INTRODUCTION

Given that Paul's thought was shaped in substantial degree by its Jewish context, to what extent is the same true of the Deutero-Pauline letters? Is a continuity visible between Paul and the Deutero-Paulines in their interaction with distinctively Jewish contexts? How do the Deutero-Paulines stand, for example, in relation to what I have elsewhere called ‘the four pillars of Judaism’ (monotheism, election, torah, temple) (Dunn 1991, ch. 2). Do they show similar dependence on Jewish categories and principles? Are they themselves properly to be described as ‘Jewish’? Alternatively expressed, is the dialogue with Paul's Jewish heritage as lively in the Deutero-Paulines as most explicitly in Galatians and Romans and more implicitly in other undisputed Paulines?

I have already offered a partial answer by noting the surprising lack of anti-Jewish features in these letters (Dunn 1993, pp. 151–65) – nothing parallel, for example, to 1 Thess. 2.14–16, Gal. 5.12, Rom. 5.20 or Phil. 3.2. But what of more positive influences? Or is it rather the case that the Deutero-Paulines bear testimony to the influence of Jewish context waning, to an interaction which now belongs to the past, with new and different agendas demanding attention? Of course, we must not assume a common authorship of the Deutero- Paulines or a consistency of Jewish influence (positive or negative) among them. At the same time, if that influence varies it may provide some further indication of changing circumstances and contexts.