonica, capital of the Roman province of Macedonia and a free city on the Via Egnatia. Paul had planted the congregation only months earlier (Acts 17:1-9) and left the city under duress; the believers were still under local pressure, and had been unsettled by a report that the day of the Lord had already arrived (2:2).
Location: Most probably Corinth, where Silvanus and Timothy were with Paul (Acts 18:5), written shortly after 1 Thessalonians.
Time period: c. AD 50-52. The date is anchored by the Gallio inscription at Delphi, which places the proconsulship of Achaia held by Gallio (Acts 18:12) at roughly AD 51-52.

Theological reading

Two events, one article. Paul writes "concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to him." In Greek a single article governs both nouns, which binds the parousia and the episynagoge into one complex event rather than two separable ones. Any reading that separates the gathering from the coming by an interval has to account for the grammar here.

Episynagoge. The noun occurs only twice in the New Testament, here and at Hebrews 10:25, where it names the assembling of believers for worship. The word is built from the same root as "synagogue." Paul is describing the final assembly as the completion of what the church already does weekly.

"We ask you, brothers." The verb is a request rather than a command. Paul is about to correct a serious error, and he begins by asking. The tone belongs with the affection of chapter 1 and is worth noticing before reading the sharper language that follows.

The verse sets the subject, not the answer. Everything from 2:2 to 2:12 is Paul answering the question this verse names. Reading any later verse in the chapter without this heading tends to produce a free-floating apocalyptic timetable, which is the opposite of what the passage is for.

Key words

Theologically-loaded Greek or Hebrew words in this verse may have entries in the lexicon. Curated to roughly 100 contested terms across the corpus, not every word; see Lexicon Roadmap.

G3952 - parousia, parousia, Strong's G3952
G5547 - christos, christos, Strong's G5547
G2962 - kyrios, kyrios, Strong's G2962
G2424 - Iesous, Iesous, Strong's G2424

Quoted in

Concepts:

Lexicon:

G3952 - parousia

Why these four translations

ris3n chose ASV, WEB, KJV, and YLT for two reasons together. They are the most literal English translations available (formal-equivalence: word-for-word renderings that preserve the Hebrew and Greek grammar rather than smoothing it into modern dynamic-equivalence idiom). And they are in the public domain in the United States, which means fair-use quotation at any length requires no publisher license. Modern licensed translations (NASB95, ESV, NIV) restrict volume of quotation under their copyright terms, so they are not used at stub-level coverage here. NASB95 appears only on hand-curated rich passage hubs under Lockman Foundation's fair-use allowance.

The four:

ASV (American Standard Version, 1901). The basis of the modern critical-text English tradition.
WEB (World English Bible, contemporary). Public-domain revision in the ASV line, in current English.
KJV (King James Version, 1611). Reformation-era, Textus Receptus base.
YLT (Young's Literal Translation, Robert Young, 1862). Hyper-literal preservation of Hebrew and Greek grammar; useful for word-study work even where English reads stiff.

See Bibles for the full per-translation history, translators, textual basis, strengths, and weaknesses.